This article discusses the phonological system of Standard Macedonian (unless otherwise noted) based on the Prilep-Bitola dialect. For discussion of other dialects, see Macedonian dialects. Macedonian possesses five vowels, one semivowel, three liquid consonants, three nasal stops, three pairs of fricatives, two pairs of affricates, a non-paired voiceless fricative, nine pairs of voiced and unvoiced consonants and four pairs of stops.
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Macedonian phonology in the context of Standard Macedonian
Standard Macedonian or literary Macedonian (Macedonian: книжевен македонски јазик, romanized: kniževen makedonski jazik or македонски литературен јазик, makedonski literaturen jazik) is the standard variety of the Macedonian language and the official language of North Macedonia used in writing, in formal contexts, and for communication between different dialect areas. Several prestige dialects have developed around the major urban centers of Skopje, Bitola, Veles and Prilep.
It was only in the 1940s, however, that the Macedonian language was able to be implemented, after being formally declared the official language of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia. The rapid pace at which the standardization process took place was in part owing to an already existing interdialect (see spoken Macedonian). The Yugoslav government initially set up a literary Macedonian language based on a spoken dialect of the northern of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia, but it was felt that this dialect was too close to Serbian and finally the dialects spoken in Bitola and Veles were adopted. These dialects, in turn, were closer to the literary Bulgarian, but as the latter was based on the Eastern Bulgarian dialects, it allowed enough differentiation for the Yugoslavs to claim a distinct Macedonian language. Since then, Bulgaria has been contesting the existence of distinct Macedonian language. Thus, the standard variety of Macedonian is phonologically and morphologically based on the central Western Macedonian dialects (in particular, the Prilep-Bitola and Skopje-Veles dialect) with its lexicon influenced by all Macedonian dialects.