Meadow Mari language
Uralic language of the Mari El Republic, Russia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Meadow Mari, also known as Meadow-Eastern Mari, or Eastern Mari, is a standardised dialect of the Mari language used by about half a million people mostly in European Russia. Meadow Mari, Hill Mari, and Russian are official languages in the republic of Mari El in the Russian Federation.[3]
| Meadow–Eastern Mari | |
|---|---|
| олык марий, olyk marij | |
| Native to | Russia |
| Region | Mari El |
| Ethnicity | Meadow Mari, Eastern Mari |
Native speakers | 470,000 (2012)[1] |
| Cyrillic | |
| Official status | |
Official language in | Russia |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | mhr |
| Glottolog | east2328 |
| ELP | Eastern Mari |
 Meadow Mari | |
 Eastern Mari is classified as Definitely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger[2] | |
Meadow Mari and Eastern Mari are distinct language varieties, which both use the Meadow Mari literary standard.[4] The main differences between Meadow Mari and Hill Mari are phonological, and to a lesser extent, morphological.[5]
Alphabet
Phonology
Consonants
/f, x, ts/ primarily occur in Russian loanwords.
Vowels
Meadow Mari has no diphthongs.
Grammar
Meadow Mari is primarily a suffixing, agglutinating language. It displays vowel harmony between rounded and unrounded vowels. Nouns decline for case, number, and possession.[6]
Nouns
Nouns can decline for case, number, and possession. The order of the suffixes is not fixed, and can change depending on context.[7]
Number
Nouns in Meadow Mari have singular and plural forms, with the singular being unmarked. However, the plural form is not used when it is clear from context. There are four potential plural suffixes: -vlak, -šaməč, -la, and -mət. They are partially interchangeable, but not completely.[8] -vlak is the most common suffix. In contrast to the other suffixes, -mət denotes the associative plural.
Possession
There are three ways to show possession in Meadow Mari: through a dedicated suffix attached to the noun, and a personal pronoun preceding the possessed noun, which may or may not have a possessive suffix.[9]
| joča "child" | ||
|---|---|---|
| Suffix Only | joča-m | "(my) child-poss" |
| Pronoun and Suffix | məjən joča-m | "1sg.gen child-poss |
| Pronoun without suffix | məjən joča | "1sg.gen child" |
There are 6 possessive suffixes, which agree with person and number.
| lüm "name" | |
|---|---|
| 1SG | lüm-em |
| 2SG | lüm-et |
| 3SG | lüm-žö |
| 1PL | lüm-na |
| 2PL | lüm-da |
| 3PL | lüm-əšt |
Possessive suffixes are typically only combined with the plural suffixes -vlak and -šaməč. The suffixes can be appended to the noun in any order, however it is most common for the possessive suffix to come first. Example: təlat joltaš-et-vlak jəηgərtenət "your friends called you."[10]
