Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik

ZDL

Zusammenfassungen / Summaries (Band 67/2000 bis 70/2003):

Günter Bellmann: Standardisierung und Umstandarisierung: der siebente / der siebte (Band 69/2002, S. 1)

In the course of the nineteenth century, lexicographers began to record the coexistence in Standard German of two variants of the ordinal number derived from the cardinal number sieben, namely, siebente and siebte. In 1865, D. Sanders introduced the lemma sieb(en)te for the ordinal number, and was later followed somewhat hesitantly by K. Duden. Nowadays, the uncontracted form siebent-, which is old-established as a written form and was once general in official usage, occurs in the written and spoken language largely in eastern Germany and in Austria, while the contracted form siebt- is by origin one of a number of dialect variants found in the spoken language. It attained its standard status as it was gradually taken into the written language in the same way as several other features and elements of the spoken language were. This happens increasingly and conclusively in the second half of the twentieth century in the territory of the old Federal Republic (West Germany), not least as a result of the influence of (sport) reporters and, above all, of television presenters.

It is possible and indeed sensible to supplement the simple opposition of siebent- vs. siebt- in Standard German (Fig. 1) by reference to High and Low German dialect forms, and to present the resulting enlarged spectrum of variants as a comprehensive model viewed in the context of formal reduction (Fig. 3). At the same time, approaching the question from the context of reduction provides access to the distribution map of the attested dialect forms (Fig. 2), firstly, with regard to the structural context and, secondly, with regard to the presumable origin of the variants. It is recognized that the initial trigger for this reduction lies in the formation of a uniform syllable structure in the numeral sequence from erst- to zwölft- in the spoken language. The result is partly (in the east and the southeast) an assimilative reduction (siemt-, etc.), which is only realized in the spoken language, and partly a strictly non-assimilative development to segmental reduction (High German sibet-, sibt-, siebt-, Low German sewet-, seft-, etc.). In the case of siebt-, we can reckon with an autochthonous origin, but also with diffusion or the effects of contamination. The apparently haphazard distribution of the segmental variants indicated on the map (Fig. 2) can be explained as resulting from the differing degrees of isolation and stabilization reached by the individual phases of reduction after the actual mechanism of reduction, which had previously been variable and continuous, had become largely static. Further important aspects of the development belonging to more recent times are the tidying up and general levelling out of the diversity of variants in connection with the triumph of the now dominant and more highly regarded variant siebt-, as well as the prestige of this "West German" variant which is now spreading into the new Bundesländer in the territory of the former GDR. We see then that the most recent diffusion pattern, that of siebt-, supersedes an earlier one, that of siebent-. Questions of semantics and of linguistic contact are also examined.

Helen Christen: Ein Dialektmarker auf Erfolgskurs: Die /l/-Vokalisierung in der deutschsprachigen Schweiz (Band 68/2001)

The present article investigates the extent to which the so-called vocalization of /l/, which is so much a characteristic feature of western Switzerland as to be almost a cliché, spreads eastwards. To this end, the realizations of the phoneme /l/ in the speech of five informants representing a locality in Canton Nidwalden in central Switzerland and a locality in Canton Uri, both areas in which the linguistic atlas of German-speaking Switzerland indicates a consonantal realization of /l/, were examined.

In the case of the informants from Canton Nidwalden, which is a direct neighbour of the area where vocalization traditionally occurs, we find the rate of vocalization is 80%, whereas in Canton Uri, which lies further east, this happens in only 20% of the cases where it might be expected. In both areas, the articulatory features which often accompany /l/ vocalization differ quite clearly from those in the areas in which vocalization is traditional. In western Switzerland, vocalization can trigger the rounding of palatal vowels, whereas it merely results in the velarization of preceding /a/ in the dialects of the informants from Canton Nidwalden and Canton Uri. This is probably a consequence of the differing phonological systems. It might be tentatively suggested that the limited geographical area covered by /l/-vocalization and the articulatory features which accompany it may be the reason for the "success" of this feature in German-speaking Switzerland. /l/-vocalization occurs neither in all dialects nor in the standard language, and is, therefore, an appropriate way of marking off local speech from that of other areas.

Georg Cornellissen: Muster regionaler Umgangssprche. Ergebnisse einer Fragebogenerhebung im Rheinland (Band 69/2002, S. 275)

The article is a preliminary evaluation of a questionnaire distributed in the Rhineland in 2000. In the answers received, the colloquial form of speech predominant in this area is described as "slang", "moderate Standard German" or "‘normal’ German, not Standard German". In the questionnaire itself, the term "Regional spoken language situated between dialect and ‘pure’ Standard German" was used.

