-----Original Message-----
From: tgpedersen [mailto:
tgpedersen@...]
Sent: Tuesday, July 16, 2002 1:30 PM
To:
cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [tied] New languages?
>>My favorite yellow rag (Ekstrabladet) contained a reference to a
reference of an interview with a "Polish professor", in which it was
claimed that the East Europeans were beginning to solve their
problems of cooperation by inventing new mixed languages:
>>Belarussian-Russian: trasjanka
Yes, that's what the Belarusians themselves call it (_tras'anka_ , literally
'mixture of hay and straw (i.e. ersatz rather than good fodder based on high
quality hay only').
>>Ukrainian-Russian: sursjik
Yes, _surz^ik_ -- literally 'mangcorn, a mixture of wheat and rye'.
>>Polish in Lithuania-Belarus-Ukraine: prosta mova
At least here in Lithuania the situation is as follows: one part of the
subethnic group of mixed Polish-Belarusian origin who refer to themselvs as
_tutejs^yje_ 'the locals' speak in what they call _tutejs^a mova_ 'local
language'. They state (and think, I guess) the language is "Polish", but
actually it's a local version of Belarusian (another part indeed speaks some
local variant of Polish). _Prosta mova_ is a term which was indeed used from
ca. 16th c. to ca. 19th c., but I don't think it's still in use.
>>Anyone heard of these languages? If yes, do they show interesting
creole devepments (regularizing or loss of inflections, etc)?
Regularizing -- yes, as to loss of the inflections, the Belarusian, Russian
and Ukrainian inflectional systems are so close that there's actually no
need to simplify anything. As for _tutejs^a mova_, I'm not sure, but what
I've actually heard is rather generalization of a Polish or Belarusian form.
I don't consider these idioms a mean of international communication --
rather consequences of assimilation and/or "cross-breeding", since they're
mostly Belarusians (not Russians) who speak _tras'anka_ and Ukrainians who
speak _surz^ik_.
Sergei