The World Academy of Rusyn Culture has a good site on the language called Rusyn by its speakers and sometimes Ruthenian in English (or "western Ukrainian" by those who do not recognize it as a separate language):
The language territory where Carpatho-Rusyn dialects are spoken coincides with the historical territory of *Carpathian Rus’, which in terms of present-day boundaries is located within southeastern Poland (the *Lemko Region), northeastern Slovakia (the *Prešov Region), most of the *Transcarpathian oblast of Ukraine (*Subcarpathian Rus’), and a small corner of north-central Romania (the *Maramureş Region). Rusyn is also spoken in a few scattered communities in northeastern Hungary and among emigrants from Carpathian Rus’ who settled in the *Vojvodina and Srem regions of present-day Yugoslavia and far eastern Croatia and in the United States and Canada...A nice find by Christopher Culver, who also posts about a projected Indogermanische Grammatik that was begun in 1968 by Kuryłowicz, "was subsequently continued by Watkins, Cowgill, and Mayrhofer, and is nowhere near completion... I wonder what the oldest perpetually unfinished project is in Indo-European linguistics." So which will appear first, this or The Last Dangerous Visions? Posted by languagehat at September 11, 2005 05:31 PMThe difficulty in classifying Carpatho-Rusyn dialects stems largely from the fact that individual dialect territories experience an overlapping of numerous isoglosses. In other words, certain linguistic features typical of one area encroach into other areas; determining where to draw a boundary between these territories in the process of defining and classifying the dialects thus becomes difficult. Another difficulty in classification is related to the fact that the dialects have in the past and continue to be influenced by numerous sociolinguistic or extralinguistic factors from the larger world in which Rusyns live, whether in Ukraine, Slovakia, Poland, Romania, Hungary, Yugoslavia, the United States, or Canada. When attempting a synchronic description of the language system of dialects and in classifying them, researchers must consider the larger linguistic and cultural worlds in which dialects function. The structure and function of the dialects must be described in connection with the languages with which they are in contact.
I think I also heard somewhere that Andy Warhol's parents were in fact Rusyns from Slovakia. Some places in the literature they're described as Slovaks or even Czechoslovakians, which is obviously less accurate.
New Rusyn Times: http://www.carpathorusynsociety.org/NewRusynTimes.html
ANdy Warhol (Time Europe)"
http://www.time.com/time/europe/html/050829/rusyn.html
Posted by: John Emerson at September 11, 2005 06:58 PMWatkins et al should publish what they have -I'm sure I'm not the only one who wants to get hold of that book. Same goes for unpublished parts of Wackernagel's Altindische Grammatik.
BTW, have you come across any on-line materials on classical (15-17th cent) Ruthenian?
Posted by: Renee at September 11, 2005 08:02 PMIf you google "ruthenian language" you'll find whatever I turned up when doing this post.
Posted by: language hat at September 11, 2005 08:07 PMHere's another one (a new language in between Belarusan, Polish and Rusyn). It's called Svoja, tentatively:
* http://www.pravapis.org/art_belarusian_poland.asp
(On the bottom of the page you'll find a sample of the language, a short story from Graham Greene translated into Svoja.)
Posted by: br23 at September 11, 2005 08:08 PMThat sample of Svoja reads awfully like Russified Ukrainian. The divergence between nationality and ethnicity has long been observed, and yet, in each instance there is an attempt to make this somehow news-worthy: "An unprecendented find shakes the linguistic community! A creole discovered in a region between two other languages!"
Posted by: Wimbrel at September 11, 2005 10:08 PMThe Ruthenians are a Slavic group that neither the Russians nor the Ukrainians have been able to absorb. They seem to be very independent minded. They were part of Czechosloavia before World War II but were still unhappy in the union despite the fact that they shared a common Roman Catholic religion with the Czechs and Slovaks. The Ruthenians are given some credit along with the Poles and the Hungarians, for stopping the Mongol invasions of Europe in the 13th century but I don' know all the details.
The Romanian dialects of nearby Bucovina and northern Moldavia (in the Carpathians) are also interesting. They diverge quite a bit from standard Romanian and have even more Slavonic (especially Russian) influences. These Romanians, however, seem to share a common Carpathian regional culture with the Ruthenians.
Posted by: Brian at September 12, 2005 02:40 AMI can only regret that "Ruthenian" is used mostly in the narrow sense of "Carpatho-Ruthenian" to the detriment of a broader meaning, "related to, or originating in Rus'." In other words, russky/rus'ky as used in the 19th century and earlier.
LH, you must have disabled comments to the Gorgoniev post to stress its title, "That's my language: keep out!"
Posted by: Alexei at September 12, 2005 03:45 AMWimbrel: "That sample of Svoja reads awfully like Russified Ukrainian."
Since I heard it spoken on a few occasions, I can share my subjective opinion on how it sounds. It sounds like normal Belarusan, but with strong Ukrainian accent and Polish intonations. Just my IMHO. ;)
As for the identity, that's exactly, the problem. Those people from Eastern Poland are something like Belarusans, but they can't fully identify with the official language of Belarus (not speaking about the political system or society values).
Posted by: br23 at September 12, 2005 06:13 AMI covered Svoja here.
Alexei: Dammit, I hate when I do that! (Sometimes when I'm publishing a post I accidentally hit "Close comments" instead of "Save.") Thanks for alerting me -- I was wondering why it hadn't attracted any comments! In general, I only close comments on old posts that are getting spammed, so if you can't comment on a new one, please do let me know.
Posted by: language hat at September 12, 2005 08:06 AMSorry, I know this isn't directly related to language, but would my (original) family name, Ruthino(w)ski, mean "from Ruthenia"? My grandfather emigrated from Poland to the US.
Posted by: mtwelles at September 14, 2005 12:49 AMSure it's language-related, and it's an excellent question, but I'm afraid I don't know. Anyone?
Posted by: language hat at September 14, 2005 07:17 AMRe: Ruthinowski
It probably is a Polish habitational name related to Ruthenia. The eastern part of the Polish province of Galicia was also called "Rusyn" or "Ruthenia' (a Latinized form) in former times. Most of the Ruthenians living there were absorbed by Polish settlers who came there in the 17th and 18th centuries. The area we generally speak of as Ruthenia today is in the western Ukraine stradling the borders of Slovakia, Hungary and Romania. Since it was previously part of Poland, Austria, Czechoslovakia and even Hungary (1939-1944) permanent control by the Ukraine is by no means assured.
Thank you for the information about the name Ruthinoski. I've always been curious because I can find no record of that name except for the two families that emigrated to Eastern Long Island (one with "w" and one without) Friends in Poland can find no record of the name.
Posted by: mtwelles at September 16, 2005 09:30 AM