I den här artikeln fokuseras problemet om man kan hävda att palatalt resp. velart k och g framför främre kort a har fonematisk funktion i dialekten i västerbottniska Rödåliden. Frågeställningen kan illustreras med följande modell med minimala par där plustecknet markerar palatal funktion: /+ka/ ≠ /-ka/ och /+ga/ ≠ /-ga/.

In Dagestan, with a total area of 50 000 sq. kms, more than 30 languages are spoken. The largest ethnic group is the Avars who traditionally inhabit the mountainous area of North-western Dagestan. In this area the Avar people have been in a leading position and at least 15 ethnolinguistic peoples have lived alongside the majority for centuries. These ethno-linguistic peoples are sometimes called the Andi-Tsez groups. Most of them were independent census categories in the first Soviet census of 1926 but in each subsequent census, those census categories were reduced to one category only, namely Avar. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia had its first All-Russian census in October 2002, where ethno-linguistic peoples of the Andi-Tsez groups again became separate census categories. The official result of the Census of 2002 has been published in parts, but it is not yet evident what the final outcome of the Dagestan figures will be. However, the government of the Republic of Dagestan seems not to have counted some of the Andi peoples separately, for example: Botlikh, Godoberi and Bagulal. Between 2001 and 2004 I have interviewed some representatives of the ethno-linguistic peoples within the Avaric region. In this paper I will present a short background concerning the minority peoples of Dagestan. I will discuss the results of the 2002 census and also forward some comments from my interviews with native speakers from the Andi-Tsez groups.