Variation in R-Pronouns in Moroccan and Turkish Ethnolectal Dutch and What It Tells Us

Abstract

R-pronouns are R-words which feature as pronouns in prepositional phrases (among other things). They are common in Dutch and German (e.g., D. daarmee, G. damit, lit. ‘therewith’, ‘with that’, D. erna, G. danach, lit. ‘hereafter’, ‘after this’). This contribution concerns a quantitative study of variation in R-pronouns in modern Moroccan and Turkish ethnolectal Dutch. In conversational speech of bilingual speakers of Moroccan Dutch, Turkish Dutch and two groups of monolingual ‘white’ Dutch (one of them being the control group), R-pronouns appear to vary in three dimensions: the R-pronoun can or cannot be realized (with the latter option violating the norms of Dutch); if it is realized, the R-pronoun and the preposition can or cannot be split (both options conform the norms of Standard Dutch), if the R-pronoun is not realized, then either another pronoun is used instead or there is no substitute (both variants violate the norms of Dutch). For all three dimensions of variation, statistical analyses were carried out, starting from a total of 1160 realizations by 52 representatives of the four groups. The analyses involved three internal parameters and four social ones. The results serve to answer research questions concerning the origin of the variation, its place in the verbal repertoires and the social spread of the variation.