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Questions tagged [albanian]

Indo-European language spoken mainly in Albania and Kosovo, in two forms: Gheg and Tosk.

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Albanian, usage of definite nominative for proper nouns

I am learning Albanian using the book "Discovering Albanian". In chapter 2, the book introduces the definitive form of the nominative case and explains how to use it whit proper names. It is ...
Lukas's user avatar
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1 answer
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How certain is the Latin origin of Albanian ”gënjej” (to lie) from Latin (ingannō<ganniō)?

Albanian word gënjej ("to lie") is considered to be of Latin origin — from Vulgar Latin ingannō, from Latin ganniō... These are the only details I could find. Wiktionary gives no scholarly ...
cipricus's user avatar
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Please could someone decode this Albanian phonetics rule for me?

I was reading through a paper on Albanian stress as I am learning Albanian. The general rule, which the paper [available here: https://home.uni-leipzig.de/jtrommer/papers/alb.pdf] claimed functioned ...
ermatveit's user avatar
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1 answer
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How should the Albanian "genitive" really be analysed?

The Albanian language is typically described as having a genitive case. In actuality, this "case" consists of an connective particle which agrees in number, gender AND CASE with the ...
Jeff Leer's user avatar
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4 answers
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Why does Latin, Turkish, and Albanian share common words?

Latin and Albanian are Indo-European languages so it makes sense that those two languages share many words with each-other. But why is it that Turkish — a non-Indo-European language — shares words ...
Get Chimp's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
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Albanian minimal pairs for r vs. rr, xh vs. gj, and q vs. ç

can anyone provide some minimal pairs for these in Albanian? I have just begun studying the language and would like to improve my ability to hear the differences in these, which is challenging as a ...
lukkieseven's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
774 views

Retroflex /r/ in Albanian?

When listening to recordings of spoken Albanian, I sometimes note what sounds like a retroflex /r/; it's less pronounced than in American English, and seems to occur in syllable codas. Now Albanian ...
Nikolay Ershov's user avatar
12 votes
3 answers
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What is an "adjectival article"? Apparently Albanian "të" is one

Being in Albania I decided to sit down with a word frequency list of the language and look each up so I would know some of the common words I see around me. The second most common word in Albanian is ...
hippietrail's user avatar
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What's the etymology of the Albanian word for hello, "tungjatjeta"? [closed]

In Albanian the usual greeting is "tungjatjeta", what is it derived or descended from? What are its origins?
hippietrail's user avatar
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Are there minimal pairs for "l" vs "ll" in Albanian?

I'd like to ask some Albanian speakers to say pairs of words which come as close as possible to differing only by one of each pair having "l" and the other having "ll". I'm trying ...
hippietrail's user avatar
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3 votes
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Which kinds of participle does Albanian have?

There are many kinds of participles. English has two kinds, past participles (eaten) and present participles (eating). The Wikipedia article on the Albanian language doesn't cover as much as many ...
hippietrail's user avatar
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7 votes
2 answers
2k views

Is the "ll" in Albanian like the sounds in other languages?

Albanian has a digraph letter "ll" which is described as being similar to English "dark l". But how similar is it and how different? My native Australian English has dark l and to me it tends to turn ...
hippietrail's user avatar
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10 votes
4 answers
4k views

Is there a general consensus on what modern language is the closest relative of Albanian?

I'm off to Albania tomorrow so starting to get more and more interested in the language. It's one of the outliers on the Indo-European family tree. It's not hard to see a relationship but it's not ...
hippietrail's user avatar
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