Talk:Polish orthography

History
Please can someone provide me urgently with some information about the historical development of this alphabet. When, and by whom was it standardised, or was this a gradual process over many centuries? Mattwhiteski 15:47, 27 April 2006 (UTC)


 * It wasn't standartised. It's created by the way of natural evolution, and officialised by Rada Języka Polskiego.

Pronunciation of words with i
Two issues: Does the i palatalize the /p/? If so, does the i disappear from pronunciation as in dnia or does one hear it? --Iopq 10:22, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

[] - i is used only to palatalize p and [ε] becomes [e] after a palatalized consonant.
 * Thanks. -Iopq 10:17, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Also, if you want to show the phonemic word (since you have used slashes), it should be only. The letter i basically stands for the phonemic palatization of the preceding consonant (here ) when a non-palatizing vowel (here ) follows.--Jeziorko (talk) 16:54, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Wait, what about wiem? Doesn't that get pronounced /vʲi̯ɛm/? In that case, how can you tell? Is it dependent on which consonant or is it just just arbitrary and has to be memorized? -Iopq 15:30, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * To my knowledge, both and  should have the same form of palatization in Polish: they are both labial obstruents. Besides that, I think that there is sufficient variation across region and across style that I wouldn't be choosing between these forms of pies. The pronounciations  and  are the extremes, but they are possible.

LaTeX
Perhaps, if someone knows, a section, or link on how to produce these symbols in LaTeX would be useful. Thehalfone 11:28, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

The clusters rz and rż
There is a comment that rż denotes [rʐ] (r+ż). I think a comment that rz (which is usually a single sound [ʐ] (or [ʂ])) can sometimes denote [rz] (r+z); e.g. zmarznie [ˈzmarzɲɛ] 'she/he will get chilled'. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeziorko (talk • contribs) 21:38, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
 * This seems to be already mentioned in the article.--Kotniski (talk) 07:39, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * My bad, I didn't check through. Nevertheless, the comment about rż, I think, should go lower, with the one about rz.--Jeziorko (talk) 16:40, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

The pronunciation of the nasals somehow got lost
Somewhere between the alphabet and the phonology articles there were more allophones of the nasals. Pronunciations like [ɛɯ̯̃]Where did those go? -iopq (talk) 20:30, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * See Polish phonology. If you think there's more to add, please add.--Kotniski (talk) 09:28, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Other issues with i and j
The table in this section seems incorrect. The pronunciation of 'Mania' (name) and 'mania' (noun) is the same. There is no difference. I am native speaker of Polish and I have never met any difference both in colloquial and official speech. Neither in theater nor in pubs :-) Xpicto (talk) 10:33, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Poor state of the article
The article severely lacks references. It looks like someone just wrote their thoughts based on being a native speaker without any phonological knowledge or citing sources. Here are my issues:


 * I've never heard kreska ukośna, it's just kreska. Kreska ukośna seems redundant, there's no other kreska in Polish orthography.
 * The whole section about "issues with i and j" is quite ridiculous, to be honest.
 * First off, pies is usually transcribed as /pʲɛs/ (ṕes in Slavic notation), so I don't know where [pʲjɛs] came from.
 * The whole thing about /ji/ and /i/ in endings is virtually non-existent in modern Polish. I would argue that it's merely an orthographic convention at this point - as the author pointed out, it's a common misspelling, which proves that native speakers don't distinguish those two sounds. I don't see you would find a native you would see any difference in the ending of ziemi and chemii. The only sound for which it still may be the case is /ɳ/, although it may be getting lost too, as attested by the user above. My spelling dictionary (Słownik Ortograficzny Języka Polskiego, PWN; published as long ago as 1993) only makes this distinction - it notes that if the ending -nia is pronounced /ɲa/ the genitive ending is -ii, and if it's pronounced /ɲja/, the ending is -ji. For all others consonants, it only lists the orthographic convention and doesn't distinguish pronunciation.
 * Also, I don't get this part: "This is why children commonly misspell and write -i in the inflected forms as armii, Danii". Did you mean "in the inflected forms such as armii, Danii"? Because otherwise, armii and Danii is actually the correct spelling.
 * The point about certain spellings "very frequently met with on the Internet" is unnecessary and unprofessional.
 * The capitalization and punctuation section could also use some expanding.

Again, these are just my observations and I don't have any sources (although I could find some); but neither does the author. The article is in a really poor condition, IMO, totally unsourced and with some parts written in broken English (the letter $⟨y⟩$ is unspoken?). It should be reworked.

Merger proposal
The Polish alphabet article is redundant and links to this article for the details of the alphabet in many instances. I propose we merge them. – anlztrk (talk) 08:53, 21 September 2022 (UTC)
 * I think it's OK to merge them. Like Czech alphabet and Czech orthography, which have already been merged. Burzuchius (talk) 10:04, 21 September 2022 (UTC)
 * In my opinion the separate article on Polish alphabet is needed as many readers search for this particular information. The article needs corrections in line with the editors note on the top of it. The correction has already started and can be applied in any further improvement works. All suport are warmly welcome. JacekVR (talk) 11:55, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I support the merger proposal. Is this discussion supporting or opposing, if it is in support, I’ll start merging them. 2001:BB6:B83E:B800:BCCF:EB6A:4124:AC33 (talk) 16:59, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose per JacekVR. Great Mercian (talk) 00:41, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

Pronunciation of ą and ę is not presented clearly
The Spelling rules section states that ą can be pronounced /ɔw̃/, [ɔn], [ɔŋ], [ɔm], and ę can be pronounced /ɛw̃/, [ɛn], [ɛŋ], [ɛm]. The table then points to the Nasal vowels section, but that section doesn't explain which of [ɔn], [ɔŋ] or [ɔm] is ą pronounced (same for ę). I think Ą and Ę have a great table that concisely lists out which pronunciation is used based on the following letter, but those list out [ɔj̃] and [ɛj̃] as well. Is it possible to write the Nasal vowels sections more clearly? 86.187.237.130 (talk) 19:25, 17 January 2024 (UTC)