4 ms·

Basque native here, studied in the University of the Basque country (mentioned in the article) and most of my family teaches there, a few are linguists includin

Basque native here, studied in the University of the Basque country (mentioned in the article) and most of my family teaches there, a few are linguists including my father. Let me know if you are curious about anything, I am happy to answer. I am obviously biased as a native speaker, but I am surprised it is considered the hardest language to learn. Yes sentences have an unusual order, and most pronouns and determinants are embedded as postfixes of other words, especially verbs. However, phonetically it is almost indistinguishable from Spanish at this point. The alphabet is latin and each letter directly corresponds to a single sound (except for silent h). Spelling is "as it sounds", very consistent and much simpler than other languages I have learned. The vocabulary includes large quantities of romance (from latin, mostly Spanish) loan words that will sound familiar to most Europeans. And the sentence structure and vocabulary are often (incorrectly) streered towards Spanish/French patterns in casual speech.

_glass 4y ago
I know, I know the Vasconic substrate hypothesis is rejected by a lot of linguists, but I know some linguists that find it intriguing. What do you think? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasconic_substrate_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasconic_substrate_hypothesis
- oersted 4y ago
  I don't have a strong opinion on the matter, evidence is very sparse. There is a strong consensus that Basque is not Indo-European. It is also seems likely that the Basque language (or an ancestor) was used in the surrounding area before the large Indo-European migration from the east, Basque doesn't seem to have been brought by a different migration from somewhere else, at least not after pre-history. The Vasconic Substrate Hypothesis suggests that Basque was a major language in Europe from prehistory or at least the neolithic, and that it influenced most modern European languages. That's rather a stretch, modern western European languages are mostly a mix between Indo-European variants and Latin, to a larger or smaller degree. Claiming another pre-indo-european layer under all that, I mean, sure, maybe, but it is diluted to an extent that makes it rather irrelevant. The evidence for that is very weak, it depends on how literally you interpret the theory. I think it is arrogant to suggest that those ancient languages were basque, rather modern basque has some distant roots in those pre-indo-european languages. In my opinion, the more correct way of expressing it would be that this proto-basque was part of a large family of related languages spoken in Europe during the neolithic. There is no proper evidence that proto-basque was widespread, it's just that it is the only preserved remnant from that linguistic era at large.
prox 4y ago
Is there a (reconstructed) “purer” form of Basque that is no longer spoken, or is that lost in the mist of time due to intermixing of roman/spanish?
- oersted 4y ago
  There is some research into proto-basque (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Basque_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Basque_language), although I wouldn't characterize it as purer. This is mostly a theoretical exercise, extrapolating back patterns observed in Latin loanwords changed after being absorbed and differences between modern dialects. Brief parenthesis: There are still significant differences in the language within a couple hundred km, to the point where it can be very hard to understand each other. An effort was made during the 60s to define a Standard Basque (Euskara Batua: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Basque https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Basque) for education, bureaucracy and law. It is comparable to the unification of Mandarin Chinese at a smaller scale. Back to the topic of older basque. You have to consider that there's a clear record of the basque living under roman rule, and the region has been under larger powers (but also relatively isolated and autonomous) for its entire history. The intermixing with romance languages started all the way back with original Latin, and the discovery discussed in the article also shows heavy influence from pre-roman iberian languages in the use of their alphabet, even if the languages probably had different roots (iberian is indo-european, basque not). Nevertheless, the language in this discovery is not really considered basque but more of an ancestor. There is a large gap in the written record, very little has been found between early Roman times and the first writings in modern Basque well into the Middle Ages, at which point heavier intermixing with the rest of Europe started during the 1500s with the pioneering of large-scale whaling and a thriving ship-building economy. It's not really clear when modern basque started, and it has been heavily influenced by other languages pretty much since the neolithic.
  - prox 4y ago
    Thank you for your in depth reply, it’s a fascinating language!
  - torben-friis 4y ago
mbustamanter 4y ago
Hello, I'm a Chilean descendant of Basques. I've a question regarding basque culture and heritage (of which I unfortunately know too little). Have basque authorities contemplated the declining population with low TFR and how it will impact the continuation of customs and most importantly, the language?
- oersted 4y ago
  I haven't heard much discussion connecting the declining population to the preservation of the culture. Generally, since the criminalization of the basque language during the dictatorship, most of the focus has been in encouraging the existing population to engage in the culture and the language. This effort has been relatively successful. A significant majority of students do all their studies, including university, fully in basque (>75%, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language#/media/File:Irakatsia.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language#/media/File:Ir...). There are many families that exclusively speak basque at home. And traditional basque public holidays and sports are prominent, popular, and frequent throughout the year. There is a serious concern however, that Basque is becoming entrenched into a language only for education, bureaucracy and family life. It is much less popular in the streets and between friends, especially in the capitals of the provinces. This is partially affected by the significant reduction in funding for basque TV, films and dubbing, especially when it comes to cartoons for young children, as well as sketch comedy, which were so influential to my generation (funnily enough, basque dubbed anime was quite big!). Nevertheless, the fertility-rate in the Basque country has actually been one of the lowest in Europe for the last few years. The conversation around it is more about the economy than culture. It is already seriously affecting primary schools, which are starting to compete a lot more and some are closing down. There are bigger problems in the public conscience lately (COVID, Ukraine, Energy Crisis...), and it will take at least another generation for the consequences of the low fertility rate to be felt, but there is an awareness of looming demographic trouble.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
livindub 4y ago
Belgian here, my wife is French Basque from Baiona. Her grandmother says she can't understand the Spanish Basques anymore. She says they created a new language or some hybrid form intended as a unified dialect or something. Has there been a spanification in recent years?
- oersted 4y ago
  I wasn't aware that this is the perspective from the French side, but I can easily believe it. There are a few factors. Generally the Spanish basque provinces have a significantly larger population, larger economy and more autonomy than the French provinces. In France Basque is not an official language in the region and is only available with private schooling. France is also very Paris-centric and very little support is given to the fringes. In Spain we keep the vast majority of our taxes, have our own local parliament and president, as well as fully independent social security, healthcare, police and education, almost all in basque, public and private. As a result, the vast majority of support for Basque has been focused on the Spanish regions, which might have increased the separation. There is indeed a Standard Basque defined during the 60s for education, media and governance. Not sure if she is referring to this, it did consider all seven major dialects, including the French ones, but it is quite biased to the dialect from the central province (Gipuzkoa) and is significantly different to dialects at the edges of the region, to the point where mutual comprehension is a legitimate challenge. The French dialects also have, well, a strong French accent, including different vowels, I also struggle to understand them. Whereas the Spanish dialects have almost the exact same phonemes as Spanish. It would probably sound like Spanish to a non-speaker, even if the grammatical differences are vast. It is also possible that she is referring to the fact that many people in the Spanish provinces just don't speak Basque very well. This is actually because of a positive achievement: most students study in basque now. The thing is that often their parents don't speak it, they tend to become friends with others with Spanish speaking families, and they end up just using Basque for school. And in school they learn to understand the language and write it well, but struggle to speak it, often with a heavy dose of Spanish elements and sentence patterns. None of this is all that new though, unless by "recent years" she means the last 30, which is not unreasonable.
  - 4y ago

