My mom is Latgalian. As a kid I wanted to learn it from her, but somehow it never happened. Guess I might check out materials you linked, so I could finaly work on this little dream. My mom would shurely be supprised if someday I started to speak to her in Latgalian instead of Latvian. 😄
I enjoyed every moment of this video. First: your English is spectacular. You speak it better than most native English-speakers. I didn't catch a single grammatical or stylistic error anywhere. Your pronunciation is very clear and you speak it in a natural rhythym. Your accent is so faint that it would not be easy to guess where you're from and many people wouldn't notice immediately anyway, especially because you really have it down pat as we say. Secondly the content is fascinating. I did a search for the Latgalian language because I wanted to know something about it and all the information I could have hoped for is here. I also really enjoyed your passionate defense of minority languages. Just personally I find that different forms of verbal expression (call them languages or dialects) make everyone much richer. Thank you very much for taking the time to put this video together. Great job, and I will of course subscribe to your channel now.
I am from Lithuania and this is very funny, entertaining and at the same time educational video!!! Thank you for hard work. I know how hard to make video like this... Aslo, reacently, I started learning latvian language. Language is always apart of history and culture and thats how I found your video. Nice!
Hi, I am from Norway. I fell in love with the Latvian language last year (and now with latgalian), and I am learning Latvian now. As a result of searching on latvian videoes on YT, I stumbled over Latgalian when the song group Tautumeitas sang a song in it, and this language sounds so beautiful! It peaked my interest to learn at least some phrases and visit latgale region. Everything I wanted to learn was all here in your comprehensive video and links. Labs darbiņs kas padarīts! Liels paldies mans draugs, un priecīgas lieldienas!
Our content is 1000 times fewer in number and subsiquently worse in quality compared to english, but I still advise you to look up a letsplay of Heroes of Might and Magic III and see how much you understand.
its great to see that the Latgalian language being spoken again after 100 years of opression im a Livonian myself and id love to see my language get revived one day too
Nice video, man! I speak Latgalian myself and I can tell you not many people my age speak Latgalian, which is a shame. Parents don't teach them, cause it's "a bother" and they'll never use it anywhere else other than in the family. And for the most part, it's true, I only use it when I talk to my family or talk with older people. :( I agree with we are latvians part! We are the same and I will happily be both latvian and latgalian. :) Did now know about Peter! So cool! I was about to ask where did you grow up, cause your accent is interesting while you were talking in latvian, but then I heard you talking in russian, lol. PS. Ausmeņa Kebabs ruļavoj!
22:29 was listening to this and looked up just as you had put up my poetry acc interview as an example for "old" and "new" writing style differences~ lovely video! will send this to my non-latvian friends since I keep babbling about all things Latgale to them but never explain everything in a coherent manner since there are so many important aspects. thanks
Shawn, I just discovered your wonderful channel. It fills a much needed niche for those of us who also love obscure languages. Please make a goal of posting a new video once a month. Just ONE! Don’t kill yourself by over committing. That leads to burn out. Your channel should be for your own enjoyment and we get to go along for the ride. You have an excellent presentation format that is both informative and entertaining at the same time. I wish you the very best. 😎 btw…I speak English, Spanish, some German, and a little Danish here in Houston, Texas.
Watching this from Morocco, the topic is interesting, and the effort that u did put to collect all the informations and adding the link is amazing. I really enjoyed it
The thinking things through tho is a bit lacking tho eg { You think latvianizing english words when speaking latvian is taking it too far because youre an anglohpone, ha ha! Allright then allow me, a speaker of 日本語, to tell you about my favorite アニメ character, with the understanding that anglisizing 日本語 words is taking it too far... Its ネプテューヌ from 超次元ゲイム ネプテューヌ. Cant read that can you? Yea I thought so. Now lets anglisize that. My favorite anime character is Neptune from Hyperdimension Neptunia. Get it? When speaking a language to someone you can not expect them to speak the other languages you do, this is very basic theory of mind. Nativization of foreign words isnt taking it too far, its the bare minimum you must do if unable to find a native equivalent. }
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 It has been nearly a year since I saw this video, I'm afraid I don't understand the point you're trying to convey to me. I'm guessing you're telling me a lot of extra translation was a necessity?
@@avivlamech-kalambi519 He said that latvianising english names is taking it too far. I pointed out how ridiculous his assertion was by showing what it looks like when you dont anglisize japanese names.
18:57 That's so random, it is my university and my hometown. I googled at it seems like there is a German professor, Nicole Nau, head of the Baltology Department at the Institute of Linguistics. She organized a lecture in 2017 about Latgalian titled "Latgalian language, the second Latvian language".
Just watched this video - what an amazing amount of work must have gone into it. Now to work my way through the many other interesting topics on your channel. May I make a tiny, tiny comment - I noticed on the second 'endangered languages' map that, although there is a Gaelic dot on Ireland and a Breton one on NW France, Great Britain is devoid of dots for Welsh, Manx Gaelic and Scots Gaelic. Finally, may I, like other commenters, marvel at your outstanding English. There is a young lady (Anete) who has a YT learn Latvian channel who also has amazing command of English. I don't know how the Latvian education system works; but it must be applauded.
ok, first of all congratulations, seriously. i can't imagine how tough was to find all these resources and explain them the way you did. thank you so much for sharing it with us, i always imagine latvia as a single-cultured and only latvian speaking country and then i discovered this week about latgalian and livonian. too much to be shocked, i assume. once again, congratulations, your content is amazing and the passion in your speech is inspiring. hugs from brazil, um abraço de outro colega que também adora idiomas e culturas não tão comentadas 🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷
You should definitely visit Latvia, it's incredibly packed with a wide variety of colorful cultural characteristics. Eh just don't focus too much on the swastikas though, they are friendly geometrical patterns over there 😂
Great video! Last times I got so much interested into our braliukas language. I speak Samogitian dialect/language. What made me so surprised, that there are so many common words between Latgalian and one of Samogitian dialects, called ‘dūnininkai’. Not even Lithuanian.
Very interesting and so many information. Even I didn't knew a lot of it. I am Latgalian but I don't use Latgalian in everyday life, but still have accent. I was born in 1979 and in my childhood Latgalian was not considered as cool language and that is a reason why I am not used to speak Latgalian, despite that half of my family still speaks Latgalian.
I'm from Kurzeme, so it's nice to hear about the cultural quirks of our eastern siblings. We've got some strange linguistic history too, in the form of the Kurši living along the Curonian spit.
How well put together. I will share this as much as possible. I have discussions within the family where unfortunately they will not accept Latgalian as a separate language though I do. This should at least give them something concrete to think about. Thank you - thank you.
Hi! I only this week discovered your channel and it's been fantastic. My language heritage is a variant of Igbo called Aniocha and while the entire language is still spoken by millions, over time I fear it may become endangered. My parents never encouraged us to speak it as kids (so English is my first language) so I can only say a few phrases though I understand perfectly. Endangered languages matter!
