Weert dialect

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

• /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.

• 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)

• 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

Bibliography