_glass 4y ago

I know, I know the Vasconic substrate hypothesis is rejected by a lot of linguists, but I know some linguists that find it intriguing. What do you think? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasconic_substrate_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasconic_substrate_hypothesis

oersted 4y ago
I don't have a strong opinion on the matter, evidence is very sparse. There is a strong consensus that Basque is not Indo-European. It is also seems likely that the Basque language (or an ancestor) was used in the surrounding area before the large Indo-European migration from the east, Basque doesn't seem to have been brought by a different migration from somewhere else, at least not after pre-history. The Vasconic Substrate Hypothesis suggests that Basque was a major language in Europe from prehistory or at least the neolithic, and that it influenced most modern European languages. That's rather a stretch, modern western European languages are mostly a mix between Indo-European variants and Latin, to a larger or smaller degree. Claiming another pre-indo-european layer under all that, I mean, sure, maybe, but it is diluted to an extent that makes it rather irrelevant. The evidence for that is very weak, it depends on how literally you interpret the theory. I think it is arrogant to suggest that those ancient languages were basque, rather modern basque has some distant roots in those pre-indo-european languages. In my opinion, the more correct way of expressing it would be that this proto-basque was part of a large family of related languages spoken in Europe during the neolithic. There is no proper evidence that proto-basque was widespread, it's just that it is the only preserved remnant from that linguistic era at large.

prox 4y ago

Is there a (reconstructed) “purer” form of Basque that is no longer spoken, or is that lost in the mist of time due to intermixing of roman/spanish?