The analysis provided numerous indications that there is a correlation between the degree of linguistic awareness on the part of the informants and the type of language used either by those answering the questionnaire or at least by the generation to which they belong. The answers to some of the questions reveal significant differences in usage between older informants and members of younger age groups. To a certain extent, we find a tendency here towards the reduction of idiomatic elements within the colloquial form of speech. Other non-standard linguistic elements tend to remain much more stable. Beside the informant’s age, it would appear that the individual ability to speak the local dialect is also an important factor.

The linguistic level between true dialect and standard speech touched upon in this enquiry is present all over the Rhineland, and not only in areas where dialect is no longer spoken (such as the Ruhr industrial area), but also in regions where – to differing degrees – dialect is still in use.

Some of the linguistic maps published here correspond quite closely to their counterparts in dialect atlases, whereas in other cases there is hardly any similarity whatsoever. Particularly interesting are those maps which show the formation of new local divisions within the regional colloquial forms of speech current in the Rhineland.

Unfortunately most informants refrained from providing really concrete information about their own personal linguistic behaviour. Individual comments show, however, that a wide variety of attitudes – from obvious rejection to an almost emphatic pride in using the regional colloquial idiom – can be expected.

Silvia Dal Negro: Altertümlichkeit, Sprachwandel und Sprachtod. Das Gleichnis vom "Verlorenen Sohn" in zwei piemontesischen Walserdialekten" (Band 67/2000)

In this article, five translations of the Parable of the Prodigal Son into Upper Alamannic dialects are compared in the context of a set of morphosyntactic features. With the exception of one text (recorded in a dialect of Wallis in German-speaking Switzerland), the other four translations come from two Walser communities in northern Italy (Formazza and Rimella) and they span a period of 160 years. Taking into account diachronic as well as synchronic variation, this article examines the nature of linguistic change in these minority dialects. In particular, the phenomena observed here are analysed in connection with the questions of linguistic isolation, contact and language death.

Winifred V. Davies: Linguistic Norms at School: A Survey of Secondary-School Teachers in a Central German Dialect Area (Band 67/2000)

Man nimmt oft an, daß Lehrer eine entscheidende Rolle bei der Förderung der Standardsprache spielen, aber diese Annahme basiert auf den Ergebnissen einiger weniger empirischer Arbeiten. Lehrer werden als "Sprachnormautoritäten" betrachtet, doch weiß man wenig über die Norm, an die sie sich halten. Dieser Aufsatz beschreibt eine Untersuchung des Normbewußtseins und des Normwissens von Lehrern in der deutschen Stadt Mannheim und Umgebung. Die Datenanalyse zeigt, daß die Standardsprache als abstrakter Begriff sehr positiv angesehen wird, daß aber Uneinigkeit darüber besteht, wie sie in ihrer konkreten Realisierung aussehen sollte. Folglich sollte die Rolle von Lehrern bei der Übermittlung von Sprachnormen neu bewertet und weiteren empirischen Untersuchungen unterzogen werden.

Csaba Földes: Dialektalität und Variation des Deutschen unter Mehrsprachigkeitsbedingungen (Band 70, S. 177)

The present article starts with the premise that German displays a considerable degree of regional heterogeneity in form and usage. Using the framework of a variation model of dialectology, the article seeks to outline the range of diatopic variation in German and to describe a specific variety of German which arises in situations of linguistic contact involving bilingualism (the so-called Kontaktdeutsch) and to fit this into the contemporary range of varieties in German. In addition, the purpose of the article is to provide an impetus to the investigation of the internal motivation behind the multiplicity of linguistic varieties. The article uses samples of the spoken language from a Danube-Swabian variety of German collected at Hajosch/Hajós in the northern Batschka in Hungary. The primary aim is to record and analyse the synchronic manifestations of intimate linguistic and cultural contact between German and Hungarian. More precisely, the intention is to find out how the numerous and diverse linguistic and cultural points of contact are realized synchronically in spoken discourse in the vernacular. The results show that German is anything but a monolithic and homogeneous language. One can conclude that it shows an extraordinary degree of diatopic heterogeneity, its characteristic features being multiple regionality and diatopic diversity. In addition, it is marked by extensive use of hybrid formations and by sporadic irregular features, especially when it is in the position of a minority language. The so-called Kontaktdeutsch described here is a new kind of regional variety in contemporary German. Embedded in an elaborate nexus of multilingual and intercultural relationships, its salient characteristics are the extensive use of dialect features, diverse manifestations of language mixing and an astonishing mobility across the boundaries of language, dialect and culture.

