Weert dialect

Weert dialect
Wieërts
Pronunciation	[βiəʀts]
Native to	Netherlands
Region	Weert
Language family	Indo-European Germanic West Germanic Low Franconian Meuse-Rhenish Limburgish West Limburgish[1] Weert dialect
Official status
Official language in	Limburg, Netherlands: Recognised as regional language as a variant of Limburgish.
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
Glottolog	None

Weert dialect or Weert Limburgish (natively Wieërts, Standard Dutch: Weerts [ʋeːrts]) is the city dialect and variant of Limburgish spoken in the Dutch city of Weert alongside the Dutch language (with which it is not mutually intelligible). All of its speakers are bilingual with standard Dutch.^[1]

It has two varieties: Stadsweerts, spoken in the city centre, and the more rural dialect.^[1]

Phonology

Consonants

Consonant phonemes^[2]

		Labial	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Dorsal	Glottal
Nasal		m	n	(ɲ)	ŋ
Plosive	voiceless	p	t	(c)	k
	voiced	b	d	(ɟ)	ɡ
Fricative	voiceless	f	s	(ʃ)	x	h
	voiced	v	z	(ʒ)	c
	trill				ʀ
Approximant		β	l		j

• /m, p, b, β/ are bilabial, whereas /f, v/ are labiodental.^[1]
• /n, l/ are realized as postalveolar [ɲ, ʎ] when they occur before /c, ɟ/.^[3]
• /ɲ, c, ɟ, ʃ, ʒ/ are marginal phonemes.^[3]
  • In the syllable onset, /c, ɟ, ʃ, ʒ/ can occur only in proper names and loanwords.^[3]
  • /ɲ/ occurs only intervocalically.^[3]
• /ŋ, k, ɡ, x, ɣ/ are velar, whereas /j/ is palatal.^[1]
  • /ɡ/ occurs only intervocalically. Younger speakers tend to merge it with /ɣ/.^[3]
  • Word-initial /x/ is restricted to loanwords.^[3]
  • /x, ɣ/ are realized as pre-velar [x̟, ɣ˖] when they are preceded or followed by a front vowel.^[3]
• /ʀ/ is a voiced fricative trill, either uvular [ʀ̝] or pre-uvular [ʀ̝˖]. The fricative component is particularly audible in the syllable coda, where a partial devoicing to [ʀ̝̊ ~ ʀ̝̊˖] also occurs.^[3]

Vowels

Monophthongs of the Weert dialect, from Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998:110). The close-mid vowels /eː, øː, ʊ, oː/ are not shown.

Monophthong phonemes^[4]

	Front				Central	Back
	unrounded		rounded		unrounded
	short	long	short	long	short	short	long
Close	i	iː	y	yː		u	uː
Close-mid	ɪ	(eː)	ʏ	(øː)	ə	(ʊ)	(oː)
Open-mid	ɛ	ɛː	œ	œː		ɔ	ɔː
Near-open	æ	æː
Open		aː				ɑ	ɑː

• Most of the non-central vowels are more or less centralized, but only /ə/ is phonetically central. The most strongly centralized vowel is /ʏ/, whereas the least strongly centralized vowels are /i, iː/.^[5]
• Among back vowels, /u, uː, ʊ, oː, ɔ, ɔː/ are rounded, whereas /ɑ, ɑː/ are unrounded.
  • /ʊ/ is used only by older speakers.^[6] Its exact phonetic quality is unknown, but it is probably more or less close-mid advanced back [o̟].
• The /ʏ/-/œ/ and /ɛ/-/æ/ contrasts seem to have begun to collapse.^[6]
• The short close-mid vowels /ɪ, ʏ/ are somewhat lower than close-mid [e̞, ø̞]. /ʏ/ is similar to the schwa /ə/; besides rounding, practically the only difference between those is that /ʏ/ is somewhat more front and slightly higher than /ə/.^[5]
• The long close-mid vowels /eː, øː, oː/ occur only in the rural variety, and correspond to the centering diphthongs /iə, yə, uə/ in Stadsweerts. The vowels traditionally transcribed with /eː, øː, oː/ are actually centering diphthongs /eə, øə, oə/; see below.^[7]
• /ə/ is mid [ə]. It occurs only in unstressed syllables.^[8]
• The open-mid front vowels /ɛ, ɛː, œ, œː/ are somewhat higher than open-mid [ɛ̝, ɛ̝ː, œ̝, œ̝ː], but the back open-mid vowels /ɔ, ɔː/ are actually open-mid [ɔ, ɔː].^[5]
  • /œ/ is realized as much more open [ɶ] when it occurs before /j/.^[5]
• /æ, æː/ are best described as somewhat lowered open-mid [ɛ̞, ɛ̞ː].^[5]

Part 1 of the Weert dialect diphthongs, from Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998:110)

Part 2 of the Weert dialect diphthongs, from Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998:110)

Diphthong phonemes^[9]

Starting point		Ending point
		Front	Central	Back
Close	unrounded		iə
	rounded		yə uə
Close-mid	unrounded		eə
	rounded		øə oə
Open-mid	unrounded	ɛi		ʌu
	rounded	œy

• The first elements of /yə, uə, øə, oə, œy, ʌu/ are somewhat centralized ([ÿ, ü, ø̈, ö, œ̈, ʌ̈], respectively), but are not central enough to be labelled as central. Among these, the first elements of /øə, œy/ are the most strongly centralized.^[5]
• /eə, øə, oə/ pattern with the long monophthongs, rather than the other diphthongs. For this reason, they may be transcribed /eː, øː, oː/.^[6]
  • Before nasal consonants, /eə, øə/ are monophthongized to [ɪː, ʏː].^[6]
  • The second elements of /eə/ and especially /oə/ are less central ([e̽, ɤ̽], respectively) than it is the case with other centering diphthongs, of which the second element is more like [ə].^[5]
• The second elements of /ɛi, œy, ʌu/ are mid-centralized ([ɪ, ʏ, ʊ], respectively).^[5]

References

1. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), p. 107.
2. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), pp. 107–108.
3. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), p. 108.
4. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), pp. 107, 109–110.
5. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), p. 110.
6. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), p. 109.
7. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), pp. 107, 109.
8. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), pp. 108, 110.
9. Heijmans & Gussenhoven (1998), pp. 109–110.

Bibliography

• Heijmans, Linda; Gussenhoven, Carlos (1998), "The Dutch dialect of Weert" (PDF), Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 28: 107–112, doi:10.1017/S0025100300006307