2013/01/01 by Tchavdar Marinov · 3 citations
Arts and Humanities · #Linguistics, Language Diversity, and Identity
paper · doi:10.1163/9789004250765_010
openalex publication_date 2013/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2025/11/06
Today, more than ten years after the resolution of the language controversy on a state level, it is far from resolved in the scholarly or the public sphere, where representatives of the two countries continue to debate the question of how distinct Macedonian is from Bulgarian. This chapter explains why this question is so hotly debated and so politicized. It deals with the process of codification of the contemporary Macedonian linguistic norm and with the conflicts between Bulgarians and Macedonians about the definition both of the Slavic vernacular dialects in geographic Macedonia and of the Macedonian norm itself. The chapter argues that the codification of the contemporary Macedonian idiom cannot be understood without examining a larger international context. Finally, it shows how the codification of a separate Macedonian norm has shaped Bulgarian nationalist representations-especially in the field of linguistics. Keywords:Bulgarian; Macedonian linguistic norm; Slavic vernacular dialects