Hi, I'm from Lithuania. And to be more exact - from Samogitia. I agree with comparison that "Samogitia = Latgalia of Lithuania". You talk about Latgalia exactly the same like we talk about Samogitia (diferent languages and not dialects, etc). As a Samogitian I find more similarities with Latgalian language (in the manner of speaking) than to Lithuanian. And about conservativeness, my placing would be like this: 1. Samogitian (most conservative Indo-European language); 2. Lithuanian (modernized/other language influenced Samogitian); 3. Latgalian; 4. Latvian (modernized/other language influenced Latgalian). Or this: 1. Samogitian/Latgalian; 2. Lithuanian (Samogitian dialect); 3. Latvian (Latgalian dialect). lol 😅
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 It is a dialect, the Latgalian language is also a dialect of the Latvian language, and all linguists outside do not agree that it is a separate language.
It's lovely to see this for Latgalian! I wish Pa Dutch had as much current enthusiasm The K/G bit with the under-acutes, reminds me of Plautdietsch. Some speakers have more of a T sound, tj, and others more of a K sound, kj so you can get words like Kjoakj also being spelt Tjoatj (church)
Yeah, this is noticeable with Flemish and Hollands when they say diminutives like "kleintje" which in Belgium might sound like -ch-, while in the NL like ķ.
Great Video, even I as a Latgalian learned a lot. Only thing that is maybe important but missing in the Video is that the language itself has its own varieties. For example in villages the latgalian language is way more traditional than it is spoken in cities where many words from latvian and russian got modified into latgalian language
This was new to me as a finn. Very interesting. There is though a finno-ugric minority in Kuur peninsula. Please present them in your video. I have seen an old tv program where prof. Pertti Virtaranta spoke with locals this language😌👍
This is such an amazing work Shawn! Thank you for compiling everything into one video! I grew up not far from Latgale, and have always been fascinated by the Latgalian people and their language, the fact that I myself as native-Latvian speaker can't understand neither Latgalian nor Lithuanian, proves that it deserves to be recognized as a language. It is also by far my most favourite and cutest Baltic language! Always loved to pick up some phrases from it :) P.S. I would suggest reading up on "Moldovan", quite interesting history. By law in Moldova it is defined to be Romanian, so probably not a comparable to this situation. It used cyrillic as far as I know, but that was introduced by, ofc. the Russians, when they decided to split Romania and keep Moldova under their control.
What I love the most about Latgale apart from lakes, forests and people is.. shmakovka served by local moonshine specialists and everything else... just great
Ak dievs, es uzzināju par tavu kanālu caur video par eļvdāļu valodu un brīnījos, no kurienes tu esi, jo es pamanīju akcentu. Izrādās, ka tu esi no Latvijas, tāpat kā es! Bet tavs akcents ir laikam krievu, vai nē? Paldies par šo video. Mana vecmāte bija polīte no "Daugpiļs".
Fascinating video! You mentioned that Latvian was more influenced by German than Latgalian was; the section at 24:02 actually ties into that. "Kleita" resembles "Kleid", the German word for dress, while "šķēres" resembles "Schere", the German word for scissors. It's always funny to notice German loanwords in places you wouldn't expect, especially because Germany and Latvia are quite far apart.
It is legacy of Teutonic order, Livonia and then what become as Baltic Germans. Also words like švāģeris, duša, štekeris, klavieres, deķis, lustīgs, zaldāts...
@@CookieFonster Six! Švāģeris comes from Schwager. It is kind of complicated. From what I remember it can be wife's brother, or sisters husband and some other variations. Like a relative basically.
@@mdjey2 Wow, nice! That's the one I was least sure of. I've never actually heard of the word "Schwager" before. It sounds like a good English translation would be "sibling in law".
I'm really loving your channel, it's right up my alley. Ive always loved that Latvia or the Duchy of Courland is the least known Colonial power in the Americas. Tobago and I forget what else
Visiting Latgale this summer from Canada. I know my cousins speaking Latgalian will blow my mind! (I have a basic knowledge of Latvian). This has been a great video!
Hmm, I’ve done a video about Persian, and I’ve also talked a bit about Aramaic in one of my earliest videos, but not Arabic yet. I want to get around to it at some point! العربية رائعة
Latgalian of now is the dialect of Latvian, which is not to be confused with ancient Latgalian. As much as I know, Latvian has evolved from Curronian, Selonian, to some extent from Livonian and in most part of ancient Latgalian. You see, the Latgallians of now are called "Latgalieši", and the ancient Latgalians are called "Latgali". The same thing Courland, the ones from before are called Curronians, the ones of now are Courlanders. Its just there is no different denomination in English for ancient Latgalians which was a tribe and for Latgalians of now, who are Latvians who originate from the region of Latgal.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 actually during crusades half of Curonian and Selonian population died out due to famine and illnesses, after which, those lands previously inhabited by the deceased Curonians and Selonians were occupied by Latgallians. As all those languages were very similar, in Courland and Sellonia they assimilated with Latgallian.
@@sandisastudem6532 "actually during crusades half of Curonian and Selonian population died out due to famine and illnesses" Half seems awfully high. 1/4 is more believable. "after which, those lands previously inhabited by the deceased Curonians and Selonians were occupied by Latgallians." Latgaļi did not have the numbers to take all the empty land they made up only 2/7 to of the baltic population of Livonia to begin with and they had empty plots of land in their own lands so why move many many days west. "As all those languages were very similar, in Courland and Sellonia they assimilated with Latgallian." As similar as old norse and old english, uninteligable at first encounter inteligable after a week of learning. Also livonians also learned to speak latgaliski, thats why 15% of latviešu languages vocabulary is of finic origin, and livonian wasnt at all like latgaļu langauge. Low german and church latin where the languages of the ruling class, latgaļu language was the common language of the better connected commoners.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 well, unfortunately that was 1/2 not 1/4, that's wat I've read. If you don't like word occupied, lets say they just evened out or dispersed to the Courland and Sellonia.
i love latvia, my step family is all latvian, so even though the Lithuanian urge too hate everyone stays strong, i love my latvian brothers and sister.
21:40 As a Plautdietsch speaker, pronouncing kj and gj as /kʲ/ and /gʲ/ rather than /c/ and /j/ sounds silly to me as well What'll bug you even more, though, is that kj is pronounced /ç/ at the beginning of words
i was so excited to see that one Latgalian-friendly place on your map in the city of Poznań where i currently live, but i looked it up now and it turns out it's just some local university branch. that's still cool though because i am planning to study in that university so i might learn some Latgalian there if there's such an option
Looking at the comment section here, I find it absurd that there is still racism from Latvians against Latgalians, like... wtf guys, it's the 21st Century and you have a population of 2 million, you need to stand together to fight to preserve your languages and cultures (which also does not mean surpressing the Russian language or Russian culture - that's also awful).
My grandfather's family is from Suwałki. His last name isn't very Polish looking/sounding. The general family consensus is that the name is probably Jadzwingi, the last tribe of the real Prussians to fall/be assimilated in the late 1600's/early 1700's. I don't know much about the Prusi; are they on your list? Anyway, you're absolutely hysterical! I know enough history of the area to have caught a good number of the jokes. Fun fact: A Polish king in the early 900's saw the writing on the wall and realized his country had to join one of the Abrahamic religions or have someone try to force one upon them. He invited emissaries to come and make their pitch. He was favoring Islam until he found out about the no alcohol part and figured he'd be deposed if he went with that. The others had eliminated themselves for reasons I've forgotten. Roman Catholicism was the only one remaining, So Poland is catholic purely by default!
