Belarusian language

Grammar

Phonetics

The most prominent phonetic features of Belarusian are

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• akannie (???????) ? the tendency to pronounce unstressed "o" and "e" as clear open front unrounded vowel "a";
• dzekanie (?????????) ? the pronunciation of palatalized d as soft affricate dz' (d?);
• tsekanie (????????) ? the pronunciation of palatalized t as soft affricate ts' (?);
• strong palatalization of ? (??) and ? (??).

Some Belarusian sounds in IPA

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Lacinka letterCyrillic letterIPAIPA definitionEnglish approximationExample in Belarusian

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r?alveolar trillrolled (vibrating) r as in arribakrok (????) ? step

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???{{IPA|}}voiceless alveolo-palatal fricativebetween see and sheer?nieh (?????) ? snow

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???{{IPA|}}voiced alveolo-palatal fricativewhere's your?miena (??????) ? change

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d????{{IPA|}}voiced alveolo-palatal affricatewould youd?mu? (???????) ? to blow

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???{{IPA|}}voiceless alveolo-palatal affricatewhat's your?vik (?????) ? nail

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d???{{IPA|}}voiced postalveolar affricatejamurad?aj (???????) ? harvest

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??{{IPA|}}voiced postalveolar fricativetreasure?ach (???) - horror

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??{{IPA|}}voiceless postalveolar affricatekitchen?as (???) ? time

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???{{IPA|}}palatal nasalel Niñoko? (????) ? horse

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ch?voiceless velar fricativeLochchor (???) ? choir

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??{{IPA|}}labial-velar semivowelwindowda? (???) ? gave

Related Topics:
? - ? - Semivowel

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Vocabulary

In terms of lexicon, Belarusian is most closely related to Ukrainian, then to Polish, and only then to Russian.

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Some very basic examples:

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• ????? (vitaju) ? hello
• ?? (jak) ? how
• ?????????? (jak majessia?) ? how are you doing?
• ?????? ?????? (dobraj ranicy) ? good morning
• ???????? (dabranach) ? good night
• ?????? (dziakuj) ? thank you
• ???? ????? (kali laska) ? please, you are welcome
• ?????? / ????????? (spadar / spadarynia) ? mister / missis
• ????? (dobra) ? good
• ?????? / ?????? (kiepska / drenna) ? bad
• ??????? (vydatna) ? excellent
• ??????? (cudouna) ? wonderful
• ??? (dzie) ? where?
• ?????? (adkul) ? where from?
• ???? (chamu) ? why?
• ? ??????? (ja razumieju) ? I understand
• ?????? ?? ??????? (nichoha nie razumieju) ? I don't understand anything

Nouns (nazounik)

There are six cases:

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• Nominative (nazouny)
• Genitive (rodny)
• Dative (davalny)
• Accusative (vinavalny)
• Instrumental (tvorny)
• Locative (mesny)

There is also a seventh case, vocative (klichny), but in modern Belarusian it's very rarely used, so in contemporary textbooks most often you'll see just the first six cases mentioned.

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For nouns there are several types of declension:

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• i-stem ? feminine (feminine nouns ending in a hard consonant, soft consonant or ?: ??? "stove", ?????? "bone", ???? "blood")
• a-stem ? mostly feminine (subdivided into four subgroups: hard stems, guttural stems, soft stems, hardened stems)
• o-stem ? masculine (subdivided into hard stem and soft stem) and neuter (????? "oar", ???? "sea")
• consonantal stem ? mostly neuter (???? "lamb", ?????? "burden", ???? "seed")
• irregular nouns (for example, ???? "eye" and ???? "ear")

Pronouns (zajmiennik)

In Belarusian there are eight types of pronouns (??????????):

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• Possessive (???????????): ??? (my, mine); ???? (your(s)familiar); ???, ????? (his); ??, ???? (her); ???, ????? (our(s)); ??? (your(s)); ??, ???? (their(s)), ???? ((one's) own).
• Personal (????????): ? (I), ?? (you (familiar)), ?? (he), ??? (she), ??? (it), ?? (we), ?? (you), ??? (they);
• Negative (????????): ????? (nobody), ????? (nothing), ????? (nobody's), ????? (not of any kind), ????????, ??????? (no one);
• Definitive (???????????): ??? (-self); ???? ("the very", - self); ????? (all, whole); ??? (all, everything); ??? (all, every, everybody); ?????, ??????? (every, any); ????? (each); ???? (other).
• Indefinite (????????): ????? (someone); ????? (something); ????? (some, ?); ???? (somebody's, a); ???????? (some of); ???????? (a few, some, several); ?????, ??????? (somebody); ?????, ??????? (something); ??????? (somebody's); ???????, ???-??????? (some, a kind of, something like); ???-???????, ???-??????? (anybody); ???-???????, ???-??????? (anything); ???-??????? (some one's); ???-??? (smth.dickey); ???-??? (a, somebody's (negative)); ???-??? (dickey).
• Interrogative-comparative (?????????): ??? (who), ??? (what), ??? (which), ?????? (which), ??? (whose), ?????? (how much);
• Demonstrative (??????????): ??? (that); ???? (this); ???? (this/that); ???? (such); ?????, ?????? (such, of this kind); ???????, ???????? (that much);
• Reflexive (????????): ???? (-self).