Global InformationBelarusian language information
| Belarusian | |
|---|---|
| беларуская мова | |
| Pronunciation | [bʲɛɫaˈruskaja ˈmɔva] |
| Native to | Belarus |
| Ethnicity | Belarusians |
Native speakers | 5.1 million[1] (2009 census) 1.3 million L2 speakers (2009 census)[1] |
Language family | Indo-European
|
Early forms | Proto-Indo-European
|
Writing system | Cyrillic (Belarusian alphabet) Belarusian Latin alphabet Belarusian Braille Belarusian Arabic alphabet |
| Official status | |
Official language in |  Belarus Poland (in Gmina Orla, Gmina Narewka, Gmina Czyże, Gmina Hajnówka and the town of Hajnówka)
|
Recognised minority language in |  Czech Republic[2] Ukraine[3] |
| Regulated by | National Academy of Sciences of Belarus |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | be |
| ISO 639-2 | bel |
| ISO 639-3 | bel |
| Glottolog | bela1254 |
| Linguasphere | 53-AAA-eb < 53-AAA-e |
 Belarusian-speaking world Legend: Dark blue – territory where Belarusian is the primary language; Light blue – territory where Belarusian is a minority language | |
Belarusian (endonym: беларуская мова, romanized: bielaruskaja mova, pronounced [bʲɛɫaˈruskaja ˈmɔva]) is an East Slavic language. It is one of the two official languages in Belarus, alongside Russian. Additionally, it is spoken in some parts of Russia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, and Ukraine by Belarusian minorities in those countries.
Before Belarus gained independence in 1991, the language was known in English as Byelorussian or Belorussian, or alternatively as White Russian. Following independence, it became known as Belarusian, or alternatively as Belarusan.[5]
As one of the East Slavic languages, Belarusian shares many grammatical and lexical features with other members of the group. To some extent, Russian, Ukrainian, and Belarusian retain a degree of mutual intelligibility. Its predecessor is generally referred to as Ruthenian (13th to 18th centuries), which had, in turn, descended from what is referred to as Old East Slavic (10th to 13th centuries).
In the first Belarusian census in 1999, the Belarusian language was declared as a "language spoken at home" by about 3,686,000 Belarusian citizens (36.7% of the population).[6][7] About 6,984,000 (85.6%) of Belarusians declared it their "mother tongue". Other sources, such as Ethnologue, put the figure at approximately 3.5 million active speakers in Belarus.[8][dead link] In Russia, the Belarusian language is declared as a "familiar language" by about 316,000 inhabitants, among them about 248,000 Belarusians, comprising about 30.7% of Belarusians living in Russia (data from Russian Census (2002) In Russian[dead link]). In Ukraine, the Belarusian language is declared as a "native language" by about 55,000 Belarusians, which comprise about 19.7% of Belarusians living in Ukraine (data from 2001 Ukrainian census In Ukrainian). In Poland, the Belarusian language is declared as a "language spoken at home" by about 40,000 inhabitants (data from 2002 Polish general census Table 34 (in Polish) [9] According to a study done by the Belarusian government in 2009, 72% of Belarusians speak Russian at home, while Belarusian is actively used by only 11.9% of Belarusians (others speak a mixture of Russian and Belarusian, known as Trasianka). Approximately 29.4% of Belarusians can write, speak, and read Belarusian, while 52.5% can only read and speak it.[10] Nevertheless, only a small part of Belarusian pupils attend Belarusian elementary schools where the language of instruction is Belarusian (e.g. 13% in 2016) and there are no Belarusian-language universities in Belarus.[11][12]
- ^ a b "Population classified by knowledge of the Belarusian and Russian languages by region and Minsk City". Belstat.gov.by. Archived from the original on 3 August 2017. Retrieved 2 December 2018.
- ^ Jan Jiřička (3 July 2013). "Česko má nové oficiální národnostní menšiny. Vietnamce a Bělorusy – iDNES.cz". Zpravy.idnes.cz. Retrieved 2017-01-10.
- ^ "To which languages does the Charter apply?". European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. Council of Europe. p. 3. Archived from the original on 2012-08-18. Retrieved 2014-04-03.
- ^ Yefim Karsky. "Belarusians. II. The language of Belarusian people". В. 1. — [S.l.], 1908.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Як нас заве сьвет — «Беларашэн» ці Belarus(i)an?was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Data from 1999 Belarusian general census in English Archived May 5, 2009, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Of these, about 3,370,000 (41.3%)[clarification needed] were Belarusians, and about 257,000 belonged to other ethnicities (Russians, Poles, Ukrainians, and Jews).
- ^ Belarusian language at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
- ^ "Ludność. Stan I Struktura Demograficzno-Społeczna". Archived from the original on May 25, 2005. Retrieved February 6, 2007.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) - ^ А.В. Зубик; А.О. Роговая (1 January 2013). "THE PROBLEM OF USING THE BELARUSIAN LANGUAGE" (PDF). Polessky State University.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
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