Can you do a video on how Welsh has survived so well seeing as you did Cornish and Breton❓like how it’s the largest Celtic language and the revival and struggle to keep it going etc I think that would be great❗️ Sorry for the emojis my phone can’t type anything that’s not on the main letters keyboard
When Latgalian vs Latvian is discussed, people (e.g. you) tend compare around five words and then proclaim their opinion with too much confidence. These five word comparisons give a highly simplified and unrepresentative picture. For example, there is a Latvian word "dzirkles" which is equivalent to English word "shears". Latvian "kleita" is a loanword from German "Kleid" and Latgalian "sukne" looks to be (for all I know) a loanword from Polish "suknia". This gives me strong vibes of Dunning-Kruger. Amazing video in other respects.
I'm latgalian too bro. But unfortunately born 1990's . And words that came out of my grandmas or her borthers mouths were too different for nowaday understanding.i think we are influenced a lot by actual latvian language a lot. the language It's getting slowly modernised with latvian and English. and I'm afraid to loose it. I also remember those 3 abc 's that we saw in a picture, which she gave me to study when I was a little child.she kept them away from everyone whose not part of a family. Little latgalian hidden in her corner.
Oh you're Latvian? I believe Julingo is Latvian too so it's interesting that Latvians are such language nerds. :) And dude, the fact that you adapt foreign names to Latvian orthography is the coolest thing ever! I wish more languages do this. Of course, I'm probably very much in the minority here but still, there, I said it.
Well done presentation of an interesting language very few outside the Baltics have ever heard of. Especially interesting to Indo-Europeanists, as the Baltic languages (Lithuanian, in particular, with Latgalian in line) have preserved aspects of Proto-Indo-European that the rest of the family has lost. BTW, "Generalplan Ost": the German word "Ost" rhymes with English "toast." (That is, it's "Ost" not "Öst" [no umlaut].) _Ja, ich weiß schon, daß Du genau gesagt hast, Du hättest an Deutsch ja kein Interesse. Schade..._
Amazing video! Great job! Ačiū! With respect from Lietuva 🇱🇹 And to be honest, I doubt there is so much done for Samogitian (Žemaičių) language in Lithuania… which is also unique and with its own rich history and culture!
Thank you fellow Baltic brother for bringing to light this beautiful language as I am half latgalian i very much appreciate this Dievs svētī Latgali. Dievs svētī Latviju. Un Dievs svētī Baltiju
Livonian is Baltic Fin related to Livvi Karelian karelian is name of subjects of the Swedish Carls charlse this region was Hansetic German and influenced the names
My great grandmother said Jūni Jūni nuoc muojās kartupeļus ieēst! Id say Jāni Jāni nāc mājās kartupeļus ēst! And we bough would be considering ourselves to speak latviski, and where she not deaf we could talk to each other just fine. She just spoke the deep latgaliešu highland dialects, while I speak a mix of Vidzemes middle dialect and shallow sēļu highland dialect. Lietuvas relevency whent down hill once their king moved to Varšava. It was the centuries before the PLC when Lietuvas relevency was peek.
And there was that time when a newly elected member of the parliament gave the oath of office in latgalian and the speaker told him to use the correct language. I think the matter was settled and now you are allowed to do it.
I definitely don't doubt that Latgalian is distinct enough to be called an own language, but at the same time it is weird since many de-facto dialects that are way more distinct from the standard language, aren't called languages themselves. For example Bavarian, spoken in most of Austria and Bavaria is a group of dialects but all of them are more distinct from standard high german than danish is from Norwegian. Of course you could argue that there is no standard form of Bavarian, which is right but still it is kind of weird to call Latgalian an own language, me as a Latvian who grew up in Bavaria (and thus don't really speak that good Latvian) can understand most of Latgalian eventhough I am not from that region at all. Like I said I don't doubt that it should be recognised as a language, it is just weird if other languages/dialects that are way different to their standard language aren't.
Good points, it’s a tricky situation and every language/dialect is it own unique case. From one side I wish there was a definite 100% way of determining whether something is a “language” or a “dialect” so that it wouldn’t be as messy as it is, but from another side, the messier it is, the more fascinating and diverse it all becomes!
@@ShamankaIlona exactly, there is no real way to define a language or a dialect. The main reason why an actual dialect is called a language is politics (look at serbo-Croatian for example)
@@duesen00 Politically many Latgallians, I'd even say MOST consider themselves Latgallian and not Latvian, and aprove of Autonomy, sometimes full seperatism, so it does depend.
@@latgalitis8305 I honestly would consider them Latvian and Latgalian. They clearly are part of the ethnicity but form a same branch. Similarly how Bavarians are Germans but have their own cultural identity.
Latgalians are separated ethnos,with own language and culture.They are most old ethnos on this lands.They was assimilated by latvians,by force. Latvian is not nationality,it mean citizen of Latvian Repulic .Kurshi,vendi,latgali,seli,zemgali-this is nationalitys of land,which now is Latvia.
Serbian and Croatian are accents of each other - Accents with armies, but easily mutually comprehensible. In my view it really is about mutual comprehensibility by "most speakers". I readily understand Norwegian (Bokmal) and they understand me (Swedish) so those are accents, or maybe dialects, never mind the spelling differences. Whereas I just don't understand Dutch (altho I'm German) (I know I said Swedish, it's complicated). I can read it kinda sorta but I think the criterion should be spoken, since that is the core of language - digression. So, Shawn, before I get off your lawn, can you understand spoken Latgalian (I assume they can all understand you, since Latvian is standard) ?
