Jamtlandic Dialects - Language

Language

Since the early 20th century it has been wildly debated if Jamtlandic is a dialect or a language. Proponents of Jamtlandic as a language point to the differences in vocabulary and pronunciation. A great percentage of the Jamtish speakers recognise Jamtish as a language rather than a Swedish dialect. There have been efforts to make the Swedish government recognise it as a minority language just as the Yiddish and Sami languages have been. One of the more prominent people that have been active in the effort to make Jamtish a recognised language is Bo Oscarsson. Oscarsson has written books about the Jamtish language/dialect and even compiled dictionaries.

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