Johannes Fournier: Vorüberlegungen zum Aufbau eines Verbundes von Dialektwörterbüchern (Band 70, S. 155)

In the present article, it is proposed that the five dialect dictionaries covering the south-western part of the German linguistic area, namely, the dictionary of the Alsatian Dialects ("Wörterbuch der elsässischen Mundarten"), the dictionary of the German dialects of Lorraine ("Wörterbuch der deutsch-lothringischen Mundarten"), the Rhenish dictionary ("Rheinisches Wörterbuch"), the dictionary of the German dialect of Luxembourg ("Luxemburger Wörterbuch") and the dictionary of the dialect of the Palatinate ("Pfälzisches Wörterbuch"), should be linked in an electronic network in such a way that corresponding entries could be connected with each other through hyperlinks, so that a comprehensive comparison of the lexemes in these dialects could be carried out. After a short description of the characteristics of each of these dictionaries, there is a discussion of various methods of establishing which entries are of identical origin and meaning and of how these could be connected with each other. This discussion starts by looking at the cross-references in the printed dictionaries themselves, then proceeds to consider the mechanical sorting of entries and goes on to examine the idea of listing lemmata according to the standard language and organizing them as hypertext. The discussion concludes by looking into the creation of an onomasiological network. Starting with a brief analysis of the dictionary entries, which examines the links between the typography, layout and microstructure of the individual articles with regard to the feasibility of the automatic recording of individual categories of information, the article goes on to suggest ways in which the lexical information contained in the dictionary entries can be evaluated in the framework of a database. Finally, the steps necessary for such a project are sketched and an assessment of the time and personnel needed is also given.

Peter Gilles, Jörg Peters, Peter Auer und Margret Selting: Perzeptuelle Identifikation regional markierter Tonhöhenverläufe. Ergebnisse einer Pilotstudie zum Hamburgischen (Band 68/2001)

The present study describes a pilot study for the identification of the Hamburg dialect on the basic of its intonational features. In an experiment to test levels of perception, the persons tested were asked to assess single test-utterances, which differed from each other only with regard to pitch, in terms of their perceived closeness to the speech of Hamburg. Using original utterances made by a regionally neutral female speaker, the test sentences were created with the help of a speech-resynthesizing process, which allowed manipulation of pitch contour alone. The investigation revealed that those utterances which showed the intonation contours characteristic of Hamburg speech were judged to be more typical of this variety than those characterized by a regionally neutral contour. The present study, therefore, supports the view that it is possible to identify regional varieties of German on the basis of intonation alone.

Volker Harm: Zur Herausbildung der deutschen Futurumschreibung mit werden + Infinitiv (Band 68/2001)

The process by which the New High German future with werden + infinitive developed has been generally regarded as an open question. The present article begins by critically examining previous attempts to explain the origin and spread of the New High German periphrastic form. The discussion here focuses on the question as to why the type werden + infinitive, which was originally peripheral, prevailed against competing constructions, in particular, against the type in which modal auxiliaries were used, a type which is frequently attested in Middle High German. The development of the future formed with werden in German is all the more surprising when one considers that the other Germanic languages have not developed a comparable future form, despite the fact that they all have etymological equivalents of German werden. This can be explained as a consequence of the fact that conditions which were particularly conducive to the establishment of the periphrastic form based on werden + infinitive existed in Middle and Early New High German. The present investigation shows that the particular conditions favouring the formation of the werden-periphrasis in Middle and Early New High German did not exist in the other Germanic languages.

Rüdiger Harnisch: Sprachwissenschaft im Epochenumbruch von der Spätaufklärung zur Romantik. Zum 150. Todestag von Johann Andreas Schmeller (1785-1852) (Band 69/2002, S. 257)

