Banyumasan dialect

Banyumasan dialect
Banyumasan, colloquially known as Basa Ngapak, is a dialect of Javanese spoken mainly in three areas of Java: the Banyumasan region, located in westernmost Central Java Province and surrounding the Slamet mountain and Serayu River; a neighboring area inside West Java Province; and northern region of Banten Province. This area includes Majenang, Cilacap, Gombong, Kebumen, Banjarnegara, Purbalingga, Purwokerto, Bumiayu, Slawi, Pemalang, Tegal, and Brebes regencies.



History :
Scholars divide the development of Javanese language into four different stages:

9th–13th century, known as Old Javanese
13th–16th century developed to Middle Javanese
16th–20th century developed to New Javanese
20th century: Modern Javanese.
The phases above were influenced by the emergence of empires in Java. In Javanese cultural history, empires yielded some distinct grades of language, each grade representing the social grade of the speakers (mainly nobles and populaces). Those grades of language are not of significant influence to Banyumasan people. In the Banyumasan region, high grades are usually used only when speaking to a stranger assumed to come from the eastern area of Java i.e. Yogyakarta / Surakarta etc., or on certain occasions. Surakartan and Yogyakartan style are usually considered the standard Javanese language.

Banyumasan has a lot of differences compared to standard Javanese, mainly in phonology, pronunciation and vocabulary. This happened due to cultural or character distinction and widely current usage of Old Javanese vocabulary. Another distinction is that the pronunciation of the vowels is not as complicated.

Vocabulary distinction basically found in:

Same word and phonetic but different meaning
Same word and meaning but different phonetic
Same phonetic and meaning but different pronunciation (changed on consonant or vowel).