Contact:
Veveří 97
602 00 Brno
Czech Republic
About the Department of Dialectology:
The Department of Dialectology is the only academic institution in the Czechia that systematically examines non-standard forms of the Czech national language; aside from traditional territorial dialects and formation of interdialects, the Department studies the peculiarities of colloquial language, even in areas with various degrees of population migration, i.e. in cities and border areas. Current research focuses on a dialect lexicon of the appellative and proprial spheres of language.
Our current work:
Project managers: PhDr. Stanislava Kloferová, CSc., PhDr. Martina Ireinová, Ph.D. (2020–)
The Dictionary of Czech Dialects is the first and only dictionary in the Czech Republic to compile the dialect lexicon from the entire territory of the Czech national language. It captures the dialect lexicon in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia of the past ca. 150 years. The extensive material used to compile this dictionary is stored in the Folk Language Archive and is intermittently added to using excerpts from manuscripts and printed sources and material from direct field research. An electronic version of the Dictionary of Czech Dialects has been available since 2016.
For details, click here.
Project manager: PhDr. Jan Balhar, CSc.
This is the definitive work in Czech studies classifying dialects in the context of the Czech national language from the viewpoints of synchrony and diachrony. The CLA volumes 1–5 won second place in the 2008 Dictionary of the Year competition, which is organised by the Union of Interpreters and Translators, and was awarded first prize by the jury in the lexicon category. In 2016 the second electronic, revised and supplemented edition of the CLA was completed (as a PDF). A HTML version is currently being developed; to date CLA volumes 1–4 have been published.
Project manager: PhDr. Libuše Čižmárová, CSc.
The Dictionary of Anoikonyms in Moravia and Silesia (DAMS) uses extensive and representational anoikonymic material from historical Moravia and Czech Silesia. A digital database of anoikonyms is under continuous development (collected in 1965–1986; 225,000 card index records; the database has been further supplemented since 2005). An electronic version of the DAMS entries has been available since 2014.
For details, click here.
All the three electronic projects (CLA, DCD, DAMS) are processed on the same program basis (also the design of the webpages is identical), that is why it will be possible to interconnect them and to create a unique and extensive interactive medium, the first of its kind not only in Europe but also in the world, which will offer an all-round view of the Czech dialect lexis, both in appellatives and proper names.
The goal of this project is to create a dialect geoportal, i.e. an interactive environment, that will significantly ease navigation through multi-dimensional grammatical data. Dialectological maps form the foundation of the project. The geoportal will enable comparison of these maps, switching between topography layers, etc. The map content is based on research conducted for the Czech Linguistic Atlas, but the map graphics will be more complex and precise and will include data from over 1,000 sources that only the CLI Department of Dialectology has in complete form. The project will include work on new entries in the Dictionary of Czech Dialects, field research, an academic publication, several studies and maps and an exhibition (including a critical catalogue, i.e. a second academic publication).
Project manager (Czech team member): PhDr. Martina Ireinová, Ph.D.
The Slavic Linguistic Atlas is an international project involving universities and academic institutions of all the Slavic nations in Europe. To date, seventeen phonetic and lexicon volumes have been published. The volume Reflexes *tort, *tolt, *tert, *telt, *ort, *olt (2019) was prepared for publication by PhDr. Martina Ireinová, Ph.D. and Mgr. Petra Přadková, who are the Czech team members of the project.
For details, click here.
Project manager (Czech team member): PhDr. Milena Šipková, CSc.
The Linguistic Atlas of Europe is a geographical-language work compiled under the auspices of UNESCO and through extensive collaboration between various European academic institutions and universities. Work on the ALE was initiated in 1970 with the first official meeting of European dialectologists in the Netherlands. To date, 84 items have been published in nine volumes. The Czech project members are PhDr. Milena Šipková, CSc., and PhDr. Libuše Čižmárová, CSc.; for the ninth volume they elaborated the item liver (“játra”) (map I.102), and for the tenth volume they elaborated the items tooth (“zub”) and bee (“včela”).
For details, click here.
Project manager: PhDr. Milena Šipková, CSc.
The Archive of Folk Speech (AFS) has been collecting materials since 1952. It collects dialect material captured in old dictionaries and other works, including both printed works and manuscripts (it has approx. 1 million records), and material obtained from correspondents. The AFS serves as one source for the Dictionary of Czech Dialects; it has been digitised and is intermittently supplemented using excerpts from dissertations and other works and from direct field research.
Archive development continues. Dialect speech recordings obtained during research for the CLA and later, which are stored on cassette tapes, were converted to digital format with the help of Czech Radio and are currently been described and backed up. Some were used in the sixth volume of the CLA in Supplements (printed in 2011). New dialect speech recordings from field research are intermittently added to the archive.
Reflection of life of our ancestors in vanishing words
(Completed project)
Project manager: PhDr. Stanislava Kloferová, CSc., project leader for grant GA CZ no. 16–046485S Reflection of life of our ancestors in vanishing words (2016–2018)
This research project focused on the specific aspects of the process by which dialect lexicon retreats and becomes extinct, the existence of regionalisms delineated by former historical-administrative boundaries and the layering of words of various (foreign language) origins in a single region. The common material source for these subject areas was the database of the Dictionary of Czech Dialects. One of the project results was the book Life in Words, Words in Life: Walking the Labyrinth of Czech Dialects.
For details, click here.
Staff:
e-mail: kopecka at ujc.cas.cz
tel.: +420 532 290 291
e-mail: krch at ujc.cas.cz
tel.: +420 532 290 294
e-mail: kubecek at ujc.cas.cz
tel.: +420 532 290 294
Mgr. Stanislava Spinková, Ph.D. 
Mgr. Bronislav Stupňánek, Ph.D.
e-mail: stupnanek at ujc.cas.cz
tel.: +420 532 290 293