The present article examines and discusses the idea of an epochal break in continuity between the Enlightenment and Romanticism. The paper concentrates on J. A. Schmeller, one of the pioneers of German Studies and the founder of academic research into dialectology. Schmeller, the 150th anniversary of whose death takes place in 2002, is known as the "Bavarian Grimm". His work shows elements of the so-called "Romantic", or rather historical-comparative, approach to the study of language, but other comments made by him belong rather to the grammatical tradition of the Enlightenment. It is shown that both schools can be internally differentiated, but, at the same time, that the respective theoretical frameworks followed by their characteristic representatives ( J. Grimm and Adelung) always include features typical of the other direction (§ 2). Following on from this, Schmeller’s position in the intellectual history of the period is redefined (§ 3), firstly, in the context of the universal grammar of the "Enlightenment" and in that of the historical-comparative grammar of "Romanticism". This reassessment takes place within the theoretical contexts of apriorism (3.1) and the historical approach to language (3.2). Secondly, Schmeller ‘s work is investigated in connection with three areas, which have hitherto received too little attention in discussions of his historical significance, namely, articulatory phonetics and phonology (§ 3.3) and sensualistic semiotics (§ 3.4). Particular attention is devoted to the last of these, since we can trace a direct line of development from the rationalist-universal grammar of the French Ideologues to Schmeller and to the semiotic typology of Charles Sanders Peirce. As a result of our examination of Schmeller’s significance in the history of ideas, we can conclude that there was no clear break in continuity between the two epochs (§ 4)

Volkmar Hellfritzsch / Herbert Steinmüller: Der Dialektologe Emil Gerbet (1867-1919) (Band 70, S. 1)

The present article deals with the biography and the academic achievements of the German dialectologist Emil Gerbet (1867–1919), whose work on the dialect of the Vogtland area, which was done at the turn of 20th century, is of fundamental importance.

Gerbet was born as the son of a small farmer in a remote village and he showed an early interest in the speech and traditions of the rural population of his native region. After taking his school-leaving examination in Plauen, he studied Germanic Philology, Modern Languages and Education at the University of Leipzig from 1889 to 1894. Here he was greatly influenced by his renowned teacher Eduard Sievers, the founder of articulatory phonetics, who directed his interests towards Linguistics. Gerbet’s doctoral thesis was about the dialect of the Vogtland. This work was highly regarded. His examiners described it as a significant contribution to the study of dialectology. From 1897 to 1919, when he committed suicide, presumably as a result of nervous disorder and exhaustion, Gerbet held various teaching posts in Aue, Glauchau and Werdau, small towns in south-western Saxony not far from his native Vogtland. In this period, he elaborated his earlier findings about the phonological isoglosses separating the central Vogtland dialect from its regional subsystems and from the dialects of the neighbouring regions. In 1908, Emil Gerbet’s "Grammatik der Mundart des Vogtlandes" ("Grammar of the Vogtland Dialect"), his principal work, was published. In this book, he described the dialect of the Vogtland as East Franconian, but with Upper German elements from the Upper Palatinate in the south and Upper Saxon-Thuringian elements in the north.

Though he followed strictly Neogrammarian principles, Gerbet was not unthinkingly dogmatic in his adherence to them. In many ways, he was a scholar who was open for more forward-looking approaches. In this context, we can mention his interest in word-geography, in the history of the dialects, in sociolinguistic problems (the expansion of colloquial speech) and in the role of settlement patterns, as well as his consistent utilization of onomastic material, especially place-names. Gerbet was an active fieldworker and regularly went on walking tours in the region. He also encouraged local authors writing in authentic dialect. By such measures, he defended the dialect against those who watered it down through their own spoken usage and through pseudo-poetry.

Emil Gerbet’s fundamental research in dialectology prepared the way for his successors, who, under the guidance of Theodor Frings (Leipzig School) and particularly in the nineteen-thirties, opened up new directions of research.

Karl Hohensinner: Zur Datierung des mittelbairischen -ch-Schwundes anhand der urkundlichen Überliefrung der Siedlungsnamen auf mhd. -ach in Oberösterreich (Band 69/2002, S. 129)

Using the collections of early spellings for the habitational names formed with the collective suffix -ahi, which were published in conjunction with the place-name compendium of the province of Upper Austria (Ortsnamenbuch des Landes Oberösterreich), as source material, the present article investigates the development of this place-name element and its linguistic implications. On the basis of these early forms, an attempt is made to look again at the question of the date of the loss of -ch in the Bavarian dialect of Middle High German. This phenomenon, which occurs in conjunction with the erosion of final syllables and the weakening of consonants, affects final -ch in words like Bach, Pech, Milch and Bauch. It is appropriate to use place-name material to date this loss of -ch, since it does not appear in the normal written language. The use of such material is a well-tried method in the Vienna school of dialectology. From the 15th century onwards, OHG -ahi, MHG -ach shows loss of -ch or is remodelled to -inger. The second of these two features reflects association with the address-names in -inger belonging to the old Bavarian habitational name-element -ing. In contrast to this, we find hypercorrect -ach-endings in Slavonic names for bodies of water in -a, in habitational names of the type Gastach, and in names in -au. The results which emerge from the present investigation support Eberhard Kranzmayer’s dating of ca. 1300. In addition, the forms examined here provide comparative material for related phenomena observed in the valley of the Lech.

