Varieties Of German Research Articles

Redefining Language Death: Evidence From Moribund Grammars

AbstractThe present work presents a critical assessment of claims in recent literature that moribund language varieties exhibit accelerated language decay, and that attrition in individual grammars has a causational relationship with language shift to the majority language. We show these claims to be unfounded. Based on two empirical points taken from moribund heritage varieties of German—complementizer agreement and the restructuring of the morphosyntactic properties of dative case—we provide evidence that (a) attrition in the form of simplification of the heritage grammar is often times minimal, especially when compared to the nonstandard input varieties (rather than to Standard German), and (b) that systematic restructuring of the grammar is a typological pattern in language contact settings. These empirical findings point toward the limited effects of attrition on particular domains of grammar systems across the lifespan.

Use of the world gene pool of bread winter wheat in new varieties of Myronivka breeding

Purpose. To analyze genetic origin of new Myronivka varieties of bread winter wheat and to identify in their pedigree the carriers of germplasm of the varieties bred at Myronivka and samples of the world gene pool. Methods. The search work was carried out on the basis of primary sources (hybridization journals, main books of breeding material and catalogs of varieties) resulted in analysis of pedigrees of 14 bread winter wheat varieties bred at the V. M. Remeslo Myronivka Institute of Wheat of NAAS which have been put on the State Register of Plant Varieties of Ukraine during 2014–2018. Results. It was revealed significant diversity of initial forms (56 variety samples from 17 countries) which are traced in the pedigrees of new Myronivka wheat varieties. The largest number among them (18) are Ukrainian, 9 from Russia, 5 from Bulgaria, 4 varieties from Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic, 3 from Italy and Hungary, 2 from Mexico and CIMMYT, 1 variety from Serbia, Yugoslavia, Tunisia, Colombia, France, Romania, and the USA. It was established that when creating 9 of 14 varieties studied (65 %), collection samples of various ecological and geographical origin were used in crossings both as the maternal component (in the varieties Berehynia myronivska, Balada myronivska, MІP Assol, MІP Dnіprianka, MІP Valensiia, MІP Kniazhna) and the paternal one (Horlytsia myronivska, Oberih Myronivskyi, Hospodynia myronivska). The most of new wheat varieties were created on the basis of germplasm of Myronivka varieties bred in previous years, such as Myronivska 808, Myronivska yuvileina, Myronivska 27, as well as promising lines (Erythrospermum 50713, 50137, 52334, Lutescens 52948, 30125). As for the varieties of foreign breeding, progenies of the Russian variety Bezostaya 1 are the most frequent. 93 % of new varieties have wheat-rye translocation (WRT) 1BL/1RS derived from the German varieties Hadmersleben 6508-74 and Weique. Conclusions. New bread winter wheat varieties are characterized with presence of wheat germplasm from Europe, America and Africa carrying by mainly Ukrainian varieties and their descents of previous years of breeding, which confirms the significant role of the local gene pool. The presence of WRT 1BL/1RS in genotypes of new varieties enhances their adaptive properties during crop formation period under stressful growing conditions.

One text, two varieties of German: fruitful directions for multilingual humour in “translation”

A heterolingual text is characterised by the presence of two or more different languages, or two or more varieties of the same language (Corrius & Zabalbeascoa 2011: 115). This article discusses possible methods of translating into English of a text containing two varieties of German: Ottokar Domma’s Der brave Schüler Ottokar [The Good Schoolboy Ottokar]. In these stories, about a schoolboy growing up in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) in the 1960s, Domma creates a zone of friction between child narrator Ottokar’s everyday German and the language of GDR officialdom (“official discourse”). This article first shows that following a conventional method of translating a literary text into English does not allow this satire to be conveyed to the reader. It then presents two alternative translational methods — “thick” and creative — that demonstrate how it is helpful, indeed in some cases necessary, for the translator to adopt a broad understanding of “translation” in respect of texts that exploit multilingualism for humorous purposes. It is argued that methods of translating in which effect is privileged over form — which here included introducing multimodality — can serve well to open up heterolingual humour for speakers of other languages.

