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The High German of Russian Mennonites in Ontario by Nikolai

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The High German of Russian Mennonites in Ontario by Nikolai The High German of Russian Mennonites in Ontario by Nikolai Penner A thesis presented to the University of Waterloo in fulfillment of the thesis requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in German Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, 2009 © Nikolai Penner 2009 Author’s Declaration I hereby declare that I am the sole author of this thesis. This is a true copy of the thesis, including any required final revisions, as accepted by examiners. I understand that my thesis may be made electronically available to the public. ii Abstract The main focus of this study is the High German language spoken by Russian Mennonites, one of the many groups of German-speaking immigrants in Canada. Although the primary language of most Russian Mennonites is a Low German variety called Plautdietsch, High German has been widely used in Russian Mennonite communities since the end of the eighteenth century and is perceived as one of their mother tongues. The primary objectives of the study are to investigate: 1) when, with whom, and for what purposes the major languages of Russian Mennonites were used by the members of the second and third migration waves (mid 1920s and 1940-50s respectively) and how the situation has changed today; 2) if there are any differences in spoken High German between representatives of the two groups and what these differences can be attributed to; 3) to what extent the High German of the subjects corresponds to the Standard High German. The primary thesis of this project is that different historical events as well as different social and political conditions witnessed by members of these groups both in Russia (e.g. closure of High German schools and churches in the 1920s and 1930s) and in Canada (e.g. the transition of most Mennonite churches from High German to English) have had a considerable influence upon and were reflected in their perception and use of High German. The data for the project consist of two sets of audio-recorded interviews in High German conducted in 1976-1978 by Henry Paetkau and Stan Dueck with Russian Mennonite immigrants of the 1920s (21 interviews), and by the author of this project in the spring of 2007 with representatives of the third migration wave (19 interviews). Both iii sets of interviews underwent textual and content analysis. Ten selected interviews have been transcribed following the rules of the CHAT (Codes of the Human Analysis of Transcripts) notation system and analyzed with the help of the CLAN (Computerized Language Analysis) software. The results of the study indicate that generally the patterns of language use by both groups showed a number of important differences during their stay in Russia but were found to be very similar after each group migrated to Canada. Further, no significant differences in the use of non-standard constructions between the two groups have been discovered and the main hypothesis of the study was not supported. Finally, it has been determined that the variety of High German spoken by the Russian Mennonites departs from Standard High German in a number of respects and features a variety of non-standard constructions. While some of them can be traced back to the influence of the English or Russian languages, many other non-standard constructions were most likely present in the speech of Russian Mennonites long before intensive contact with these languages began. It has been argued that some non-standard constructions were also relatively stable in the group‟s High German and that they are a result of both language- internal as well as language-external processes of change. iv Acknowledgements First and most of all, I would like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Mathias Schulze. After taking his course on the history of the German language, I fell in love with the subject. It was he who first gave me the idea of doing a doctoral degree in German at the University of Waterloo. I cannot express how deeply thankful I am to Dr. Schulze for the countless hours he spent supervising my project, proof-reading and editing my writings (often overnight and during weekends), and for teaching me most of what I know about linguistics. I am thankful for the tremendous amount of support and personal advice I received from him, and for his patience during the years I spent on this project. I am also very thankful to my mentor, Dr. David John, who has guided me throughout my studies. Without his personal advice and help, I would hardly be where I am now. Dr. John also helped me significantly with the choice of topic for my dissertation. For all this, I would like to express my wholehearted thanks. My further thanks go to Manfred Richter, who provided me with a very valuable feedback at the initial stage of the project, to E. and J. Dyck of Kitchener, Ontario, who have helped me recruit most of the participants for this study, and to Dr. Zina Gimpelevich, without whom I would probably have never become a graduate student at the University of Waterloo. I also would like to give special thanks to my wife, who supported and encouraged me throughout the project, and to my relatives Paul and Marie Penner, Paul and Dolores Penner, and Agnes Samson, who made it possible for me to live and study in Canada. v Last but not least, I would like to thank my father for getting me interested in linguistics when I was in the elementary school by explaining to me the concept of relatedness of the Indo-European languages, and for my family‟s support during my both undergraduate and graduate studies. vi Table of Contents Author‟s Declaration.......…………….………………………………………...………….ii Abstract…...………………..………………………………………………………..……iii Acknowledgements………....…………………………………………………………….iv Table of Contants……….……..………………………………………………….……….v 1. INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................... 1 1.1 General Overview ................................................................................................... 2 1.1.1 Origins of Mennonites as a Religious Movement .....................................................2 1.1.2 The Swiss and The Dutch Mennonites ......................................................................4 1.2 Existing Literature .................................................................................................. 7 1.3 Study Design, Objectives and Research Questions .............................................. 11 1.4 Chapter Outline ..................................................................................................... 12 2. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ....................................................................... 14 2.1 Key Terms and Definitions ................................................................................... 14 2.1.1 Dialects, Languages, and Standard Languages ..................................................... 14 2.1.2 German, High German, and Standard German ..................................................... 19 2.1.3 Low German, Plautdietsch, and Other Related Terms........................................... 24 2.2 Other Linguistic Terms ......................................................................................... 28 2.2.1 Bilingualism with and without Diglossia ................................................................ 29 2.2.2 Borrowing, Code-Switching, and Convergence ...................................................... 35 2.3 Theoretical Framework ......................................................................................... 39 2.3.1 Construction Grammar: Overview ......................................................................... 39 2.3.2 Advantages of the Constructional Approach ......................................................... 47 3. THE LINGUISTIC HISTORY OF RUSSIAN MENNONITES ......................... 50 3.1 Early Mennonites in Northern Europe .................................................................. 51 3.1.1 The Original Homeland .......................................................................................... 51 3.1.2 The Flemish and the Frisian Mennonites ............................................................... 52 3.1.3 Languages of the Early Mennonites ...................................................................... 53 3.1.4 Languages of the Northern Anabaptists before Migrating to Prussia .................. 54 3.2 Netherlandic Mennonites in Prussia ..................................................................... 55 3.2.1 Migration from the Low Lands .............................................................................. 55 vii 3.2.2 Languages of the Early Mennonites in Prussia ...................................................... 57 3.2.3 The Prussian Period: The Dutch Connection .......................................................... 58 3.2.4 Mennonites and High German in Prussia before 1800 .......................................... 61 3.2.5 On the Way to Russia ............................................................................................ 68 3.2.6 Summary of the Prussian Period ............................................................................ 70 3.3 Mennonites in Russia ............................................................................................ 71 3.3.1 The Migration Process ........................................................................................... 71 3.3.2 Economic and Cultural Development .................................................................... 73 3.3.3 High German among Mennonites
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