Otto Holzapfel: Die Entstehung des alpenländischen Mundartliedes nach 1800 als Spiegelbild einer neuen Wertschätzung des Dialekts (Band 69/2002, S. 38)

Dialect texts in song fly-sheets (broadside) of the first half of the nineteenth century reveal a new attitude towards dialect, an attitude which is connected with a phase of the "discovery" of the common people in the years after 1800. The texts of the song fly-sheets conform fully to the intellectual trends of the period and present "songs of the mountain pasture" (Almlieder), the stock-in-trade of Tyrolean itinerant pedlars and "authentic" Zillertal (Tirol, Austria) "national singers" from the 1820s onwards. In the period prior to this, we have, inter alia, the dialect plays of popular theatre and the shepherds’ songs of the stage version of the Christmas story. The use of dialect here is intended to amuse or to parody the language of the lower classes. A movement in the opposite direction arose in Switzerland consequent on J. G. Herder’s initiative for a rediscovery of such forms of the "folksong". However, this did not result in the recording of the existing song corpus, but in the poetic stylization of a recreated, or indeed invented, type of song from which the supposedly "authentic" and characteristic song of the mountain pastures known in the 1850s developed. The high regard for dialect even led to the "improvement" of original texts, in order to emphasize their authenticity, and the "reconstruction" of dialect where it had previously been absent (as was still done in the 1930s by Gustav Jungbauer). The supposedly typical "maiden on the mountain pasture" with songs in dialect is an invention of the Biedermeier period.

Hermann J. Künzel: Eine Datenbank regionaler Umgangssprachen des Deutschen (DRUGS) für forensische Anwendungen (Band 68/2001)

The present article describes the basic features of a multimedial database of regional varieties of colloquial German (DRUGS), which has been conceived in the first instance as a tool in crime-detection for the identification of persons on the basis of their verbal behaviour. This system, which is based on Windows 98 and has been tested in daily forensic use for the last two years, has been set up as an open modular system, so that the initial empirical basis of 182 persons from Germany, Austria and Switzerland can be enlarged at will. It is possible to subject the data to phonological, morphological and orthographic investigation. On a phonetic level, the data can be presented acoustically and as a pre-segmented oscillogram, which can be further segmented by the user. The link to a map on which the German dialect areas are marked allows data to be drawn randomly from the places surveyed and, conversely, the geographical assignment of research results to a particular place among those surveyed. DRUGS has a variety of possible applications in the study of linguistic variation, which can be extended still further through the systematic enlargement of the number and widening of the structural variety of the places recorded in the database.

Nils Langer: Zur Verbreitung der tun-Periphrase im Frühneuhochdeutschen (Band 67/2000)

The stigmatization of unwanted syntactic constructions in the course of the historical development of the German standard language has been largely ignored in the secondary literature. In this article, the development of the use of auxiliary tun ‘to do’ is investigated in order to determine the extent to which seventeenth-century grammarians were able to form the syntax of the emerging standard language. In contrast to previous studies on the influence exerted by grammarians, this article is concerned with a construction that did not become part of Standard German. The study is based on an empirical investigation of the distribution of the tun-periphrasis in Early New High German (1350-1650) (ENHG) with reference to geographical, chronological and sociolinguistic (text type) variables. It is shown here that the construction was widespread in the period under review, and, most importantly, that there are no discernable patterns of particular frequency/lack of frequency with regard to any of the aforementioned variables. These findings suggest that the reasons behind the stigmatization of the construction as ‘bad German’ lie in the aim of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century grammarians to develop a prestige variety of German which would be independent of any of the existing varieties of ENHG. The article shows that the stigmatization of the construction occurred in three stages with varying motivations behind the stigmatization and an increasing extension of the areas covered by the stigmatization. The earliest stigmatization, in the 16th century, is restricted to poetry. In the late seventeenth century, the use of the construction was no longer acceptable in non-literary formal written language, but it was not until the eighteenth century that the present notion of it being ‘bad German’ and associated with speakers of ‘socially lower status’ fully crystallized.