Zur Verwendung der Forschungsplattform Regionalsprache.de (REDE) bei der Vermittlung arealer Sprachvariation in den Bereichen Deutsch als Fremdsprache und Deutsch als Zweitsprache

Integrating regional linguistic variation more heavily into classes of German as a foreign language (DaF) and German as a second language (DaZ) has been subject to discussion for quite some time in the research literature. Surveys have shown that students of DaF and DaZ are interested in learning about regional varieties of German, but that this often fails for two reasons: the lack of appropriate materials as well as reluctance on the part of teachers (cf. Baßler/Spiekermann 2001, Spiekermann 2007). Consequently, there are numerous non-standard variants of which students are not aware. It has also been observed that non-standard linguistic structures can lead to miscomprehension (cf. Negele 2012: 94). This con-tribution calls attention to two desiderata: 1. Areal linguistic variation is covered only sel-dom in DaF and DaZ classes. 2. There is insufficient suitable teaching material for treating and imparting knowledge on regional linguistic variants in these classes. The goal of the present contribution is then twofold: to provide teachers and textbook authors with information about the resources available over the research platform Regionalsprache.de (REDE) and then to give some impulses for its use in DaF and DaZ courses.

Contact-induced variation in Transylvanian Saxon verb clusters

This article illustrates two-verb clusters in Viscri Saxon, a dialect of Transylvanian Saxon (TrSax) spoken in Viscri, Romania, along with Romanian and Standard German. The orders found in Viscri Saxon verb clusters are encountered in West Germanic varieties related to TrSax (e.g. Moselle Franconian, Luxembourgish), but the distributions differ from the ones discussed in other varieties (Dubenion-Smith 2010, Wurmbrand 2017). I argue that word-order variation in Viscri Saxon is the result of syntactic transfer from Standard German, and show that there is flexible distribution between possible word orders. Furthermore, speakers with different linguistic profiles use the available constructions to different degrees, thus illustrating the roles of German and Romanian in the progression of contact-induced changes in Viscri Saxon.

Möllers Karl, Schulten Mama and Schmidtenbuur

In rural speech communities, we find specific systems for personal reference used to talk about absent referents. They only apply within one village’s ingroup and consist of the surname or an unofficial family name preceding the first name, a kinship term or other personal reference terms. The surname can show a former genitive suffix and mostly appear without a determiner in Low German ( Mollers Karl ). Diachronically, complex systems with several levels marking insider or outsider status can be noted distinguishing between well and lesser known referents within the speech community. For well-known referents, kinship terms or first names are used, while for lesser known persons, occupational terms are preferred. House names as the least official form of reference are only given to families living in the speech community for several generations. By using these systems for personal reference, speakers not only position other persons within the speech community’s ingroup, but also establish their own identity as their members. Synchronically, these systems are simplified or even abolished simultaneously with the decrease of Low German varieties. This especially applies to unofficial family names, which are closely tied to dialect. Even today, being established as a local family over several generations forms the most important condition of using unofficial reference terms.

Voice onset time and beyond: Exploring laryngeal contrast in 19 languages

In this special collection entitled Marking 50 Years of Research on Voice Onset Time and the Voicing Contrast in the World’s Languages, we have compiled eleven studies investigating the voicing contrast in 19 languages. The collection provides extensive data obtained from 270 speakers across those languages, examining VOT and other acoustic, aerodynamic and articulatory measures. The languages studied may be divided into four groups: ‘aspirating’ languages with a two-way contrast (English, three varieties of German); ‘true voicing’ languages with a two-way contrast (Russian, Turkish, Brazilian Portuguese, two Iranian languages Pashto and Wakhi); languages with a three-way contrast (Thai, Vietnamese, Khmer, Yerevan Armenia, three Indo-Aryan languages, Dawoodi, Punjabi and Shina, and Burushaki); and Indo-Aryan languages with a more than three-way contrast (Jangli and Urdu with a four-way contrast, and Sindhi and Siraiki with a five-way contrast). We discuss the cross-linguistic data, focusing on how much VOT alone tells us about the voicing contrast in these languages, and what other phonetic dimensions (such as consonant-induced F0 and voice quality) are needed for a complete understanding of laryngeal contrast in these languages. Implications for various issues emerge: universal phonetic feature systems, effects of language contact on linguistic levelling, and the relation between laryngeal contrast and supralaryngeal articulation. The cross-linguistic VOT data also lead us to discuss how the distribution of VOT as measured acoustically may allow us to infer the underlying articulation and how it might be approached in gestural phonologies. The discussion on these multiple issues sparks new questions to be resolved, and provide indications of where the field may be best directed in exploring laryngeal contrast in voicing in the world’s languages.

