Karjalankieli

When you use the word karjalanmurteet, you have to already know if you’re talking about the Finnish language or the Karelian language. When discussing the Karelian language, “karjalanmurteet” refers to the dialects of the Karelian language (Viena, South, Livvi and Tver). When discussing the Finnish language, “karjalanmurteet” refers to certain eastern dialects of Finnish, specifically those spoken in the municipal regions of North and South Karelia. So-called “karelian” dialects of Finnish are not necessarily dialects of Finnish that have been influenced by the Karelian language. The name refers instead to the geographical area where the dialects are spoken.

This maps shows a little bit of the difference: https://www.kotus.fi/files/3179/karjalat-kartta.JPG

The blue and purple regions (Etelä and Pohjois-karjalan murteet) are regions where dialects of Finnish are spoken. These dialects are referred to as Karelian dialects, but they are, in fact, dialects of the Finnish language.

The other colors represent Karjalan kielen murteet, or dialects of the Karelian language.

This can be confusing, especially since there is a lot of overlap between where Karelian is spoken and where so-called “karelian” dialects of Finnish are spoken. Dialects along the boarder between Karelian speaking and Finnish speaking areas can intermix in a way that makes it hard to tell which language the person is speaking. The intermixing is also usually due to the fact that the person’s mother tongue or most frequently used language is Finnish, so that influences their own personal way of speaking. However 99% of the time, it’s extremely clear if someone’s using the Karelian language or a karelian dialect of Finnish.  

From a more cultural perspective, quite a lot of Finns to this day are under the impression that the Karelian language doesn’t actually exist, but is instead just a dialect of Finnish. This is not true and is due to propaganda spread by the Finnish government during and after World War 2. Unfortunately the modern Finnish government has done little to undo the damage it caused during that time, and the misinformation prevails. In Russia, there’s essentially no question about what is Finnish and what is Karelian both linguistically and culturally, because there haven’t been decades of propaganda claiming that they’re the same.

Records of the Karelian people’s distinctness from Finnish people based on language, traditions, beliefs, values, cultural identity, etc go back into the early 1000s CE.

Hopefully this answered your question? If you know any Finnish or are a Finn, try reading some Karelian, perhaps this newspaper: http://omamua.ru/. You’re sure to understand a lot of it, but lot of it may also seem foreign to you.

Going off of the ask I received about the northern dialects of Karelian, I thought I’d share a bit more information about the dialectography of Karelian.

I’ve studied both Viena Karelian and Livvi Karelian for a year each. I’ve also taken a two-week intensive course on Tver Karelian and next week I’ll start a two-week intensive course on Lude (lyydin kieli), which Russian scholars tend to consider a dialect of Karelian (mostly for political, rather than linguistic, reasons). I’ve also taken a course on Karelian dialects in general (their common and contrasting characteristics, their geographical spread, history, etc). Unfortunately I haven’t been able to study South Karelian outside of the dialects course.

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The Karelian language is made up of two main dialects: Karelian Proper and Livvi Karelian. Karelian Proper is further split into two main sub-dialects: Viena Karelian and South Karelian.

There are a number of different terms to refer to these dialects. Viena Karelian is known in English also as North Karelian and White Sea Karelian. Livvi Karelian is known also as Aunus Karelian and Olonets Karelian (sometimes Olonec Karelian). In Finnish, Livvi Karelian is known as livvinkarjala and aunuksenkarjala. In Livvi Karelian itself, Livvi Karelian is known as livvinkarjal as well as anuksenkarjal.

In my posts, I choose to use the words closest to the word used in the language itself. Therefore, I will say Viena, South, Livvi, and Tver Karelian.

Below is a map of the Karelian dialects from Karjalan kielen sanakirja “The dictionary of the Karelian language”: http://kaino.kotus.fi/kks/kkskartta.html

The link gives more information on how to interpret the map, but in general, blue county names show where Viena Karelian is spoken, red (orange? brown?) county names is where South Karelian is spoken, and green is where Livvi is spoken. Tihvinä, Valdai, and Tver Karelian are all related to South Karelian; however, they have been separated from the original dialect since the 1600s and have extremely different characteristics. Essentially, they’re their own dialects. The few unnamed counties near Petroskoi (Petrozavodsk) is where Lude is spoken.