I never saw or heard of any official governmental or educational document that defines latgalian as a dialect. The dialects of latvian language are: vidus, tāmnieku and augšzemes which all together consists of more than 500 subdialects (you can find this information in any book of latvian language grammar for schools) . They all together forms the latvian language, but the latvian official written language are based on vidus dialect, while the latgalian written language are based mainly on augšzemes dialect. So, de jure, it's a latvian language and it is automatically meant by third article of our constitution which says that official language of the country are latvian. The Language Law explains it as a historical form of latvian language. The problem is, that Language Law or any other Laws didn't say more about the using possibilities of this written language, and it kind a mean that you can use it anywhere without the limits, but at the same time due to a lack of the detailed reglamentation (contrary to the official latvian) and because of many still living stereotypes (defining the latgalian language as a dialect is one of them, actually) in Latvia's population (including also latgalians), the real progress of surviving this language are slow, and to be honest, I'm not feeling that it will survive at all, because it's all are based on private, mostly enthusiastic and underrated job while the governmental support come slowly, chaotically, in small portions. But the main factor is that, this idea of learning and using latgalian isn't very popular among the population. Why should anyone speak and write in some "secret code" language, or learn it in the schools, when we already have the official one? But, thank you for the video! Peoples of the world must know about human heritage. Lost one, or succeeded one - let's take a beer, wait and see ;)
That classification is the fruit of Ulmanis's genosse linguist Endzelīns, which has not been corrected to this day. To call latgalian as part of some mystical augšzemnieku dialect is absurd. Thats obvious to everyone with rudimentary knowledge of variations of spoken language in different parts of Latvia
@@lolikususs What Endzelīns thought or said has nothing in common with what we see in official Latvian language dialects list in official documentation. Which means that he couldn't find the arguments to strengthen his position. Endzelīns wasn't alone at his work, and this means that all solutions what we see in Latvian language field came thru discussion. You said "correct the Endzelīns". Well, he's already corrected and it happened under his active years. There is an augšzemes dialect which consists of two parts - selonian and non-selonian (sēliskās un nesēliskās izloksnes). Latgalian written language is mainly based on non-selonian subdialects of augšzemes dialect but isn't a separate dialect. We can see even more - he couldn't strengthen his position even in the first period of independence of Latvia - because from the first day until 1934. when K.Ulmanis came into power, latgalian was in the schools and was a book keeping language in Latgale. Problems for Latgalian written language didn't start with Endzelīns, they started and continued with the authoritarian rule. And today we are mainly reproducing the position of Ulmanis and soviet authoritarian regime, than looking at our culture heritage as whole. His thoughts started to realise only when discussion was supressed. It means that this point of view is nothing more than heritage of the soviet regime and must be diminished. Soviet union wasn't interested in any national culture, it wanted to built soviet culture and if there was an option to take out some part of the Latvian culture, they just did it. With the help of Endzelīns or without it, complete assimilation was planned as the only result for our nation in the future. Today we can be proud of clarity of our language and that we have even two written languages. But I'm old enough to remember how Latvian sounded from the lips of ordinary people in TV at 1991. It was such a disaster and full of russian language influence that Latvian national radio channel (Latvijas radio 1) started a new broadcast "Runāsim pareizi latviski!" which lasted for more than 20 years, to teach people use the correct words and sentences in Latvian.
you forgot to mention that....in every city there is a different "latgalian language", I mean, core is the same but "izloksne' or some sht like that is different :D but yeah, its a really awesome language - its unique, its adaptable and it has a lot of cool old-school words.....for next generations to learn....and be confused :D
Latgalians are like Russians, They both have little to do with their ancient counterparts from whom they derive their name. Just like the core Rus' ethnographic territories lay outside the so called “Russia” (which is actually a descendant of a rebellious Rus' colony heavily influenced by the Finnic tribes already living in the area before the establishment of the colony.) So does the core ethnographic territory of ancient latgalians ironically lay outside of modern “Latgale”, west of the rezekne river, in vidzeme. The actual descendants of ancient letgolans are the modern Latvians. Through cooperation with the Germans letgolans subsumed what was left of other Baltic tribes in the area after germans were done killing most them. The modern latgalians are slavicised Balts. Ther language has been heavily influenced by various Slavic languages.
”Moldovan” is not a language, not even a dialect or subdialect. It's simply Romanian with a slight accent. Russians tried to assimilate them since 1812 by different means, and one was to invent a non-existing language filled with slavic words (Russian mostly). Did not stick.
Latgaliešu and latviešu languages are the same language. Latviešu language was formed then the other 4 tribes learned to speak latgaļu langauge in the middle ages. I have no recent ancestors from Latgales. 75% of my ancetors are from Vidzemes and 25% from Kurzemes. I, usually, celebrate Jāņus Zemgalē, in my home. Your accent speaking latviski is right on the border of what I consider acceptable and unacceptable. Fun fact I dont watch Latvijas TV because some anchors pain my ears, which is funny considering how I accept virtually any accent when lisening to english solidly accepting your (perhaps objectively more) flawed english accent.
It's funny how in school, we weren't taught about any of this, we were only taught about Gotthard Friedrich Stender, or prominent 'Young Latvians' like Krišiānis Barons and Juris Alunāns, like, complete erasure of Latgalian history... We've already lost so many accents, dialects and entire languages to history, the very linguistically diverse Curonia is now but a shadow of its former self, most people from western Latvia only speak pure standard Latvian... it is my belief that the goal of this revisionist Latvia only education is to create a culturally homogenous Latvia that has no room for the incredible diversity that once formed its identity... just one identity in service of hollow nationalism...
My mom is Latgalian. As a kid I wanted to learn it from her, but somehow it never happened. Guess I might check out materials you linked, so I could finaly work on this little dream. My mom would shurely be supprised if someday I started to speak to her in Latgalian instead of Latvian. 😄
My dad is Latgalian, and I have been slightly learning the language recently.
Pls tell me you started to actually learn it 😶🌫️
"My mom is Latgalian. As a kid I wanted to learn it from her, but somehow it never happened." How is that even possible?
I enjoyed every moment of this video. First: your English is spectacular. You speak it better than most native English-speakers. I didn't catch a single grammatical or stylistic error anywhere. Your pronunciation is very clear and you speak it in a natural rhythym. Your accent is so faint that it would not be easy to guess where you're from and many people wouldn't notice immediately anyway, especially because you really have it down pat as we say. Secondly the content is fascinating. I did a search for the Latgalian language because I wanted to know something about it and all the information I could have hoped for is here. I also really enjoyed your passionate defense of minority languages. Just personally I find that different forms of verbal expression (call them languages or dialects) make everyone much richer. Thank you very much for taking the time to put this video together. Great job, and I will of course subscribe to your channel now.
Thank you so much! I greatly appreciate all the support, and this comment is one that I won’t soon forget!
Cause he is jew! Jews can learn every nations langueges like gipsy.
@@tetris136is he actually? Cuz that would be unfortunate
@@tetris136 Any healthy human is able to learn to mastery any natural human language...
@@kirillp.4630 By the languages he speaks and opinions he holds its likely.
I am from Lithuania and this is very funny, entertaining and at the same time educational video!!! Thank you for hard work. I know how hard to make video like this...
Aslo, reacently, I started learning latvian language. Language is always apart of history and culture and thats how I found your video. Nice!
Hi, I am from Norway. I fell in love with the Latvian language last year (and now with latgalian), and I am learning Latvian now. As a result of searching on latvian videoes on YT, I stumbled over Latgalian when the song group Tautumeitas sang a song in it, and this language sounds so beautiful! It peaked my interest to learn at least some phrases and visit latgale region. Everything I wanted to learn was all here in your comprehensive video and links. Labs darbiņs kas padarīts! Liels paldies mans draugs, un priecīgas lieldienas!
Our content is 1000 times fewer in number and subsiquently worse in quality compared to english, but I still advise you to look up a letsplay of Heroes of Might and Magic III and see how much you understand.
its great to see that the Latgalian language being spoken again after 100 years of opression im a Livonian myself and id love to see my language get revived one day too
Nice, hope to see you start uploading more regularly again
I hope to see myself doing that as well haha
Nice video, man! I speak Latgalian myself and I can tell you not many people my age speak Latgalian, which is a shame.