Apparent exceptions to final devoicing in High Prussian: A metrical analysis

High Prussian, a variety of East Central German, has a segmentally opaque process of final devoicing: Only some forms with underlyingly voiced obstruents devoice at the end of a word. This phenomenon can also be observed in some morphological alternations where simplex forms show final devoicing but complex ones do not. This paper provides a metrical analysis of final devoicing and two related phenomena: spirantization, and an interaction of vowel length in high vowels and obstruent voicing. It is claimed that nondevoicing items contain disyllabic foot templates and that word-final consonants are then syllabified as onsets of empty-headed word-final syllables. The analysis demonstrates how evidence from West Germanic dialects can contribute to our understanding of the phonology of laryngeal features and to the role that metrical structure can play in shaping phonological alternations.*

Intonazione e significato: l’esempio dell’italiano regionale di Bergamo

Abstract In this paper we present a selection of preliminary results of our research project “Intonation and Meaning”, in which we compare recurrent intonation contours in German and Italian regional varieties. We apply the method of German Interactional Prosody Research (Interaktionale Prosodieforschung), which in turn is based on Conversation Analysis, to a sample of selfcollected empirical data. Our aim is to show the value of intonation as a resource to contextualize speech activities and to point out form-function relationships between intonation patterns and speech act types. In this respect, we observe the usage of intonation contours with rising accent (L*H) and with falling accent (H*L) in the utterance of question activities, and provide evidence for the fact that the latter represent a distinctive type of questions with epistemic presupposition, whereas L*H correlates rather with default, modally unmarked questions.

Causal inference or conventionalized meaning? A corpus study of the German connector nachdem ‘after’ in regional standard varieties

AbstractDrawing on a corpus study using German and Austrian parliamentary protocols, this paper shows that the originally temporal connectornachdem‘after’ may carry causal meaning in southern German standard varieties. In these varieties,nachdemclauses may occur with individual level predicates, cases which, I will argue, provide unambiguously causal contexts since a temporal succession of events is excluded with individual level predicates. Whilenachdemdisplays polysemy comparable to Englishsincein southern German standard varieties, it is a temporal marker in central and northern German varieties and a causal link may arise only due to a conversational implicature. The observed polysemy coincides with a higher token frequency ofnachdemas well as a higher incidence of present tense use in thenachdemclause in the respective southern German varieties. Remarkably, causalnachdemclauses show a clear tendency to be fronted to the matrix clause despite the overall tendency of causal clauses to be post-posed, both cross-linguistically and in German, which may be explained in terms of information structure and discourse-organizing functions.

Loss and preservation of case in Germanic non-standard varieties

This paper deals with inflectional change in Germanic standard and non-standard varieties, challenging the standard model of phonologically driven case loss in favour of a model that allows for interaction between phonological, syntactic, and purely morphological processes. After providing evidence from the language histories of the modern, standardised varieties of High German and Swedish which calls into question the exclusive role of phonology, we concentrate on two Germanic non-standard varieties: Visperterminen Alemannic, a successor of Old High German, and Övdalian, which stems from Old Dalecarlian (Old Swedish is used as a proxy to Old Dalecarlian). Both can serve as a testing ground for system-internal morphological change, as they carry on specific phonological aspects of their ancestral varieties, and have not been subject to excessive language contact that could have triggered external simplification processes. Using these non-standard varieties as an empirical base, we examine the patterns of loss of inflectional case marking and corresponding compensation strategies on the level of the nominal phrase. It can be shown that, while there are extensive syncretisms in noun inflection, these are systematically compensated for in the noun phrase for dative, but not for the nominative-accusative syncretism. The systematic (non-)compensation in the noun phrase can be explained by word order. Based on our results, we propose an alternative model for morphological change in Germanic that is less prone to counterevidence from non-standard varieties.

Breaking Up Verb Clusters: Two-Verb Constructions in Moundridge Schweitzer German

Verb clusters are a linguistic phenomenon where two or more verbs align in adjacent order. This paper discusses the structure of a certain type of verb cluster, namely modal infinitivo pro participio (IPP) structures, in main clauses of a moribund heritage variety of German, Moundridge Schweitzer German (MSG), spoken in Kansas. An acceptability judgment task was conducted with twelve participants to investigate two aspects of verb clusters in MSG. The first question concerned the integration of non-verbal elements, here the direct object (DO) and the negation particle (neg), in the verbal complex. The second question investigates whether MSG modal IPPs show variability in verb order, which is an essential characteristic of this type of verb cluster in other verb-cluster languages. The results show that modal IPP constructions in MSG have a fixed 2–3 verb order but allow object scrambling to some degree. Thus, while the ordering of verbs lacks syntactic variability, flexibility and variation are attested in the placement of the non-verbal constituents within the verbal complex. This is interpreted as the retention of an archaic dialectal trait.

