Lwów dialect

The Lwów dialect (Polish: gwara lwowska, Yiddish: לעמבערג דיאלעקט) is a subdialect (gwara) of the Polish language characteristic of the inhabitants of the then Polish city of Lviv (Polish: Lwów, Yiddish: לעמבעריק), now in Ukraine. Based on the substratum of the Lesser Polish dialect, it was heavily influenced by borrowings (mostly lexical) from other languages spoken in Galicia, notably Ukrainian (Ruthenian), German and Yiddish.

One of the peculiarities of the Lwów dialect was its popularity. Unlike many other Polish dialects, it was seen by its speakers as neither inferior to standard Polish nor denoting people of humble origin. That caused it to be used both by common people and university professors alike. It was also one of the first Polish dialects to be properly classified and to have a dictionary published. Despite that, the best known form of the Lwów dialect was the bałak, a sociolect of the lower class (batiars), street hooligans and youngsters.