Parents don't teach them, cause it's "a bother" and they'll never use it anywhere else other than in the family. And for the most part, it's true, I only use it when I talk to my family or talk with older people. :(
I agree with we are latvians part! We are the same and I will happily be both latvian and latgalian. :)
Did now know about Peter! So cool!
I was about to ask where did you grow up, cause your accent is interesting while you were talking in latvian, but then I heard you talking in russian, lol.
PS. Ausmeņa Kebabs ruļavoj!
The fact that hes a rīdzinieks is rather obvious.
22:29 was listening to this and looked up just as you had put up my poetry acc interview as an example for "old" and "new" writing style differences~
lovely video! will send this to my non-latvian friends since I keep babbling about all things Latgale to them but never explain everything in a coherent manner since there are so many important aspects. thanks
Shawn, I just discovered your wonderful channel. It fills a much needed niche for those of us who also love obscure languages. Please make a goal of posting a new video once a month. Just ONE! Don’t kill yourself by over committing. That leads to burn out. Your channel should be for your own enjoyment and we get to go along for the ride. You have an excellent presentation format that is both informative and entertaining at the same time. I wish you the very best. 😎 btw…I speak English, Spanish, some German, and a little Danish here in Houston, Texas.
Watching this from Morocco, the topic is interesting, and the effort that u did put to collect all the informations and adding the link is amazing. I really enjoyed it
The amount you research to entertain and educate us is inspiring. I'm getting tired seeing how many sources you must have gone through.
The thinking things through tho is a bit lacking tho
eg {
You think latvianizing english words when speaking latvian is taking it too far because youre an anglohpone, ha ha!
Allright then allow me, a speaker of 日本語, to tell you about my favorite アニメ character, with the understanding that anglisizing 日本語 words is taking it too far...
Its ネプテューヌ from 超次元ゲイム ネプテューヌ. Cant read that can you? Yea I thought so.
Now lets anglisize that.
My favorite anime character is Neptune from Hyperdimension Neptunia. Get it? When speaking a language to someone you can not expect them to speak the other languages you do, this is very basic theory of mind. Nativization of foreign words isnt taking it too far, its the bare minimum you must do if unable to find a native equivalent.
}
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 It has been nearly a year since I saw this video, I'm afraid I don't understand the point you're trying to convey to me. I'm guessing you're telling me a lot of extra translation was a necessity?
@@avivlamech-kalambi519 He said that latvianising english names is taking it too far. I pointed out how ridiculous his assertion was by showing what it looks like when you dont anglisize japanese names.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 Thank you for the clarification
18:57 That's so random, it is my university and my hometown. I googled at it seems like there is a German professor, Nicole Nau, head of the Baltology Department at the Institute of Linguistics. She organized a lecture in 2017 about Latgalian titled "Latgalian language, the second Latvian language".
Just watched this video - what an amazing amount of work must have gone into it. Now to work my way through the many other interesting topics on your channel.
May I make a tiny, tiny comment - I noticed on the second 'endangered languages' map that, although there is a Gaelic dot on Ireland and a Breton one on NW France, Great Britain is devoid of dots for Welsh, Manx Gaelic and Scots Gaelic.
Finally, may I, like other commenters, marvel at your outstanding English. There is a young lady (Anete) who has a YT learn Latvian channel who also has amazing command of English. I don't know how the Latvian education system works; but it must be applauded.
ok, first of all congratulations, seriously.
i can't imagine how tough was to find all these resources and explain them the way you did.
thank you so much for sharing it with us, i always imagine latvia as a single-cultured and only latvian speaking country and then i discovered this week about latgalian and livonian.
too much to be shocked, i assume.
once again, congratulations, your content is amazing and the passion in your speech is inspiring.
hugs from brazil, um abraço de outro colega que também adora idiomas e culturas não tão comentadas 🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷
You should definitely visit Latvia, it's incredibly packed with a wide variety of colorful cultural characteristics. Eh just don't focus too much on the swastikas though, they are friendly geometrical patterns over there 😂
Great video! Last times I got so much interested into our braliukas language. I speak Samogitian dialect/language. What made me so surprised, that there are so many common words between Latgalian and one of Samogitian dialects, called ‘dūnininkai’. Not even Lithuanian.
"there's a language called latgalian." Wow, I had no idea.
Thx for introducing me to a new Baltic language
Very interesting and so many information. Even I didn't knew a lot of it. I am Latgalian but I don't use Latgalian in everyday life, but still have accent. I was born in 1979 and in my childhood Latgalian was not considered as cool language and that is a reason why I am not used to speak Latgalian, despite that half of my family still speaks Latgalian.
Very cool and informative video! Thank you for informing me so well about one of the languages of my country.
Delighted to have discovered your channel. Great video! Love the pace, the detail and the humour!
I'm from Kurzeme, so it's nice to hear about the cultural quirks of our eastern siblings. We've got some strange linguistic history too, in the form of the Kurši living along the Curonian spit.
Kursenieki ne kurši.
How well put together. I will share this as much as possible. I have discussions within the family where unfortunately they will not accept Latgalian as a separate language though I do. This should at least give them something concrete to think about. Thank you - thank you.
Great video, I'm looking forward to your future ones.
Hi! I only this week discovered your channel and it's been fantastic. My language heritage is a variant of Igbo called Aniocha and while the entire language is still spoken by millions, over time I fear it may become endangered. My parents never encouraged us to speak it as kids (so English is my first language) so I can only say a few phrases though I understand perfectly.
Endangered languages matter!
Hi, I'm from Lithuania. And to be more exact - from Samogitia. I agree with comparison that "Samogitia = Latgalia of Lithuania". You talk about Latgalia exactly the same like we talk about Samogitia (diferent languages and not dialects, etc). As a Samogitian I find more similarities with Latgalian language (in the manner of speaking) than to Lithuanian.
And about conservativeness, my placing would be like this:
1. Samogitian (most conservative Indo-European language);
2. Lithuanian (modernized/other language influenced Samogitian);
3. Latgalian;
4. Latvian (modernized/other language influenced Latgalian).
Or this:
1. Samogitian/Latgalian;
2. Lithuanian (Samogitian dialect);
3. Latvian (Latgalian dialect).
lol 😅
Samogitian is dialcet of Lithuanian
@@Oberschutzee No it isnt. All linguists outside of Lietuva agree that its its own language, myself from Latvija included.
The north south devide among extant baltic languages is strongest, but there is also an east west divide.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 It is a dialect, the Latgalian language is also a dialect of the Latvian language, and all linguists outside do not agree that it is a separate language.
@@Oberschutzeethere’s literally no way to determine if it’s a dialect or a language because it’s a social construct.
It's lovely to see this for Latgalian! I wish Pa Dutch had as much current enthusiasm
The K/G bit with the under-acutes, reminds me of Plautdietsch. Some speakers have more of a T sound, tj, and others more of a K sound, kj
so you can get words like Kjoakj also being spelt Tjoatj (church)
Yeah, this is noticeable with Flemish and Hollands when they say diminutives like "kleintje" which in Belgium might sound like -ch-, while in the NL like ķ.