oersted 4y ago
There is some research into proto-basque (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Basque_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Basque_language), although I wouldn't characterize it as purer. This is mostly a theoretical exercise, extrapolating back patterns observed in Latin loanwords changed after being absorbed and differences between modern dialects. Brief parenthesis: There are still significant differences in the language within a couple hundred km, to the point where it can be very hard to understand each other. An effort was made during the 60s to define a Standard Basque (Euskara Batua: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Basque https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Basque) for education, bureaucracy and law. It is comparable to the unification of Mandarin Chinese at a smaller scale. Back to the topic of older basque. You have to consider that there's a clear record of the basque living under roman rule, and the region has been under larger powers (but also relatively isolated and autonomous) for its entire history. The intermixing with romance languages started all the way back with original Latin, and the discovery discussed in the article also shows heavy influence from pre-roman iberian languages in the use of their alphabet, even if the languages probably had different roots (iberian is indo-european, basque not). Nevertheless, the language in this discovery is not really considered basque but more of an ancestor. There is a large gap in the written record, very little has been found between early Roman times and the first writings in modern Basque well into the Middle Ages, at which point heavier intermixing with the rest of Europe started during the 1500s with the pioneering of large-scale whaling and a thriving ship-building economy. It's not really clear when modern basque started, and it has been heavily influenced by other languages pretty much since the neolithic.
- prox 4y ago
  Thank you for your in depth reply, it’s a fascinating language!
- torben-friis 4y ago

mbustamanter 4y ago

Hello, I'm a Chilean descendant of Basques. I've a question regarding basque culture and heritage (of which I unfortunately know too little). Have basque authorities contemplated the declining population with low TFR and how it will impact the continuation of customs and most importantly, the language?

oersted 4y ago
I haven't heard much discussion connecting the declining population to the preservation of the culture. Generally, since the criminalization of the basque language during the dictatorship, most of the focus has been in encouraging the existing population to engage in the culture and the language. This effort has been relatively successful. A significant majority of students do all their studies, including university, fully in basque (>75%, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language#/media/File:Irakatsia.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language#/media/File:Ir...). There are many families that exclusively speak basque at home. And traditional basque public holidays and sports are prominent, popular, and frequent throughout the year. There is a serious concern however, that Basque is becoming entrenched into a language only for education, bureaucracy and family life. It is much less popular in the streets and between friends, especially in the capitals of the provinces. This is partially affected by the significant reduction in funding for basque TV, films and dubbing, especially when it comes to cartoons for young children, as well as sketch comedy, which were so influential to my generation (funnily enough, basque dubbed anime was quite big!). Nevertheless, the fertility-rate in the Basque country has actually been one of the lowest in Europe for the last few years. The conversation around it is more about the economy than culture. It is already seriously affecting primary schools, which are starting to compete a lot more and some are closing down. There are bigger problems in the public conscience lately (COVID, Ukraine, Energy Crisis...), and it will take at least another generation for the consequences of the low fertility rate to be felt, but there is an awareness of looming demographic trouble.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

livindub 4y ago

Belgian here, my wife is French Basque from Baiona. Her grandmother says she can't understand the Spanish Basques anymore. She says they created a new language or some hybrid form intended as a unified dialect or something. Has there been a spanification in recent years?

oersted 4y ago
I wasn't aware that this is the perspective from the French side, but I can easily believe it. There are a few factors. Generally the Spanish basque provinces have a significantly larger population, larger economy and more autonomy than the French provinces. In France Basque is not an official language in the region and is only available with private schooling. France is also very Paris-centric and very little support is given to the fringes. In Spain we keep the vast majority of our taxes, have our own local parliament and president, as well as fully independent social security, healthcare, police and education, almost all in basque, public and private. As a result, the vast majority of support for Basque has been focused on the Spanish regions, which might have increased the separation. There is indeed a Standard Basque defined during the 60s for education, media and governance. Not sure if she is referring to this, it did consider all seven major dialects, including the French ones, but it is quite biased to the dialect from the central province (Gipuzkoa) and is significantly different to dialects at the edges of the region, to the point where mutual comprehension is a legitimate challenge. The French dialects also have, well, a strong French accent, including different vowels, I also struggle to understand them. Whereas the Spanish dialects have almost the exact same phonemes as Spanish. It would probably sound like Spanish to a non-speaker, even if the grammatical differences are vast. It is also possible that she is referring to the fact that many people in the Spanish provinces just don't speak Basque very well. This is actually because of a positive achievement: most students study in basque now. The thing is that often their parents don't speak it, they tend to become friends with others with Spanish speaking families, and they end up just using Basque for school. And in school they learn to understand the language and write it well, but struggle to speak it, often with a heavy dose of Spanish elements and sentence patterns. None of this is all that new though, unless by "recent years" she means the last 30, which is not unreasonable.
- 4y ago