The mutual intelligibility of Slavic languages as a source of support for the revival of the Sorbian language

Abstract

This study reports on the results of a listening-task experiment concerning the intelligibility of Czech, Polish and Slovak to students of the Sorbian-language secondary school in Bautzen/Budyšin, Germany. The analysis focuses on the question of whether the knowledge of Sorbian enables the comprehension of other Slavic languages, as Sorbian language activists claim, and to what extent approximately.

Keywords

• Sorbian
• intelligibility
• Slavic languages
• language revival