Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock composed of mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especially quartz and calcite. The ratio of clay to other minerals is variable. Shale is characterized by breaks along thin laminae or parallel layering or bedding less than one centimeter in thickness, called fissility.  Mudstones, on the other hand, are similar in composition but do not show the fissility.

Shalë is a former municipality in the Shkodër County, northwestern Albania. At the 2015 local government reform it became a subdivision of the municipality Shkodër. The population at the 2011 census was 1,804. Its name comes from the Shala tribe which lives in the area. The municipal unit covers the upper course of the river Shalë, and part of the Prokletije mountains. There are eleven small mountain villages in the municipality: Breg-Lumi, Abat, Nicaj-Shalë, Lekaj, Vuksanaj, Pecaj, Theth, Ndërhysaj, Gimaj, Nen-Mavriq, Mekshaj, and Lotaj.