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The Slovak language ( slovenský jazyk (help·info), slovenčina , not to be confused with slovenščina...

The Slovak language ( slovenský jazyk (help·info), slovenčina , not to be confused with slovenščina, or Slovenian), is an Indo-European language that belongs to the West Slavic languages (together with Czech, Polish, Silesian, Kashubian, and Sorbian). Slovak is spoken in Slovakia (by 5 million people), the United States (500,000), the Czech Republic (320,000), Serbia (60,000), Ireland (30,000), Romania (22,000), Hungary (20,000), Poland (20,000), Canada (20,000), Croatia (5,000), Australia, Austria, Ukraine, and Bulgaria. Slovak uses a modification of the Latin alphabet. The modifications include the four diacriticals (ˇ, ´, ¨, ^; see Pronunciation) placed above certain letters. The primary principle of Slovak spelling is the phonemic principle, "Write as you hear". The secondary principle is the morphological principle: forms derived from the same stem are written in the same way even if they are pronounced differently. An example of this principle is the assimilation rule (see below). The tertiary principle is the etymological principle, which can be seen in the use of i after certain consonants and of y after other consonants, although both i and y are pronounced the same way.