The 5 GENDERS of SLAVIC LANGUAGES ant Their Little Secrets

[@phmagnabosc0]

Super interesting! I really like the panslavic perspective on this. Many thanks. What I find fascinating is that the distinction between sub-genders of masculine is not just that 'animate' nouns or 'human" plural nouns have a separate form. That would just be a different noun declension paradigm. But this also extends to adjectives and pronouns, who have different forms depending on whether they agree with e.g. human masculine plural 'szal*eni* chłopacy' (crazy guys) or 'nonhuman masculine plural' szal*one* psy' (crazy dogs). Therefore, they are indeed separate agreement categories, and therefore actual genders, not just alternative noun declensions.

[@Rozum-Razum_Slavic-linguistics]

Thank you! I'm glad you liked the video! I try to keep in mind the big picture in everything I do! You're totally right to say it's not only about the nouns, your example shows it very well!

[@Rozum-Razum_Slavic-linguistics]

A PROPOS DES AUTRES LANGUES SLAVES - ABOUT OTHER SLAVIC LANGUAGES (below) Les choses fonctionnent de façon similaire dans les autres langues slaves, mais il y a tout de même des différences, et voici quelques informations supplémentaires et particularités sur ces langues : 🔶Langues faisant la distinction animé - inanimé non seulement au masculin, mais aussi au féminin et parfois au neutre : langues slaves de l'est : 🔹Langues slaves de l'est (non abordées dans la vidéo) : - russe et ruthène : la distinction animé et inanimé se fait principalement au masculin, de la façon décrite dans la vidéo, mais également au féminin, à l'accusatif pluriel uniquement - biélorusse, ukrainien : la distinction animé et animé se fait, comme en russe, principalement au masculin, de la façon décrite dans la vidéo, mais également au féminin et au neutre, à l'accusatif pluriel uniquement (acc. pl. = gen. pl). Les noms neutres qualifiant les petits d'animaux sont inclus dans la liste, alors qu'en russe, ils sont généralement passé au genre masculin à l'aide de l'ajout d'un suffixe en -ок. 🔶Langues ne faisant que la distinction animé - inanimé au masculin : tchèque, bas-sorabe - langues slaves du sud-ouest et macédonien : 🔹Langues slaves de l'ouest : - tchèque (cf. vidéo) - bas-sorabe : en bas-sorabe, l'accusatif pluriel des noms animés, humains comme animaux, peut être soit égal au nominatif singulier, soit égal au génitif pluriel, le choix est en théorie libre. 🔹Langues slaves du sud-ouest : slovène, croate, serbe (cf vidéo.) 🔹Langues slaves du sud-est : macédonien : Le macédonien n'a plus de cas, mais la distinction se fait lorsque que les noms sont comptés. Une forme de pluriel spécial existe pour les noms masculins animés terminés par une consonne, appelé "pluriel compté" 🔶Langues faisant la distinction animé humain et animé animal, en plus de l'inanimé, au masculin uniquement : langues slaves de l'ouest (hors tchèque et bas-sorabe): 🔹Langues slaves de l'ouest : - polonais, slovaque (cf. vidéo) - cachoube et haut-sorabe : fonctionne comme en polonais et en slovaque 🔶Langue faisant la distinction entre masculin animé humain et inanimé : bulgare: 🔹Langues slaves du sud-est : - bulgare: Le bulgare n'a plus de cas, mais la distinction se fait lorsque que les noms sont comptés. Une forme de pluriel spécial existe pour les noms masculins animés humains terminés par une consonne, appelé "pluriel compté" ---------------------------- English version: Things work similarly in other Slavic languages, but there are differences, and here is some additional information and peculiarities about these languages: 🔶Languages making the animate - inanimate distinction for feminine (and sometimes neuter) too: East Slavic languages 🔹East Slavic languages (not covered in the video): - Russian and Rusyn: the animate and inanimate distinction is mainly made for the masculine gender, as described in the video, but also it exists also for the feminine gender, in the accusative plural only. - Belarusian, Ukrainian: the distinction animated and animated is made, as in Russian, mainly for masculine, in the way described in the video, but also for the feminine and neuter genders, in the accusative plural only (acc. pl. = gen .pl). Neutre nouns of animal cubs are included in the list, while in Russian they generally switched to the masculine gender by adding the suffix -ок. 🔶Languages making only the animate - inanimate distinction for masculine: Czech, Lower Sorbian - Southwest Slavic languages and Macedonian: 🔹West Slavic languages: - Czech (see video) - Lower Sorbian: in Lower Sorbian, the accusative plural of animate nouns, both human and animal, can be either equal to the nominative singular, or equal to the genitive plural, the choice is in theory free. 🔹Southwest Slavic languages: Slovenian, Croatian, Serbian (see video.) 🔹Southeast Slavic languages: Macedonian: Macedonian no longer has cases, but the distinction is made when the nouns are counted. A special plural form exists for animate masculine nouns ending in a consonant, called "counted plural" 🔶Languages distinguishing between masculine animate human and masculine animate animal, in addition to masculine inanimate: West Slavic languages (excluding Czech and Lower Sorbian): 🔹West Slavic languages: - Polish, Slovak (see video) - Kashubian and Upper Sorbian: works as in Polish and Slovak 🔶Language distinguishing animate human from inanimate: Bulgarian: 🔹Southeast Slavic languages: - Bulgarian: Bulgarian no longer has cases, but the distinction is made when the nouns are counted. A special plural form exists for human animate masculine nouns ending in a consonant, called a "counted plural"

[@Jodrik713]

#PrayForMirko

[@Rozum-Razum_Slavic-linguistics]

Merci pour lui !

[@yozhleszy]

dieťa miluje šteňa šteňa miluje dieťa où sont l'objet et le sujet?

[@Slovenist972]

So it seems complexity was added going south from north as time progressed? Because you said Slovak and Polish added that after the 15th century.

[@Rozum-Razum_Slavic-linguistics]

Yes, the original logic of the distinction is the one I explained, it's therefore the oldest phenomenon, that happened in a time where there were more or less only one Slavic language, or at least the distinctions were not big, and the phenomenon has been able to spread in the whole Slavic area. For Western Slavic languages, there is one thing I didn't speak about. In Old-Slavic for example, there was several types of masculine nouns (named stems). The main one were the o-stem nouns and the u-stem nouns. That meant that they had different declensions. During the evolution of Slavic languages, both stems merged, but in different ways, which means that the endings of nowadays masculine nouns in Slavic languages are a mix of the original o-stem and u-stem endings. In Western Slavic languages, this lead to a bigger distinction between masculine animate and inanimate. Endings from the original u-stem were used for both masculine animate (for example, for genitive singular, which means that genitive singular of inanimate is -u, and not -a anymore for inanimate nouns) and animate (for example, for dative and locative singular). In Slovenian, masculin nouns that are former u-stem nouns have usually two possibilities of declension for genitive singular (-a or -u) and a long plural form in -ov (sin, sina or sinu, sinovi) This merging of o and u-stems happened later than the use of -a for accusative animate, when languages were already distinct, which explains the fact it didn't happen in the same way in every language. I couldn't say right now when it was, and I guess it could have been at different times for different languages, but I didn't check. And the further distinction that happened in Polish and Slovak is probably the newest one. The motivation might be because, even if the original distinction has only a grammatical motivation, there was at that time a need to separate animals from human beings, at least for masculine nouns.