I personally prefer the following map, even though it has less information and lacks Tver Karelian:

Of course, brown is Viena Karelian, green South Karelian, yellow Livvi and pink Lude. The horizontal lines in the green and yellow represent the “Boarder Karelian” dialects, essentially dialects of Karelian that have a lot of influence from Finnish (mostly Savo dialects).

Karelian is spoken outside of its native area throughout Russia (e.g. the Tver dialects) and throughout Finland. This has to do with boarder politics, a topic for another post. Tver is the biggest island community in Russia, Helsinki and Oulu house the biggest island communities in Finland. Here’s a map:

You may ask yourself: Why do the first two maps make it seem like Karelian is only spoken in Russia? The dialect areas in the first two maps end harshly at the Finnish boarder, but in the third map, there’s a large red area in Finland connected to them.

The answer to that question lies in the different language policies of Finland and Russia during the two world wars. Finland’s policy was essentially “There’s no such thing as a Karelian, they’re just Finns who talk funny”, whereas Russia had no incentive to pretend like Karelians don’t exist (instead it was more of a “whatever you are, be Russian or die” tactic). As a result of these two assimilation tactics, Karelian populations are dwindling. Finland’s tactics were (arguably) more successful, so a lot of research focuses on the Russian side of the boarder. This is actually a very important topic, but one that will have to wait for its own post.

The dialects of Karelian (not including Tver) don’t differ much in terms of grammar (sentence structure, noun declensions, verb conjugations, etc.), but they differ mainly in their sounds (phonologically) and in their lexicon. Tver and other nearby dialects differ in all ways from other dialects.

Unfortunately I’ll have to end this post here. Expect a post detailing the differences between the dialects at some distant point in the future. My plan is to first talk more in depth about Livvi and then use that as a point of comparison to explain the other dialects (at my university in Finland, Karelian is taught using Finnish as a point of comparison, but that doesn’t work for an English speaking audience). However, in the future if you have questions about other dialects than Livvi, feel free to contact me and ask!

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Another important mention: I realize I’m not citing sources for anything I’ve said up til now. I realize that’s bad form, and I plan to go back and add sources at a later date (another reason why I didn’t go into explaining the history and politics of the Karelian dialects in this post is that those topics require citations far more than just verb conjugations and such). For now feel free to challenge me on anything and request a citation.

Hi! Thanks so much for your question. I’ve spent a year studying Viena (White Sea) Karelian, the northernmost dialect. My professor actually published an online beginner’s textbook at this link:

http://avtor.karelia.ru/elbibl/karlova/vienankarjalan/index.html#1

It’s really nice because it has audio to go along with it.

This post discusses vowel harmony and diphthongs/triphthongs found in Karelian

Vowel harmony is a phenomenon found in many different languages, both in the Uralic language family (e.g. Finnish and Hungarian) and outside of it (e.g. Turkish). If you already know about Finnish vowel harmony, congrats, Livvi Karelian vowels work (almost) the exact same way! 

In languages with vowel harmony, vowels are separated into different classes which determine which vowels any given word can contain. If vowel harmony is a new concept to you, this video discusses a number of languages that have vowel harmony, as well as how it works in Finnish: https://youtu.be/fA_slID7tEY. If you still don’t get it, don’t stress! It’s such a common feature of the language, you’ll catch on in no time, probably without even noticing it.

In Karelian, vowels are split between front and back vowels. Front and back refers to the position of your tongue when producing the sound. However, you don’t have to be a linguist to master this. The front vowels in Karelian are “y, ö, and ä” while the back vowels are “u, o, and a”. With the exception of loan words and compound words, words in Karelian may only contain either front vowels or back vowels. If an ending is applied to a word (more on this in a later post), the vowels in that ending change to match the frontness or backness of the other vowels in the word.

