Dialect in the consciousness of rural inhabitants (the example of Kielce and Opoczno regions)

The subject matter of the article is the way in which the rural population of two regions, namely Kielce and Opoczno, sees their language. Field studies were conducted in 2018, involving mainly the oldest residents of the village of Lasocin, Kielce County (1993–1997 and later) and 40 villages in Opoczno County in 2018. The responses, recorded using a voice recorder, show that they treat dialect as a variety of language of a limited geographical range: mainly local (borders of one village, several neighbouring villages); regional (e.g. Silesia, Kaszuby, Kielce, Opoczno, Podhale, Kurpie and others), characteristic of the oldest generation. The dialect is also, in their opinion, a vital indicator of local identity, an essential element of community ties (cf. mówić po nasemu). The dialect in the consciousness of the speakers is distinguished by certain linguistic features from the phonetic subsystem, e.g. a narrowed vowel articulation a→o, e→i, y, articulation broadening i, y→e, e.g. piełka, bieł, beła, labialisation of the initial o, denasalisation of nasal vowels ą→o, ę→e, and lexis, e.g. kaj, źmioki, zaściegacka, podwyrze, plindze, nizinier.