Upper Reka Albanian dialect

Phonology The Upper Reka dialect contains phonological and morphological characteristics that are unique of speakers in Albanian within Upper Reka. For example, the Albanian letter (in Standard Albanian, ) often voiced as a hard () sound in some Northern dialects is articulated as a soft sound in Upper Reka. Unlike in some Albanian dialects (typically Northern), where the sound cluster has contracted into , in Upper Reka it is maintained in words like katund (spread out village), nder (honour) and vend (place). Morphology and Syntax The Upper Reka dialect uses do to create its future tense, as do most Tosk dialects as well as certain other Gheg dialects, including all of Southern Gheg (i.e. Tirana and Elbasan dialects), the Northwestern Gheg dialect of Shkreli, the Northeastern Gheg dialects of the Has and Luma regions, and the Northern Gheg of Mirdita. ==Education and Literature==

The earliest known example of the Upper Reka dialect being employed in writing is from an Orthodox graveyard headstone inscription written in Cyrillic script at Duf which dates from 1889. While an ethnographic work by Bajazid Elmaz Doda from Štirovica titled Albanisches Bauerleben im oberen Rekatal bei Dibra (Makedonien)/Albanian Peasant Life in the Upper Reka Valley near Dibra (Macedonia) was completed in 1914. The work has been praised by Elsie and other scholars like Andrea Pieroni for its detailed and important information of Upper Reka. The first attested example of Albanian literature being present in Upper Reka is a 19th-century Albanian language gospel text (New Testament) written in the Greek alphabet held in a church in the village of Duf. During the monarchist Yugoslav era, schooling was done in the Serbian language and none existed in Albanian. ==Language usage==

Starting in the 1950s, Albanians in Upper Reka were forced to send their children to schooling in Macedonian, with the goal of assimilating them. It was reported that during that period, many Albanian children cried when they came home from school and tried to refuse to attend, because they didn't understand the language. Most Upper Reka inhabitants do not have complete command of higher registers of the Albanian language, as higher level Albanian vocabulary remains unknown to them. Instead, Macedonian words are used, especially for modern household items or designating certain modern concepts. In the 2000s, there are elderly Upper Reka women who still have some knowledge of Serbian, though not of Macedonian. Of the Orthodox population residing in Upper Reka in the 2000s, in terms of daily speech were mainly fluent in Albanian among themselves and even the young. Due to the legacy of seasonal migration for work, trade and emigration, Upper Reka people have become multilingual over time in various languages including Turkish, Greek, Serbian, Bulgarian, Romanian, French and English. ==See also==