Great Video, even I as a Latgalian learned a lot. Only thing that is maybe important but missing in the Video is that the language itself has its own varieties. For example in villages the latgalian language is way more traditional than it is spoken in cities where many words from latvian and russian got modified into latgalian language
This was new to me as a finn. Very interesting. There is though a finno-ugric minority in Kuur peninsula. Please present them in your video. I have seen an old tv program where prof. Pertti Virtaranta spoke with locals this language😌👍
Wow, really appreciate your hard work for this amazing video as Latgalian myself 💪🏻
This is such an amazing work Shawn! Thank you for compiling everything into one video! I grew up not far from Latgale, and have always been fascinated by the Latgalian people and their language, the fact that I myself as native-Latvian speaker can't understand neither Latgalian nor Lithuanian, proves that it deserves to be recognized as a language. It is also by far my most favourite and cutest Baltic language! Always loved to pick up some phrases from it :)
P.S. I would suggest reading up on "Moldovan", quite interesting history. By law in Moldova it is defined to be Romanian, so probably not a comparable to this situation. It used cyrillic as far as I know, but that was introduced by, ofc. the Russians, when they decided to split Romania and keep Moldova under their control.
skill issue
What I love the most about Latgale apart from lakes, forests and people is.. shmakovka served by local moonshine specialists and everything else... just great
I just discovered your channel, fantastic stuff.
25:50 Moldovan isn't a language, it's literally Romanian with a different pronunciation of a couple of words (and that's in informal speech)
Ak dievs, es uzzināju par tavu kanālu caur video par eļvdāļu valodu un brīnījos, no kurienes tu esi, jo es pamanīju akcentu. Izrādās, ka tu esi no Latvijas, tāpat kā es! Bet tavs akcents ir laikam krievu, vai nē?
Paldies par šo video. Mana vecmāte bija polīte no "Daugpiļs".
Fascinating video! You mentioned that Latvian was more influenced by German than Latgalian was; the section at 24:02 actually ties into that. "Kleita" resembles "Kleid", the German word for dress, while "šķēres" resembles "Schere", the German word for scissors. It's always funny to notice German loanwords in places you wouldn't expect, especially because Germany and Latvia are quite far apart.
It is legacy of Teutonic order, Livonia and then what become as Baltic Germans. Also words like švāģeris, duša, štekeris, klavieres, deķis, lustīgs, zaldāts...
In order, I'm guessing these words mean: pregnant, shower, plug, piano, blanket, funny, soldier. How many did I get right?
@@CookieFonster Six! Švāģeris comes from Schwager. It is kind of complicated. From what I remember it can be wife's brother, or sisters husband and some other variations. Like a relative basically.
@@mdjey2 Wow, nice! That's the one I was least sure of. I've never actually heard of the word "Schwager" before. It sounds like a good English translation would be "sibling in law".
Hyped on the upload fire vid didn’t know this language existed
I'm really loving your channel, it's right up my alley. Ive always loved that Latvia or the Duchy of Courland is the least known Colonial power in the Americas. Tobago and I forget what else
Visiting Latgale this summer from Canada. I know my cousins speaking Latgalian will blow my mind! (I have a basic knowledge of Latvian). This has been a great video!
I advise staying away from the russijan areas (you can look up an ethnic map).
You should talk about the case of Old Prussian which is a revived language within the Baltic languages in this case of the western branch of these
Where is ot being revived? I thought there exist no texts in old prussian?
Didnt you have a video about Arabic?
I would love a video about that from you. Great effort you put in your content so keep up the good work!
Hmm, I’ve done a video about Persian, and I’ve also talked a bit about Aramaic in one of my earliest videos, but not Arabic yet. I want to get around to it at some point! العربية رائعة
Latgalian of now is the dialect of Latvian, which is not to be confused with ancient Latgalian. As much as I know, Latvian has evolved from Curronian, Selonian, to some extent from Livonian and in most part of ancient Latgalian.
You see, the Latgallians of now are called "Latgalieši", and the ancient Latgalians are called "Latgali". The same thing Courland, the ones from before are called Curronians, the ones of now are Courlanders.
Its just there is no different denomination in English for ancient Latgalians which was a tribe and for Latgalians of now, who are Latvians who originate from the region of Latgal.
Latviešu language came to be when the other tribes of Latvija learned latgaļu language to comunicate now that they where all part of Livonija.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 actually during crusades half of Curonian and Selonian population died out due to famine and illnesses, after which, those lands previously inhabited by the deceased Curonians and Selonians were occupied by Latgallians. As all those languages were very similar, in Courland and Sellonia they assimilated with Latgallian.
@@sandisastudem6532 "actually during crusades half of Curonian and Selonian population died out due to famine and illnesses" Half seems awfully high. 1/4 is more believable.
"after which, those lands previously inhabited by the deceased Curonians and Selonians were occupied by Latgallians." Latgaļi did not have the numbers to take all the empty land they made up only 2/7 to of the baltic population of Livonia to begin with and they had empty plots of land in their own lands so why move many many days west.
"As all those languages were very similar, in Courland and Sellonia they assimilated with Latgallian." As similar as old norse and old english, uninteligable at first encounter inteligable after a week of learning. Also livonians also learned to speak latgaliski, thats why 15% of latviešu languages vocabulary is of finic origin, and livonian wasnt at all like latgaļu langauge.
Low german and church latin where the languages of the ruling class, latgaļu language was the common language of the better connected commoners.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 well, unfortunately that was 1/2 not 1/4, that's wat I've read. If you don't like word occupied, lets say they just evened out or dispersed to the Courland and Sellonia.
And who also have their language
i love latvia, my step family is all latvian, so even though the Lithuanian urge too hate everyone stays strong, i love my latvian brothers and sister.
Finally you're back! I hoped for a new video from you! 11:22 Hitler's face is creepy
0:35 thats the best way too describe it, russification was bullshit, i went too latvia for a wedding and the apartment blocks always feel depressing
Just found your channel; great stuff! I enjoyed it all
21:40
As a Plautdietsch speaker, pronouncing kj and gj as /kʲ/ and /gʲ/ rather than /c/ and /j/ sounds silly to me as well
What'll bug you even more, though, is that kj is pronounced /ç/ at the beginning of words
@R S123 Northern Paraguay, Northern Mexico, and scattered pockets throughout North America and parts of Central Asia
i was so excited to see that one Latgalian-friendly place on your map in the city of Poznań where i currently live, but i looked it up now and it turns out it's just some local university branch. that's still cool though because i am planning to study in that university so i might learn some Latgalian there if there's such an option
Im obsessed with latvija qnd latgoli loved this video
Especially the latgoli video game and film keep it up
You mentioned my old friend Juris
Cibulis! I was astonished.
Looking at the comment section here, I find it absurd that there is still racism from Latvians against Latgalians, like... wtf guys, it's the 21st Century and you have a population of 2 million, you need to stand together to fight to preserve your languages and cultures (which also does not mean surpressing the Russian language or Russian culture - that's also awful).
Russians come as imperialist ocupats
In latgalia you can have street names in Latgalian
My grandfather's family is from Suwałki. His last name isn't very Polish looking/sounding. The general family consensus is that the name is probably Jadzwingi, the last tribe of the real Prussians to fall/be assimilated in the late 1600's/early 1700's. I don't know much about the Prusi; are they on your list?