Arned Mihm: Oberschichtliche Mehrsprachigkeit und ,Language Shift‘ in den mitteleuropäischen Städten des 16. Jahrhunderts (Band 68/2001)

Although multilingualism has rightly been regarded as an important cause of linguistic change, historical linguists have hitherto paid insufficient attention to the important role played by the command of foreign languages among the urban upper classes since the Middle Ages. For this reason, the present article starts by assembling the contemporary reports about the nature and extent of the knowledge of foreign languages. In this context, not only the historical precursors of the European standard languages were examined, but also the independent regional languages of the Continental Germanic linguistic area. Evidence for the process of language acquisition in the Middle Ages is also provided. It is demonstrated that, with the exception of the learning of Latin, school and the written text were of negligible importance and that language acquisition primarily took place through personal contact with speakers of the target language. In the 16th century, there was a fundamental change in the way that multilingualism was used, a change which can even be designated ‘language shift‘. This change is characterized by the fact that allochthonous languages which had been formerly used only for contact with foreigners were used for internal communication by the urban upper classes among themselves. In this period, French became an upper class means of communication in the Flemish and Brabançon towns, the same is true of Italian in some of the towns of southern Germany and of High German in those of northern Germany. As a result, the traditional urban forms of speech were submerged and reshaped, but also partially excluded from further areas of communication.

The probable causes of this historically significant development are examined in the context of the communication requirements of the upper classes in the Early Modern period under the headings ‘Verticalization’, ‘External Cultural Orientation’ and ‘Repudiation of Loyalties’. On the whole, it begins to emerge that the spoken language of the upper classes has played a larger role in the formation of the modern standard languages than has been hitherto believed.

Robert Möller: Zur diatopischen Gliederung des alltagssprachlichen Wortgebrauchs (Band 70/2003, S. 259)

The present article presents the results of a dialectometrical analysis of Jürgen Eichhoff’s "Word Atlas of Colloquial Varieties of German" (Wortatlas der deutschen Umgangssprachen [Vol. 1-4, 1977. 1978, 1993, 2000]). This atlas investigates which words are "usual" in a locality. At the same time, it seeks to record local variants in the area of lexis and to establish the characteristic diatopic differences in the degree to which regional words on the one hand and words from Standard German on the other are used. The statistical evaluation of 198 word maps provides us with a comprehensive picture of the regional differentiation in the everyday German of the period between the nineteen-seventies and the nineteen-nineties in the areas of lexis and pragmatics. The clear distinction between northern Germany, where we have a language closer to Standard German, and the southern parts of the German-speaking area, where we have usages closer to regional dialect, is made apparent by the mapping of the "range" (that is, the size of the area with relevant samples) of the words listed. Maps in which the degree of agreement between the information from one particular locality and the others is indicated also show us the larger regional entities which are differentiated from each other by specifically regional vocabulary and differing attitudes towards the use of regional vocabulary in everyday speech. These maps and the results of a cluster analysis allow us to recognize the pattern of usage in everyday language, which to some extent corresponds to the traditional dialect classification based on phonological and morphological criteria. However, certain features appear to be determined by the political boundaries of the 19th and 20th centuries. This can probably be partly explained by the changeable nature of areal lexical structures in the dialects and partly by processes of levelling and selection which are to be associated with the transition to a colloquial language no longer (purely) dialectal in character whose reception in the 19th and 20th centuries by the population as a whole followed a clear geographical pattern. The almost complete agreement between the pattern of lexical usage and today’s national and provincial boundaries leads one to expect that this state of affairs will remain more or less unaltered as long as regional forms do not entirely give way to those of Standard German.

Karl-Heinz Mottausch: Zur Geschichte der Substantivflexion im Südhessischen um Lorsch - Worms (Band 68/2001)

The modern dialect of Lorsch and the surrounding area shows no trace of substantival inflection by endings ("post-determination"), whereas its earliest ancestor in the Old High German period, which is represented by the Lorscher Beichte of the eighth century and the Lorscher Bienensegen of the tenth century, has a fully fledged inflectional system of Old High German type, which is additionally characterized by the use of the article ("pre-de-termination"). The development to the modern system took place over a period of 300 years. Two interdependent phonetic changes were the main causes of this transformation, namely, (1) the weakening of vowels in unstressed syllables to /e/ in the tenth century, and (2) the almost complete loss of this /e/ in the period between the late tenth century and the middle of the thirteenth century. In particular, the multifunctional /-e/# (e.g. dat. sing. and nom., gen., acc. pl. a-stems; nom. sing. n-stems) gave way to a system governed by predetermination (articles and pronouns with or without prepositions). The "weak" declension and the isolated dat. pl. /-en/ were given up fairly quickly. The increasing tendency to predetermination also caused the loss of the "strong" s-genitive sing. At first, there were three competing options by which the synthetic genitive could be replaced (das Haus des Vater, das Haus von dem Vater, dem Vater sein Haus), two of them only surviving in complementary distribution. The thirteenth century is marked by the definitive collapse of the ancient postdeterminative substantival inflectional system.

