Prof. Olko: Recognizing Wymysorys as a regional language would be a breakthrough

On Wednesday, the Senate supported the draft amendment establishing Wymysorys as a regional language. According to Professor Justyna Olko, signing the amendments by the president would be a breakthrough and demonstrate that, regardless of scale, every community has the right to protect its cultural and linguistic distinctiveness.

Wymysorys—whose proper name is "wymysioeryś"—is spoken as the indigenous vernacular of the town of Wilamowice in Bielsk County, Silesian Voivodeship. Today, there are about a dozen fluent Wymysorys speakers, and several dozen with basic competence.

If the president signs the amendment to the Act on National and Ethnic Minorities and Regional Languages, Wymysorys will become the second regional language in Poland—after Kashubian. Regional language is a legal category. The inclusion of a language in the aforementioned act signifies the Polish state's commitment to supporting it, not that it is just becoming a language.

According to Wymysorys researcher and activist Dr. Tymoteusz Król, including their language in the law would also have great symbolic significance for Wymysorys residents. "The ban on the use of Wymysorys issued in 1945 was never officially lifted, and those who suffered persecution have not received an apology. Granting Wymysorys statutory protection would be such symbolic redress," he said.

In turn, according to Professor Justyna Olko, director of the Centre for Engaged Research on Cultural Continuity at the University of Warsaw, this would be a breakthrough, as Wymysorys would become the smallest official minority language in Europe.

– It would also show that regardless of the scale, every community has the right to protect its distinctiveness, its identity, its language – and that this local identity is an added value for the entire country, for our unity in diversity – she said in an interview with PAP.

The local community itself, with the support of collaborating researchers specializing in minority languages, has been seeking recognition of Wymysorys as a regional language since 2013. In addition to members of the parliamentary commission, the team developing the draft amendment included Professor Tomasz Wicherkiewicz, Dr. Tymoteusz Król, and Professor Justyna Olko.

The origins of the Wymysorys language are unclear and indicate that its speakers were settlers not only from one place – present-day Germany and the Netherlands – but also from England, among others. Its diversity was also influenced by the numerous trade contacts of Wymysorys merchants visiting distant cities in Western Europe.

"The first settlers arrived there in the 13th century. Their language survived for several hundred years, developing and evolving in the midst of Slavic languages—variants that can today be associated with Polish, Czech, and Silesian. In a sense, the Wymysorys language has become unique—it is based on a Germanic base, but with very strong Slavic influences," explained Professor Justyna Olko.

Wymysorys was widely spoken until World War II. It was not only a domestic language but also a literary one, with literary works also being written in it.

During World War II, the Wilamowiceans, like many inhabitants of territories incorporated into the Third Reich, were forced to sign the Volksliste and forcibly conscripted into the Wehrmacht. For this reason, after the war ended, they were persecuted by the then communist Polish authorities. Therefore, the language was officially banned throughout the entire community, and over time, researchers condemned it to extinction.

"Despite prohibitions and repression, many Wilamowiceans used this language among themselves in their homes. Thanks to this, at the beginning of the 21st century, the oldest Wilamowiceans were able to pass on their language to the youngest generation. Some of these young Wilamowiceans eventually became activists for the revitalization of the language," the scientist explained.

As Professor Olko explained, today in Wilamowice, young people speak this language, perform plays in Wilamowicean, and books are being translated. A Museum of Wilamowice Culture has also been established, directed by Justyna Majerska-Sznajder, also a researcher at the Center for Engaged Research on Cultural Continuity at the University of Warsaw.

"Today, in addition to the several dozen young people who use this language, there is also a group of about 200 people in Wilamowice who are passive users. These are people who were bullied for using it as children," said Dr. Król. (PAP)

Science in Poland

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