Lost in Translation: Trediakovskii's Journey to the Island of Love and its Social Context

V. K. Trediakovskii’s translation of Paul Tallement Voyage de lisle d’amour occupies a special place in the history of Russian 18th-century literature: it is often credited with creating a new vocabulary of love and amorous intercourse, an innovation that would pave the way for much of the later poetry and prose. It is also believed to have gained instant popularity among Russia’s youth, although who exactly Trediakovskii’ early readers were is not clear. Likewise, while Trediakovskii’s early life and his stay in Europe have been a subject of extensive study, we do not know much why exactly he choose this topic and this particular work for his translation: following the version offered by the poet himself, this choice is usually treated as nearly random. Against this background, this this paper uses a variety of archival sources to reconstruct the actual courtly context of these events. On the one hand, it focuses on the secret liaison between Ekaterina Ioannovna, the Duchess of Mecklenburg, the most important patron of Trediakovskii and his work in the early 1730s, and Prince Beloselskii. On the other, it explores a trove of unpublished letters written by a variety of French, German, and Dutch ladies to Prince A.B. Kurakin during his stay in Europe in the 1720s: these letters present the prince as fully integrated in the social life of Western European aristocracy and, most importantly, as thoroughly versed in the contemporary rules and conventions of gallant intercourse. Kurakin, as is well known, was another patron of Trediakovskii, and it was thanks to him that the poet has been introduced to Ekaterina. Taken together, these documents not only provide context for Trediakovskii’s translation and its popularity, but also allow us to reconstruct the amorous practices of the post-Petrine Russian elite

Super light-headed relatives, missing prepositions, and span-conditioned allomorphy in German

The ‘missing-P’ phenomenon (Bresnan and Grimshaw in Linguist Inq 9:331–391, 1978) refers to free relative constructions in which one of two prepositions appears to be missing. This paper provides an account of free relatives in German that straightforwardly extends to this phenomenon, drawing on evidence from standard free relatives as well as from previously undiscussed free relatives in East Franconian, which may be formed with a non-wh relative pronoun. Both types of free relatives are argued to be derived from light-headed relatives—to which they are structurally identical underlyingly—through a haplology-like process grounded in featural redundancy over pairs of adjacent spans (Williams in Representation theory, MIT Press, Cambridge, 2003). Contextual allomorphy in the postsyntactic component of the grammar is argued to trigger the non-pronunciation of a matrix argument in a light-headed relative, resulting in a super light-headed relative. As the conditioning environment for allomorphy occurs over multiple terminal nodes, the proposal offers further evidence that spans are morphological units targetable for vocabulary insertion (Svenonius in Spanning. Manuscript, University of Tromso, 2012; Merchant in Linguist Inq 46(2):273–303, 2015). The analysis improves on previous analyses of free relatives in German by providing a unified account of both nominal and prepositional free relatives, meanwhile providing new insight into feature-triggered allomorphy over adjacent spans as well as a method of accounting for the variation observed in the form of the relative pronoun across two varieties of German.

Nonconvergence and Divergence in Bilingual Phonological and Phonetic Systems: Low Back Vowels in Moundridge Schweitzer German and English

This study explores the bilingual phonology of two heritage speakers of Moundridge Schweitzer German (msg) from Moundridge, Kansas. The speakers are descendants of Mennonite speakers of German who settled in the area around Moundridge, Kansas, in the 1870s. The production of Moundridge Schweitzer German /a/ and /ɔ/ and American English /a/ and /ɔ/ were compared and no evidence of phonological or phonetic convergence was found. For one speaker, there was evidence that phonetic realizations of /a/ and /ɔ/ in the two languages were diverging with a merger or a near merger of the two vowels in the heritage variety of German but not in English.

An OT analysis of do-support across varieties of German

Just like most varieties of West Germanic, virtually all varieties of German use a construction in which a cognate of the English verb do (standard German tun) functions as an auxiliary and selects another verb in the bare infinitive, a construction known as do-periphrasis or do-support. The present paper provides an Optimality Theoretic (OT) analysis of this phenomenon. It builds on a previous analysis by Bader and Schmid (An OT-analysis of do-support in Modern German, 2006) but (i) extends it from root clauses to subordinate clauses and (ii) aims to capture all of the major distributional patterns found across (mostly non-standard) varieties of German. In so doing, the data are used as a testing ground for different models of German clause structure. At first sight, the occurrence of do in subordinate clauses, as found in many varieties, appears to support the standard CP-IP-VP analysis of German. In actual fact, however, the full range of data turn out to challenge, rather than support, this model. Instead, I propose an analysis within the IP-less model by Haider (Deutsche Syntax - generativ. Vorstudien zur Theorie einer projektiven Grammatik, Narr, Tubingen, 1993 et seq.). In sum, the do-support data will be shown to have implications not only for the analysis of clause structure but also for the OT constraints commonly assumed to govern the distribution of do, for the theory of non-projecting words (Toivonen in Non-projecting words, Kluwer, Dordrecht, 2003) as well as research on grammaticalization.