Anyway, you're absolutely hysterical! I know enough history of the area to have caught a good number of the jokes.
Fun fact: A Polish king in the early 900's saw the writing on the wall and realized his country had to join one of the Abrahamic religions or have someone try to force one upon them. He invited emissaries to come and make their pitch. He was favoring Islam until he found out about the no alcohol part and figured he'd be deposed if he went with that. The others had eliminated themselves for reasons I've forgotten. Roman Catholicism was the only one remaining, So Poland is catholic purely by default!
Very nice channel! Gonna subscribe right now. Hugs from neighbour belarusian in immigration.
Thanks for these precious informations about latvia !
i’m very happy i’ve found this video
Can you do a video on how Welsh has survived so well seeing as you did Cornish and Breton❓like how it’s the largest Celtic language and the revival and struggle to keep it going etc I think that would be great❗️
Sorry for the emojis my phone can’t type anything that’s not on the main letters keyboard
1:48 - I can actually read and understand meme with Home Alone reference. Proud of my Latgalian heritage!
I drew his attention to your mention of Juris Cibulis (Cibuļs) in this video. I encouraged him to contact you.
Dude! The pronunciation! Who are you?👏👏👏
When Latgalian vs Latvian is discussed, people (e.g. you) tend compare around five words and then proclaim their opinion with too much confidence. These five word comparisons give a highly simplified and unrepresentative picture. For example, there is a Latvian word "dzirkles" which is equivalent to English word "shears". Latvian "kleita" is a loanword from German "Kleid" and Latgalian "sukne" looks to be (for all I know) a loanword from Polish "suknia". This gives me strong vibes of Dunning-Kruger.
Amazing video in other respects.
I'm latgalian too bro. But unfortunately born 1990's . And words that came out of my grandmas or her borthers mouths were too different for nowaday understanding.i think we are influenced a lot by actual latvian language a lot. the language It's getting slowly modernised with latvian and English. and I'm afraid to loose it. I also remember those 3 abc 's that we saw in a picture, which she gave me to study when I was a little child.she kept them away from everyone whose not part of a family. Little latgalian hidden in her corner.
@@beecins Yes. Latgallians I have met consistently refused to speak Latgallian. It makes me so angry. They do not appriciate the lingustic diversity
Suknia actually comes from east Slavic language
Nameiz seems suspiciously similar to Namejs, any connections or is it just me being a dumb foreigner?
Oh you're Latvian? I believe Julingo is Latvian too so it's interesting that Latvians are such language nerds. :) And dude, the fact that you adapt foreign names to Latvian orthography is the coolest thing ever! I wish more languages do this. Of course, I'm probably very much in the minority here but still, there, I said it.
Well done presentation of an interesting language very few outside the Baltics have ever heard of. Especially interesting to Indo-Europeanists, as the Baltic languages (Lithuanian, in particular, with Latgalian in line) have preserved aspects of Proto-Indo-European that the rest of the family has lost.
BTW, "Generalplan Ost": the German word "Ost" rhymes with English "toast." (That is, it's "Ost" not "Öst" [no umlaut].)
_Ja, ich weiß schon, daß Du genau gesagt hast, Du hättest an Deutsch ja kein Interesse. Schade..._
Amazing video! Great job! Ačiū! With respect from Lietuva 🇱🇹 And to be honest, I doubt there is so much done for Samogitian (Žemaičių) language in Lithuania… which is also unique and with its own rich history and culture!
Thank you fellow Baltic brother for bringing to light this beautiful language as I am half latgalian i very much appreciate this
Dievs svētī Latgali.
Dievs svētī Latviju.
Un Dievs svētī Baltiju
in 2017 I met a very old couple in Huntingdon UK who were Latgalian and spoke to me of a Latgalian New Testament published around 1930
Hey. Can you tell me more about Latgalian couple, please?
Livonian is Baltic Fin related to Livvi Karelian karelian is name of subjects of the Swedish Carls charlse this region was Hansetic German and influenced the names
Do Tzakonic language from Peloponesus ,Greece ,It's the last language derived from Doric (Spartan).
There is reason for changing foreign names and names from other languages. It is done for words to correspond to grammatical norms!
My great grandmother said
Jūni Jūni nuoc muojās kartupeļus ieēst!
Id say
Jāni Jāni nāc mājās kartupeļus ēst!
And we bough would be considering ourselves to speak latviski, and where she not deaf we could talk to each other just fine. She just spoke the deep latgaliešu highland dialects, while I speak a mix of Vidzemes middle dialect and shallow sēļu highland dialect.
Lietuvas relevency whent down hill once their king moved to Varšava. It was the centuries before the PLC when Lietuvas relevency was peek.
And there was that time when a newly elected member of the parliament gave the oath of office in latgalian and the speaker told him to use the correct language. I think the matter was settled and now you are allowed to do it.
I definitely don't doubt that Latgalian is distinct enough to be called an own language, but at the same time it is weird since many de-facto dialects that are way more distinct from the standard language, aren't called languages themselves.
For example Bavarian, spoken in most of Austria and Bavaria is a group of dialects but all of them are more distinct from standard high german than danish is from Norwegian.
Of course you could argue that there is no standard form of Bavarian, which is right but still it is kind of weird to call Latgalian an own language, me as a Latvian who grew up in Bavaria (and thus don't really speak that good Latvian) can understand most of Latgalian eventhough I am not from that region at all.
Like I said I don't doubt that it should be recognised as a language, it is just weird if other languages/dialects that are way different to their standard language aren't.
Good points, it’s a tricky situation and every language/dialect is it own unique case. From one side I wish there was a definite 100% way of determining whether something is a “language” or a “dialect” so that it wouldn’t be as messy as it is, but from another side, the messier it is, the more fascinating and diverse it all becomes!
And at the same time there are many languages which are very similar to each other and still considered a separate languages.
@@ShamankaIlona exactly, there is no real way to define a language or a dialect. The main reason why an actual dialect is called a language is politics (look at serbo-Croatian for example)
@@duesen00 Politically many Latgallians, I'd even say MOST consider themselves Latgallian and not Latvian, and aprove of Autonomy, sometimes full seperatism, so it does depend.
@@latgalitis8305 I honestly would consider them Latvian and Latgalian. They clearly are part of the ethnicity but form a same branch. Similarly how Bavarians are Germans but have their own cultural identity.
Latgalians are separated ethnos,with own language and culture.They are most old ethnos on this lands.They was assimilated by latvians,by force.
Latvian is not nationality,it mean citizen of Latvian Repulic .Kurshi,vendi,latgali,seli,zemgali-this is nationalitys of land,which now is Latvia.
Force. Source?
@@lolikususs
Historical books.
Book name?@@djumin1m
@@lolikususs
One of them
I.Valerian-Ethnocied of latgals in Latvija
@@djumin1m He is not Latgalian, and i cant find his book in Latgalian.