“e and i“ can exist in any word. However, if they are the only vowels in a word, any endings applied to the word will take front vowels. Therefore, they are usually referred to by Karelian grammars as front vowels.

Let’s see a few examples:

Juomine (stem: juomise-) “drink” (noun) -- this word contains back vowels and the vowels “i and e”. This makes it a back vowel word. The partitive ending -tu/-ty will then take its back vowel form: juomistu.

Syömine (stem: syömise-) “food” -- this word contains front vowels and the vowels “i and e”. This makes it a front vowel word. The partitive ending -tu/ty will then take its front vowel form: syömisty

Using the “we” ending for verbs -mmo/mmö: astummo “we walk” vs näimmö “we see”

A word that only contains “i and e”: kiireh “hurry” (noun) vs kiirehty “hurry” (partitive case)

Using the essive case for nouns (to be discussed in a later post) -nnu/nny: Erähänny päivänny pienenny lapsennu “One day as a small child...”

In Livvi Karelian, clitics, or little particles that attach to the end of a word, do not change to match vowel harmony like they do in Finnish (as well as northern dialects of Karelian). These include:

-go, the interrogative particle:

Oletgo? “Are you?” vs. Näitgo? “Do you see?”

-häi, the emphasis particle:

Sehäi on hyvä “It [really] is good” vs. Opastujathäi ollah hyvät “The teachers [really] are good”

-päi, attached to certain locative cases to clarify their meaning (more on this later):

Lähten Petroskoilpäi “I’m leaving [from] Petrozavodsk” vs. Lähten kylyspäi “I’m leaving [from] the sauna” 

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Diphthongs and triphthongs

Diphthongs are the combination of two vowels within the same syllable. Try saying the words “eye”, “how”, and “boy”. How many vowels do they have? (hint: two). How many syllables do they have? (hint: one) Karelian contains a boat load of diphthongs and a bunch of triphthongs (syllables which contain three vowels). In fact, it is impossible for a Karelian word to have two or more vowels next to each other without them belonging to the same syllable.

An example of vowels that are next to each other, but not part of the same syllable, can be found in the English word “aortic”. Phonologically speaking, this word contains three syllables and two diphthongs: [ei.our.tik]. 

Look at the following Livvi Karelian words and think about how many syllables they might have if they were part of your own native language. (a “.” is used to separate syllables):

oi.gei “right”

oi.gie.du “right” (partitive case)

kač.čuo “to watch”

piäs.tiä “to pass, get to, get into”

ma.guau “he/she/it sleeps”

ru.bieu “he/she/it begins, starts”

har.mai “gray”

har.mual “on/from the gray one”

jiäy “he/she/it stays”

jäi “he/she/it stayed”

ko.di “home”

kois “at home”

In practice, knowing about diphthongs and triphthongs won’t be of much importance to you if your goal is only to use Karelian, rather than study it linguistically. The word “aortic” wouldn’t really be pronounced all that differently if it only had two syllables [eiour.tic]. However, it can come in handy when trying to understand the language as a whole, as well as to make the smoothness of your speech sound more natural.

If you speak Finnish, you’ll notice that for cognates which contain a long vowel in Finnish, the Karelian word contains a diphthong. There is a regular rule that can help you determine which Karelian diphthong will be in the Finnish long vowel’s place. This will be discussed in a future post. The only long vowels allowed in Livvi Karelian are “ii, uu, and yy”. Other dialects allow even fewer long vowels.

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The following are the letters used in the written standard of Livvi Karelian. As with all dialects of Karelian, Livvi uses a Latin based alphabet:

(An apostrophe (’) palatalizes the sound preceding it. This is similar to adding a slight “y” after the sound.)

A, a - as in father. Ahven “bass (fish)”

B, b - as in bat. Buabo “grandmother”

C, c - as in cats (usually only in foreign words) Infekcii “infection”