Ein Vorschlag des dialektbasierten Hochdeutschunterrichts für die Wolgadeutschen in Argentinien

Wie in vielen anderen deutschen Gemeinschaften in Amerika wurde bei den Wolgadeutschen in Argentinien bis heute eine dialektale Varietät des Deutschen aufrechterhalten. Diese wurde i.d.R. nur mündlich weitergegeben, verfügt über covert prestige für die Sprecher und dient als Marker ethnischer Identität. Die Sprache der Mehrheitsgesellschaft (Spanisch im Falle der Wolgadeutschen in Argentinien) verfügt dagegen über overt prestige und objektiven Nutzen für den Alltag. Auch dem Hochdeutschen wird ein objektiver Nutzen, z.B. für die berufliche Zukunft, zugesprochen. Gleichzeitig wird die von der Gemeinschaft gesprochene Varietät meist als inkompatibel mit dem Hochdeutschen wahrgenommen: Die Sprecher des Dialekts sind oft der Meinung, dass die Dialektkenntnisse für sie eher ein Hindernis als eine Hilfe beim Erwerb des Hochdeutschen darstellen. Nichtsdestotrotz gab es bereits Initiativen dialektbasierten Hochdeutschunterricht für die Wolgadeutschen in Argentinien voranzutreiben: So initiierte z.B. Arndt Schmidt ein Programm zur Ausbildung der Lehrer im wolgadeutschen Dorf Santa Maria in der Provinz Buenos Aires. Der vorliegende Artikel geht auf die Frage des Deutschunterrichts für Dialektlerner ein, gibt einen kurzen Überblick über die soziolinguistische Situation der Wolgadeutschen in Argentinien und macht einen Vorschlag eines ursprungsdialektbasierten Hochdeutschunterrichts.

An Idiosyncracy of Valais German Intonation: Default L+M*+H in Statements

The present paper uncovers a fundamental distinction between the intonation of Valais German (VG) and that of Midland Swiss German (MSG): Statements in VG are mainly composed of L+M*+H-accents. Such three-level pitch accents have not been described for any variety of German. MSG uses two-level pitch accents instead, Bernese German (BG), for instance, L+H*. The difference between VG and BG may be schematized as follows:

Genetic Variability of Barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) Genotypes in Phytoremediation of Heavy Metals-Contaminated Soil

SOIL contaminated with heavy metals negatively affects both the groundwater quality and the food production system. Heavy metals can be remediated from contaminated soil by phytoextraction. This study aims to illustrate the possible use of barley genotypes as a cheap, effective, safe and sustainable way to remediate contaminated soil. A set of 17 genotypes, including Egyptian and German varieties and wild accessions were sown under heavy metals contaminated and uncontaminated soil in a potted experiment for two years (2015/2016 and 2016/2017). Heavy metals concentrations including Al, Cr, Cu, Fe, Ni and Zn were measured in grains and leaves, separately, for each genotype under contaminated and uncontaminated soils. Results showed that genotypes differed in their capability to accumulate different heavy metals in either grains or leaves. In addition, there were significant positive correlations between Al, Cr, Cu and Zn concentrations in grains under uncontaminated and contaminated soils. In conclusion, mixture of barley’s genotypes including Heines-Hanns, ICB 180410, Giza-126, Giza-129, Giza-130, Giza-2000, Pasadena and Barke might be used to remediate contaminated soil.

Using Authentic Materials to Teach Varieties of German: Reflections on a Pedagogical Experiment

German is a language with multiple standard and non‐standard varieties (Fagan, ). Yet L2 textbooks still favor one standard form, offering little information about other varieties of the language. In particular, Austrian and Swiss Standard German are underrepresented, and even when present, the language is often in a mixture of dialect and standard varieties. This is an important limitation, since students who embark on study abroad programs will inevitably be confronted by different standard forms and dialects in spoken language (Lam & O'Brien, ). In order to help learners develop an awareness of varieties of German so that they can succeed in L2 environments, it is essential to supplement textbook materials with other resources. This article describes a ten‐week pedagogical experiment whose objective was to raise learners’ awareness of several spoken varieties of German (standards and dialects) through the use of authentic materials. An attitude survey revealed that the 18 participants viewed learning about German as a multi‐variable language positively. A critical review suggests, however, that not all teaching materials were equally effective in achieving the learning objectives.