| Icelandic Language |
Index for Icelandic |
Website Links For Icelandic |
Information AboutIcelandic Language |
Icelandic (''íslenska'') is a , Accusative , Dative and Genitive . Its closest relative is Faroese and can be somewhat understood by some Norwegians as well, depending on their dialect and education. While most Western European languages have reduced greatly the extent of inflection, particularly in Noun Declension , Icelandic retains an inflectional grammar comparable to that of Latin , Ancient Greek , or more closely, Old English . Written Icelandic has changed relatively little since the 13th Century . As a result of this, and of the similarity between the modern and ancient grammar, modern speakers can still understand, more or less, the original Sagas and Edda s that were written some eight hundred years ago. This ability is sometimes mildly overstated by Icelanders themselves, most of whom actually read the Sagas with updated modern spelling and footnotes - though otherwise intact. This old form of the language is called Old Icelandic, but also commonly equated to Old Norse , an umbrella term also known as "Danish Tongue" used for the common Scandinavian language of the Viking era. The (thorn) and ð (eth or edh), representing the Voiceless and Voiced "th" sounds as in English ''thin'' and ''this'' respectively. The complete Icelandic Alphabet is: A Á B D Ð E É F G H I Í J K L M N O Ó P R S T U Ú V X Y Ý Þ Æ Ö (32 letters) a á b d ð e é f g h i í j k l m n o ó p r s t u ú v x y ý þ æ ö The preservation of the Icelandic language is taken seriously by the Icelanders — rather than borrow foreign words for new concepts, new Icelandic words are diligently forged for public use. Icelandic does not have any notable dialect differences. Sounds Icelandic has an Aspiration Contrast between Plosive s, rather than a voicing contrast, something relatively rare among European languages. Preaspirated voiceless stops are also common. However Fricative and Sonorant Consonant Phoneme s exhibit regular contrasts in voice, including in Nasals (rare in the world's languages). Additionally, length is contrastive for many phonemes; voiceless sonorant consonants seem to be the only exception. The chart below is based on Scholten (2000, p. 22); refer to the IPA article for information on the sounds of the following symbols: Consonants The voiced fricatives , , and are not completely constrictive and are often closer to approximants than fricatives. The status of and as Phoneme s or as Allophone s of and is the topic of some debate. On the one hand, the presence of Minimal Pair s like ''gjóla'' "light wind" vs. ''góla'' "howl" and ''kjóla'' "dresses" vs. ''kóla'' "cola" suggests that the palatal stops are separate phonemes. On the other hand, only the palatal stops, not the velars, may appear before Front Vowel s, and some linguists (e.g. Rögnvaldsson 1993) have held out for an underlying phonemic representation of and as and respectively, with a Phonological process merging into . Whether this approach, which is consistent with the orthography and historical processes, represents a synchronic reality is disputed, especially since most phonological phenomena are adequately explained diachronically, so an artificial, synchronic system seems somewhat unnecessary. The dental fricatives and are allophones of a single phoneme. is used word-initially, as in ''þak'' "roof", and before a Voiceless Consonant , as in ''maðkur'' "worm". is used intervocalically, as in ''iða'' "vortex" and word-finally, as in ''bað'' "bath", although it can be devoiced to before pause. Of the voiceless nasals, only occurs in word-initial position, for example in ''hné'' "knee". Recently, there has been an increasing tendency, especially among children, to pronounce this as voiced, for example pronouncing ''hnífur'' "knife" rather than standard . The Palatal Nasal appears before palatal stops and the Velar Nasal s before Velar Stop s. appears also before and through the deletion of in the Consonant Cluster s and . The preaspirates (e.g. ''löpp'' "foot") do not occur in initial position. The Geminate s are not necessarily longer than simple but do cause shortening of a preceding vowel. Still, they may be pronounced long in certain styles of speech, such as when talking to children. Vowels Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents a rounded vowel. Vowel Length is predictable in Icelandic (Orešnik and Pétursson 1977). Stressed vowels (both monophthongs and diphthongs) are long:
Before other consonant clusters (including the preaspirated stops and Geminate consonants), stressed vowels are short. Unstressed vowels are always short.
Morphology Many German speakers will find Icelandic morphology familiar. Almost every morphological category in one language is represented in the other. Noun s are declined for Case , Number and Gender , Adjective s for case, number, gender and Comparison , and there are two Declension s for adjectives, weak and strong. Icelandic possesses only the Definite Article , which can stand on its own, or be attached to its modified noun (as in other North-Germanic languages). Verb s are Conjugated for Tense , Mood , Person , number and Voice . There are three voices, active, passive and medial, but it may be debated whether the medial voice is a voice or simply an independent class of verbs of its own. There are only two simple tenses, past and present, but to make up for that there are a number of auxiliary constructions, some of which may be regarded as tenses, others as Aspects to varying degrees. Syntax Icelandic is SVO , generally speaking, but the inflectional system allows for quite some freedom in word order. Icelandic sign language Main article: Icelandic Sign Language Icelandic sign language was originally based on Danish Sign Language . Until 1910 , deaf Icelandic people were sent to school in Denmark. Today, Icelandic sign language has evolved apart from its Danish roots. The language is regulated by a national committee. See also References External links
|