The Kozjak subdialect is a Slovene subdialect in the Styrian dialect group

Styrian dialect group

The Styrian dialect group is a group of closely related dialects of Slovene. The Lower Carniolan dialects are spoken in central and eastern Slovenian Styria and in the Lower Sava Valley and Central Sava Valley....

. It is a subdialect of the South Pohorje dialect

South Pohorje dialect

The South Pohorje dialect is a Slovene dialect in the Styrian dialect group. It is spoken south of the Drava River, starting east of Ruše and extending through Maribor to just before Zlatoličje, and extending as far south as the Slovenske Konjice area...

, which it greatly resembles, and is the northernmost member of the Styrian dialect group. It encompasses the Kozjak Hills north of the Drava

Drava

Drava or Drave is a river in southern Central Europe, a tributary of the Danube. It sources in Toblach/Dobbiaco, Italy, and flows east through East Tirol and Carinthia in Austria, into Slovenia , and then southeast, passing through Croatia and forming most of the border between Croatia and...

 River and partially extends into Austria, including the Leutschach

Leutschach

Leutschach is a municipality in the district of Leibnitz in Styria, Austria....

 area.

Phonological and morphological characteristics

The Kozjak subdialect has the typical Styrian diphthongs ei and ou as well as two open glides as reflexes of old acute yat

Yat

Yat or Jat is the thirty-second letter of the old Cyrillic alphabet. Its name in Old Church Slavonic is jěd’ or iad’ . In the common scientific Latin transliteration for old Slavic languages, the letter is represented by e with caron: .The yat represented a Common Slavic long vowel...

and neoacute e and o.