Serbian and Croatian are accents of each other - Accents with armies, but easily mutually comprehensible. In my view it really is about mutual comprehensibility by "most speakers". I readily understand Norwegian (Bokmal) and they understand me (Swedish) so those are accents, or maybe dialects, never mind the spelling differences. Whereas I just don't understand Dutch (altho I'm German) (I know I said Swedish, it's complicated). I can read it kinda sorta but I think the criterion should be spoken, since that is the core of language - digression. So, Shawn, before I get off your lawn, can you understand spoken Latgalian (I assume they can all understand you, since Latvian is standard) ?
Ontons Skrynda published the first book on Latgainan Grammar. Looks like more a Latvian Grammar, am I wrong?
I'm going next month!! To tilža in latgale❤❤❤
You should really make a video on Livonian.
I never saw or heard of any official governmental or educational document that defines latgalian as a dialect. The dialects of latvian language are: vidus, tāmnieku and augšzemes which all together consists of more than 500 subdialects (you can find this information in any book of latvian language grammar for schools) . They all together forms the latvian language, but the latvian official written language are based on vidus dialect, while the latgalian written language are based mainly on augšzemes dialect. So, de jure, it's a latvian language and it is automatically meant by third article of our constitution which says that official language of the country are latvian. The Language Law explains it as a historical form of latvian language. The problem is, that Language Law or any other Laws didn't say more about the using possibilities of this written language, and it kind a mean that you can use it anywhere without the limits, but at the same time due to a lack of the detailed reglamentation (contrary to the official latvian) and because of many still living stereotypes (defining the latgalian language as a dialect is one of them, actually) in Latvia's population (including also latgalians), the real progress of surviving this language are slow, and to be honest, I'm not feeling that it will survive at all, because it's all are based on private, mostly enthusiastic and underrated job while the governmental support come slowly, chaotically, in small portions. But the main factor is that, this idea of learning and using latgalian isn't very popular among the population. Why should anyone speak and write in some "secret code" language, or learn it in the schools, when we already have the official one? But, thank you for the video! Peoples of the world must know about human heritage. Lost one, or succeeded one - let's take a beer, wait and see ;)
That classification is the fruit of Ulmanis's genosse linguist Endzelīns, which has not been corrected to this day. To call latgalian as part of some mystical augšzemnieku dialect is absurd. Thats obvious to everyone with rudimentary knowledge of variations of spoken language in different parts of Latvia
@@rolandsv8 Then go and correct genosse linguist J.Endzelīns.
@@lolikususs What Endzelīns thought or said has nothing in common with what we see in official Latvian language dialects list in official documentation. Which means that he couldn't find the arguments to strengthen his position. Endzelīns wasn't alone at his work, and this means that all solutions what we see in Latvian language field came thru discussion. You said "correct the Endzelīns". Well, he's already corrected and it happened under his active years. There is an augšzemes dialect which consists of two parts - selonian and non-selonian (sēliskās un nesēliskās izloksnes). Latgalian written language is mainly based on non-selonian subdialects of augšzemes dialect but isn't a separate dialect. We can see even more - he couldn't strengthen his position even in the first period of independence of Latvia - because from the first day until 1934. when K.Ulmanis came into power, latgalian was in the schools and was a book keeping language in Latgale. Problems for Latgalian written language didn't start with Endzelīns, they started and continued with the authoritarian rule. And today we are mainly reproducing the position of Ulmanis and soviet authoritarian regime, than looking at our culture heritage as whole. His thoughts started to realise only when discussion was supressed. It means that this point of view is nothing more than heritage of the soviet regime and must be diminished. Soviet union wasn't interested in any national culture, it wanted to built soviet culture and if there was an option to take out some part of the Latvian culture, they just did it. With the help of Endzelīns or without it, complete assimilation was planned as the only result for our nation in the future. Today we can be proud of clarity of our language and that we have even two written languages. But I'm old enough to remember how Latvian sounded from the lips of ordinary people in TV at 1991. It was such a disaster and full of russian language influence that Latvian national radio channel (Latvijas radio 1) started a new broadcast "Runāsim pareizi latviski!" which lasted for more than 20 years, to teach people use the correct words and sentences in Latvian.
Amazing video
Ir dzirkles Vidzemē! Senlaicīgāks vārds šķērēm.
Where to find the pronunciation for saying: "Kai jums vadās?" (How are you?)
Those Balts sure are crazy!
Do it about Samogitian language
you forgot to mention that....in every city there is a different "latgalian language", I mean, core is the same but "izloksne' or some sht like that is different :D but yeah, its a really awesome language - its unique, its adaptable and it has a lot of cool old-school words.....for next generations to learn....and be confused :D
Your pronunciation of russian is so damn good
Latgalians are like Russians,
They both have little to do with their ancient counterparts from whom they derive their name.
Just like the core Rus' ethnographic territories lay outside the so called “Russia” (which is actually a descendant of a rebellious Rus' colony heavily influenced by the Finnic tribes already living in the area before the establishment of the colony.)
So does the core ethnographic territory of ancient latgalians ironically lay outside of modern “Latgale”, west of the rezekne river, in vidzeme. The actual descendants of ancient letgolans are the modern Latvians. Through cooperation with the Germans letgolans subsumed what was left of other Baltic tribes in the area after germans were done killing most them. The modern latgalians are slavicised Balts. Ther language has been heavily influenced by various Slavic languages.
”Moldovan” is not a language, not even a dialect or subdialect. It's simply Romanian with a slight accent. Russians tried to assimilate them since 1812 by different means, and one was to invent a non-existing language filled with slavic words (Russian mostly). Did not stick.
Great video, I'm getting some meme vibe from Latvia and I love it
Excellent stuff 😀
thank you!
Cool car model collection. Those look like Soviet cars i suppose.
Paldis tav, par tovu dorbu, Vasals
New Speechleech soon?
How is ķ - "soft T" and ģ - "soft D" ?? Where on earth did you get that, man!?
You burned with Commonwealth joke
i was in learning in RTA
Why do you pronounce Ost as Öst?
best vid for now
Latgaliešu and latviešu languages are the same language. Latviešu language was formed then the other 4 tribes learned to speak latgaļu langauge in the middle ages.
I have no recent ancestors from Latgales. 75% of my ancetors are from Vidzemes and 25% from Kurzemes. I, usually, celebrate Jāņus Zemgalē, in my home.
Your accent speaking latviski is right on the border of what I consider acceptable and unacceptable. Fun fact I dont watch Latvijas TV because some anchors pain my ears, which is funny considering how I accept virtually any accent when lisening to english solidly accepting your (perhaps objectively more) flawed english accent.
0:43 me, a russian: well, about that
It's funny how in school, we weren't taught about any of this, we were only taught about Gotthard Friedrich Stender, or prominent 'Young Latvians' like Krišiānis Barons and Juris Alunāns, like, complete erasure of Latgalian history...
We've already lost so many accents, dialects and entire languages to history, the very linguistically diverse Curonia is now but a shadow of its former self, most people from western Latvia only speak pure standard Latvian... it is my belief that the goal of this revisionist Latvia only education is to create a culturally homogenous Latvia that has no room for the incredible diversity that once formed its identity... just one identity in service of hollow nationalism...