User:Garygo golob/Mixed Kočevje subdialects/sandbox

Mixed Kočevje subdialects (mešani kočevski govori ) is a catch-all category for the Slovene dialects of heterogeneous origin now spoken in the Kočevje region, between Goteniška Gora in the west and Kočevski Rog in the east, and spanning as south as Slovene–Croatia border. Microdialects are very poorly studied, but are very close to standard Slovene. Subdialects border North White Carniolan dialect to the east, South White Carniolan dialect to the southwest, Kostel dialect to the south, Čabranka dialect to the west and Lower Carniolan dialect to the north. Subdialects are derived from many different dialect bases, but it is currently listed as a special group of subdialects in Lower Carnolan dialect group.

Geographical distribution
Mixed Kočevje subdialects are spoken where Gottscheers used to live; this is around Kočevje, east even a bit past Kočevski Rog to Črmošnjice and Komarna Vas, north up to Stari Log and Ložine, west up to Gotenica and Goteniška Gora and south up to Briga and Grgelj. It is thought that the subdialects do not extend as far south as Logar and Rigler proposed because German was never spoken along Kupa river and Kostel dialect is actually spoken there, however due to a lack of research, that cannot be determined. Area where Gottscheers used to live is larger than area where Mixed Kočevje subdialects are currently spoken. Borderline areas were heavily influenced by the neighbouring dialects so the original microdialects stayed more or less intact and immigrants are in the process of assimilation. Notable settlements include Kočevje, Šalka Vas, Livold, Mozelj, Podlesje, Kočevska Reka, Borovec pri Kočevski Reki, Grčarice, Koblarji, Stari Log, Črmošnjice, Planina, and Koprivnik.

History
Region was sparsely populated in the 13th century, so in 1330, Gottschee Germans were moved here and lived along with the native population. Both Slovene and German population lived in this area, and still do, however after the disintegration of Austria-Hungary and especially during second world war, when Gottscheers voluntarily moved or were forcibly deported, area became empty and was populated again, mostly by people from Slovenia, but also from other former Yugoslav countries. The area was therefore resettled by speakers from various areas and (mostly Slovene) dialects, creating a new mixed dialect area. Various microdialects, as well as the dialect spoken by Slovene natives are in the process of merging.

Research
A lack of research means that very little is known about the characteristics of the Slovene spoken here, other than that the language of the area differs from the surrounding Lower Carniolan and White Carniolan area.

Indigenous people
Despite the fact that more than 1000 Slovenes lived in this area before the immigration, no attempts to research their dialect were made. Fran Ramovš completely excluded the area despite researching after the first world war. Tine Logar and Jakob Rigler also did not show much interest for research of this area. This area is also excluded from Slovenski lingvistični atlas.

Immigrants
First immigrants to come here were mostly from Zasavje and moved to this area a few years prior to World War II, therefore most of them spoke Zagorje-Trbovlje subdialect. After WWII, people from all over Slovenia started moving to this area. In 1953, only 28% of population was indigenous, and only 15% in Kočevje. Most of the immigrants this time were from more densely populated areas, such as around Mura (mostly speaking Prekmurje and Prlekija dialects), northern Lower Carniola (speaking Lower Carniolan dialect), White Carniola (speaking North and South White Carniolan dialects), and Inner Carniola (speaking Inner Carniolan dialect). Many people also moved from aroun Krško (speaking Sevnica-Krško subdialect) and Tolmin (speaking Tolmin and Soča dialects), as well as Croats and Bosnians. Most people, however, moved from bigger cities, mainly from Ljubljana (speaking Upper Carniolan dialect), Maribor (speaking South Pohorje dialect or Kozjak subdialect), Celje (speaking Central Savinja dialect), Novo Mesto (speaking Eastern Lower Carniolan subdialect), Murska Sobota (speaking Prekmurje dialect) and Ptuj (speaking Prlekija dialect).

The vast majority of the immigrants after the year 1940 were from Ljubljana (28%) and Novo Mesto (15%), representing a third of the entire population.

Unified dialect
People that moved to that area mostly spoke their original dialect or somewhat adapted when speaking with others, while their children already seem to form a somewhat unified dialect. The only research of microdialects spoken here was a bachelor thesis that focuses on Kočevje microdialect and it appears to be very similar to standard Slovene and having similarities to Upper Carniolan dialect, such as no diphthongs, ukanye, ending -u instead of -i in dative/locative singular o-stems and very prominent vowel reduction, especially ending -o and -i, and at the same time lacks some key features of Lower Carniolan dialects, such as akanye. However, a feature present in (most) Lower Carniolan microdialects and not in Upper Carniolan, no masculinization or feminization, is also listed. The dialect shows clear influence of Ljubljana microdialect, possibly also standard Slovene. However, more research has to be conducted to be sure.

The author focused on speakers that were in school at that time, which would correlate to speakers born somewhere between 1972 and 1984.

Accent changes
Bachelor thesis does not provide stress diacritics, but when researching White Carniolan dialects, Tine Logar mentions that accent shifts *məglȁ → *mə̀gla, *sěnȏ / *prosȏ → *sě̀no / *pròso, *visȍk → vìsok, and *kováč → *kòvač are not present "on the other side of Kočevje forests", i. e. Mixed Kočevje subdialects, which would be reasonable as neither Lower Carniolan nor Upper Carniolan dialects have undergone these accent shifts. Dialects have probably undergone *ženȁ → *žèna accent shift because only some marginal northern and western dialects have not undergone it and speakers from those dialects were not in any of the bigger groups of immigrants. Subdialects differentiate between long and short vowel, but do not have pitched accent.

Morphology
Unified dialect shows typical features of a colloquial speech, such as short infinitive instead of long, infinitive ending in -či now have suffix -t, locative singular merging with dative, pəsa instead of psa (ending accent became fixed), many masculine nouns became t-stem, but dual and neuter gender still exist.