Tosk
/tɒsk
/noun (plural same or Tosks)
1A member of one of the main ethnic groups of Albania, living mainly in the south of the country.The Ghegs live in the northern half of the country, and the Tosks live in the south....
- Prior to 1920, most of the Albanians who migrated to the United States were Orthodox Tosks from the city of Korce in southern Albania.
- Although dialect and cultural differences between the Ghegs and Tosks can be substantial, both sides identify strongly with the common national and ethnic culture.
2 [mass noun] The dialect of Albanian spoken by the Tosk, with about 4 million speakers, forming the basis for standard Albanian. Compare with Gheg.Today, Albanian is spoken in two major dialects (with many subdialects) in Albania and in neighboring Kosova - Tosk (about two-thirds of the population) and Gheg (the remaining one-third).
adjective
Relating to the Tosk or their dialect.In addition to the standard Albanian terms (mostly similar to the Tosk dialect), Elsie often provides us with the variant forms of Gegerishte (the Gheg dialect of northern Albania)....
- Hence, Albanian nationalist intellectuals stressed linguistic nationalism in their attempts to build an Albanian national consciousness, an effort made difficult because of the Gheg / Tosk division.
- In 1952, a standardized Albanian language was adopted, which is a mixture of Gheg and Tosk but with a prevailing Tosk element.
Origin
From Albanian Toskë.