Karl-Heinz Mottausch: Die Flexion des Adjektivs in den Mündarten um Lorsch. Systematik und Vorgeschichte (Band 70, S. 129)

Adjectival inflection in the dialect of Lorsch (and the surrounding area) is more complex than is usually assumed and described in the dialect handbooks. Alongside the traditional division into strong and weak declensions, there is also a difference between attributive and substantival use. In addition, the weak declension has a full and a reduced variant, the latter occurring only after the "true" article (as opposed to the "demonstrative" article).

Starting from the (reconstructed) state reached by the declension in the 13th century, when [´] and final -n had almost completely disappeared, we see that the main changes took place in the 13th and 14th centuries and in the period from the 18th to the 20th century. The tendency followed by most of these changes was to restore or reinforce the strong adjective as an important determiner of the substantive, which had lost its inflectional endings in the 13th century. Additionally, there was also a pronounced tendency to give the substantivized adjective syllabic endings.

Another important factor which played an important role in the shaping of adjectival inflection was the influence of the literary language, which increased steadily from the 18th century onwards.

Bruno Rossbach: Skizze einer semiotisch-linguistischen Theorie narrativer Texte (Band 68/2001)

In the present paper, the derivation of the three literary genres, lyric poetry, narrative, and drama, is examined in terms of communications theory within the framework of Karl Bühler’s Organon-Modell. The characteristics of narrative texts are then investigated. From an analytical point of view, a fundamental dichotomy is inherent in narrative texts. On the one hand, we have the world of the narrator and on the other the subject matter, a string of events. The narrative itself is the result of the tension between these two components. The narrator is the focal point of interest in the study of narrative text. The narrator can be described as a person-place-time system, which is implicitly or explicitly and partially or completely linked to the system of characters in the story. Finally, with the help of a series of literary examples, the concept of the "virtual narrator" is introduced. The narrator can be designated "virtual" when, in a similar fashion to a camera, he is at the centre of the events as they unfold. As such, he acts as a sort of observer of the unfolding events. The narrator observes the events, and the linguist observes the observer, defines his mental equipment and follows his syntagmatic and paradigmatic decisions. Through projection of these decisions onto the much broader substratum of the range of possibilities inherent in each sequence of events, the processes by which the meaning of the text is communicated to the audience are made apparent.

Hans Ulrich Schmid: Die Ausbildung des werden-Futurs. Überlegungen auf der Grundlage mittelalterlicher Endzeitprophezeiungen (Band 67/2000)

Various explanations have been offered for the periphrastic verbal construction werden + infinitive, a construction found in no other Germanic language but High German. These explanations are briefly reviewed here. Using a corpus of ca. 100 German versions of the "Fifteen Omens before the Day of Judgement", in which different and competing options for the expressions of futurity are attested from all German dialect areas between the 12th and the 17th centuries, a new explanation for this construction is postulated, namely, that it is a result of the convergence of two competing and homonymic constructions, firstly, werden as a full verb, and, secondly, in combination with a modal verb (particulary sollen) + the infinitive. – Six previously unpublished fifteenth-century versions of the text are edited in an appendix to the article.

Peter Seidensticker: Myrica Gale L., der Gagel. Ein apokryphes Lemma im "Promptuarium Medicine" (Band 68/2001)

The "Concise Linguistic Atlas of Dutch" (KNSA) project is a logical follow-on to the "Concise Linguistic Atlas of German". The network of localities surveyed in the KNSA forms a continuation westwards of that of the KDSA. In both atlases, the material basis consists of forty of G. Wenker’s sample sentences translated into local dialect and both use a similar computerized method to create their maps. The first KNSA maps delineate the divisions within the Dutch dialect area and its boundary to West Frisian. Frequency analyses supported by diagrams illustrate the varying strengths of different dialect constituents in Standard Dutch.

