Peculiar sociolinguistic features of the Slavic world

By far the most interesting and signi®cant issue dealt with by sociolinguistics in the Slavic world is the standard language question. Uniquely Slavic features are evident in all discussions of the genesis of the standard language, the processes of standardization, various relations with other standard languages, and the physiognomy of the contemporary standard language. In this, Slavic standard languages do not essentially di er from other single standard languages and/or groups of genetically related standard languages, because greater or lesser peculiarities exist in all languages and groups (i.e. groups such as Romance, Germanic, Aryan-Indian, some Ugro-Finnish groups, Turkic, Bantu, Thai, etc.). Slavic standard languages are distinguished by two peculiar characteristics that permeate all the abovelisted questions, which makes them distinct from all Ð or at least from the majority Ð of the other language groups. In the Slavic language world, the fact of genetic kinship was of ideological and practical signi®cance for a longer period of time and in a more intensive manner than anywhere else; in addition, there is the role of the homogenetic Cyril-Methodic language heritage, which can only be compared with the role of Latin and Sanskrit within the Romance and Aryan-Indian languages

Etymology · Linguistics · Romance languages · Slavic languages · Sociolinguistics · Sociology · Standard language · Discourse Analysis and Cultural Communication · History · Linguistics, Language Diversity, and Identity · Philosophy