The Scanian language (Swedish: Skånska, Danish: Skånsk) is the language indigenous to the region of southern Sweden once known as Terra Scania, of which the Swedish province of Scania constitutes the main part. There exists no common understanding of what is to be considered Scanian and what is not. The notion of Scanian as a separate language is controversial: Scanian is regarded as a dialect of Swedish by most speakers; and also by most Swedish speakers.

Different Scanian dialects differ considerably, and none of them are standardized or supported by any governmental authorities. Swedish is the language of education and government, and Swedish vocabulary and grammar dominate most dialects. The spoken prestige dialect(s) must be considered as a variety of Standard Swedish. Following the industrial revolution and urbanization, genuine rural dialects are in decline.

The term Scanian may be applied to dialects spoken by populations of vastly different sizes inhabiting an area of similarly differing size:

• In its very widest meaning, it may be used as a catch-all denomination for all Swedish dialects of Southern Scandinavia where the exclusive use of uvular R dominates, which is delimited by a border that stretches approximately from Varberg in the West over Jönköping to Oskarshamn in the East. (approx. 2 mill. speakers) This is the same as the more narrow definition of the area were South Swedish Standard is the spoken variety of Standard Swedish.
• More strictly, it may denominate the dialects of the province of Scania. (approx. 1.2 mill. inhabitants), or some subset of these.
• In its most narrow meaning, it includes genuine rural dialects (less than 100.000 speakers).

There is an insignificant number of Scanian separatists who hold the view that Scanian is a supressed minority language in Sweden and should receive legal protection by being granted official status.

Specific features

Scanian is a uvular R-language. Like Danish and several dialects of Norwegian Scanian realizes /r/ as a uvular trill or fricative rather than with the alveolar articulation and retroflex assimilations of Svealand Swedish and some other varieties of Swedish.

Additionally, the prosody of Scanian differs from (other) Swedish dialects, and overall Scanian is most closely related to the east Danish dialects spoken on the island of Bornholm, which is why some linguists prefer to classify Scanian as a variety of Danish.

History

Immediately following the acquisition of Skåne from Denmark in 1658 along with territories on the Swedish west coast known as Skåneland or "Terra Scania", a process of Swedification took place, including a switch of language used in church. The transformation became more successful with the 20th century dominance of Swedish language radio and television and the increased travelling from other regions in Sweden. The gradual language transition from Danish to Swedish resulted in a mix between these two languages. Before the 18th century, Scanian can be characterized as a dialect of Danish, but nowadays it clearly has mostly Swedish characteristics where basically only the pronounciation and some grammar differing from standard Swedish.

See also

• Jamska
• Gutnish
• Dalecarlian language

External link

• Language Tree - Ethnologue report
• the Scanian Institute - a Scanian regionalist organization advocating the rights of Scanian as a seperate language