Werner H. Veith: Kleiner niederländischer Sprachatlas (KNSA) (Band 67/2000)

Peter Wagener: Gesprochenes Deutsch online. Zur Modernisierung des Deutschen Srpacharchivs (Band 69/2002, S. 314)

In recent decades, the investigation of spoken language has become increasingly important in linguistic research. However, the spoken word is a fleeting phenomenon which is difficult to analyse and which requires an elaborate process of examination and appraisal. The Institute for the German Language (Institut für Deutsche Sprache) has the largest collection of recordings of spoken German, the German Speech Archive (Deutsches Spracharchiv [DSAv]). Up to now, the inadequate processing and accessibility of the valuable material held by the DSAv has been regarded as its major shortcoming. A solution to this problem is at hand now that a start has been made with the systematic modernization of the DSAv and, in particular, with the digitalization of its material. In recent years, we have been able to systematically exploit the unique opportunities provided by a new and easier form of access to the spoken language via the recorded sound signal, which can be realized digitally in the computer, and its linkage to the corresponding texts and documentary data. Through the integration of the existing data about the corpora and of the written versions of the texts into an information and full text database and through the linking of these data with the acoustic signal itself, it is now possible for us to construct a data pool which allows a better documentation of the material and provides rapid internal and external access to the sound recordings. Processed in such a way, the material of the German Speech Archive can now be regarded as having been saved for posterity. As a result, entirely new areas of inquiry and entirely new research perspectives have been opened up. This is true both for the work of the Institute itself and for linguistic research in German as a whole.

Richard Wiese: The Unity and Variation of (German) /r) (Band 70, S. 25)

Gegenstand dieses Beitrags ist die Natur des r-Lautes und seine Variation vor allem in den Varietäten des gegenwärtigen Deutsch. Einem Vorschlag von Richard Wiese (2001a) folgend, wird zunächst argumentiert, dass die Einheit der Laute, die allgemein als "r" bezeichnet werden, in ihrem phonotaktischen Verhalten und nicht in ihren segmentalen Eigenschaften zu finden ist. Anschließend werden Art und Umfang der r-Variation in verschiedenen Varietäten des Deutschen und benachbarter Sprachen untersucht. Die Untersuchung hat zwei Ziele: Erstens wird die nahezu unbegrenzte Variabilität der r-Laute bestätigt. Innerhalb von Sprachen können fast alle der in der Literatur erwähnten r-Laute nachgewiesen werden. Die Übergänge von einem r-Laut zum anderen sind häufig, bidirektional und für das phonologische System irrelevant. Zweitens zeigt sich, dass die segmentalen Veränderungen keinen Einfluss auf die phonotaktischen Muster haben. In Bezug auf die Konsonantencluster verhält sich /r/ wie ein Konsonant ohne Ortsmerkmale. Abschließend wird die soziolinguistische Bedeutung der Variabilität der r-Laute diskutiert: Die generell verfügbare Variabilität erlaubt, diese Klasse von Lauten zur Markierung von Registern, Dialekten und anderen identitäts- und situationsbezogenen Varietäten einer Sprache heranzuziehen.

Herbert Wolf: Luthers spielerischer Umgang mit Spracheigenheiten anderer (Band 67/2000)

Up to now, linguistic research has paid little attention to Luther’s games with the linguistic idiosyncracies of other speakers. In the present article, an attempt is made to show the diversity apparent in his skilful treatment of such phenomena. Particular attention is given to the unerringly accurate deployment of characteristic dialect markers and individual modes of word-formation in Luther’s polemical writings.

Gerhard Zimmermann: Sprachvielfalt – Sprachmischung – Sprachspiel. Historische und fiktionale Aspekte nationaler und dialektaler Mehrsprachigkeit (Band 67/2000)

In several European states, the course of historical development has led to multiethnic and multilingual populations. In most cases, the different national languages and dialects existing within each set of political boundaries did not remain isolated from one another, but were subject to mutual interference through geographical contact, social choices and language mixing. To a considerable degree, the biographies of public figures offer quite interesting material on their encounters with and their responses to the various languages which they were required to use in the course of their lives. In a jocular mood, aiming at some humorous or ironical effect, some speakers may deliberately incorporate dialect variables in their usage. Fiction, another productive source, yields insights into the individual speech habits of particular literary figures, habits which often display contradictory features. Finally, the translator of foreign-language drama and fiction in which characters speak dialect is faced with the difficult task of transferring the original variety into an ‘adequate’ equivalent in the target language (e.g., English varieties into German). In his search for equivalents across the language boundary, he may select from the dialects of his native tongue, or he may even turn to idiosyncratic mixed types of speech.