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Contact-Induced Language Change and Remnants of the Former System

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Contact-Induced Language Change and Remnants of the Former System Contact-induced language change and remnants of the former system – the verbal agreement of Koĩc (English: Sunuwar; Tibeto-Burman) Dörte Borchers, Karl-Franzens-University, Graz, Austria Koĩc ([kɔĩts]; English: Sunwar; Nepali: सनु वु ार Sunuvār) is a Kiranti language spoken in eastern Nepal. With about 38 000 speakers, Koĩc is one the bigger languages of the 123 languages of Nepal.1 Koĩc once had a biactantial agreement system with transitive verbs agreeing with agents and patients (Carol Genetti 1988), a typical feature of Kiranti languages. In modern Koĩc, transitive verbs agree with the agent but not with the patient. As most speakers of Koĩc are bilingual with Nepal's official language Nepali (Indo-Iranian), changes in the grammatical system of Koĩc that result in structures similar to those of Nepali are likely to have been caused by language contact. Besides the mentioned loss of verbal object agreement, the loss of marking dual number in nouns is another example of such a contact induced change. The latter change occurs increasingly in places where frequent language switching between Koĩc and Nepali is the rule. A comparison of modern Koĩc verbal paradigms and the obsolete verbal paradigms with biactantial agreement collected by Genetti (1988) shows rather regular similarities in form and function between old and new person and number markers. Such a comparison shows in addition the retention of a structural difference in reference to a first person singular agent as opposed to reference to non-first person singular speech act participants. In the equivalent Nepali paradigms, there is no such difference between indicating first person agents or other agents. A brief overview of changes in the Koĩc language from a biactantial to a monoactantial agreement marking system will be followed by a presentation of the morphological and semantic continuities between the older and newer person marking system of Koĩc. Finally, possible reasons for the special status of the marking of a first person singular agent will be discussed. References Borchers, Dörte 2008. A Grammar of Sunwar. Descriptive grammar, paradigms, texts and glossary (Languages of the Greater Himalayan Region, Volume 7). Leiden: Brill Central Bureau of Statistics 2012. National Population and Housing Census 2011 (National Report). Volume 01, NPHC 2011. Kathmandu: Government of Nepal, National Planning Commission Secretariat (https://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic/sources/census/wphc/Nepal/Nepal- Census-2011-Vol1.pdf; accessed 21 March 2017) Commissioner for Linguistic Minorities 2011. 48th Report of the Commissioner for Linguistic Minorities in India (July 2010 to June 2011). Allahabad: Ministry of Minority Affairs, Government of India (http://nclm.nic.in/shared/linkimages/nclm48threport.pdf; accessed 14. April 2017) Genetti, Carol 1988. Notes on the structure of the Sunwari transitive verb, in: Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area11.2; 62-92 1 The figures for languages of Nepal and speakers of Koĩc come from the Census of 2011 (Central Bureau of Statistics 2012). Gebrauch und Dynamik der Regionalsprache in Ost-Lothringen Mit dem Ende des Mittelalters waren die Sprachgrenzen in Europa konsolidiert und haben sich seitdem nur wenig verändert. Indessen hielten Annexionsbewegungen, Staatenbildung und Grenzverschiebungen von Staaten bis ins 20. Jahrhundert an. Dabei orientierten sich die neuen Grenzziehungen nun nicht an sprachlichen Räumen, sondern durchquerten und zerteilten sie vielmehr. Dies betrifft das Aufeinandertreffen von Germania und Romania in besonderem Maße. So verläuft die Staatsgrenze zwischen Deutschland und dem nordöstlichen Frankreich seit 1957 (wieder) südlich von Merzig – Saabrücken – Zweibrücken – Landau (Pfalz). Bezogen auf die sprachlich- dialektale Ebene liegen somit große Teile des Mosel- und Reinfränkischen im deutschen Staatsgebiet, während sie in Ost-Lothringen Teil des französischen Diasystems sind. In den letzten 150 Jahren hat dieses Gebiet vier Herrschaftswechsel erlebt. Frühere Maßnahmen zur Französisierung Ost- Lothringens zeigten nur geringe Effekte. Jedoch haben die Ereignisse v.a. des 2. Weltkriegs ein kollektives Trauma bei der Bevölkerung ausgelöst, das eine eigenständige Identität auf der Basis ihres germanophonen Dialekts massiv erschwerte. In der Folge wurde die Förderung des Französischen mit wenig Widerstand hingenommen und in vielen Familien die Weitergabe des Lothringer Platt aufgegeben (Dorner 2012). Im Rahmen eines Projekts am Institut für Deutsche Sprache werden zur Zeit umfassende Datenerhebungen durchgeführt, die den Gebrauch der Regionalsprache und seine soziosituativen Bedingungen in einem spezifischen mehrsprachigen Kontext dokumentieren. Eine solche Dokumentation erscheint angesichts der bedrohten Lage umso dringlicher. Die Daten umfassen neben dialektalen Übersetzungstests (Wenkersätze) und stdd. Vorlesetests („Nordwind und Sonne“) auch freie Rede in sprachbiographischen Interviews und in Freundesgesprächen. Vor allem letzteres Setting erlaubt Einblicke auf das Nebeneinander von Lothringer Platt und Französisch. Die Erhebungen im gesamten germanophonen Gebiet Ost-Lothringen sowie von mehreren Generationen ermöglichen zudem Analysen der diatopischen und intergenerationellen Variation. Im Beitrag sollen erste Ergebnisse der Analysen vorgestellt werden. Dabei zeigt sich ein heterogenes Bild bezüglich der intergenerationellen Weitergabe und dem Erreichen von Sprachlagen im standardnahen Bereich, das bisweilen mit der Wahrnehmung der Staatsgrenze als Handlungsgrenze in Zusammenhang stehen. Dorner, Daniela (2012) „Social actors and the language policy and planning process: A case study from German-speaking Lorraine (France).“ In: Studer, Patrick/Werlen, Iwar (Hrsg.) Linguistic Diversity in Europe. Current trends and Discourses. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter: 157-175. Intergenerationelle Weitergabe der Regionalsprache in Ost‐Lothringen Mit dem Ende des Mittelalters waren die Sprachgrenzen in Europa konsolidiert und haben sich seitdem nur wenig verändert. Indessen hielten Annexionsbewegungen, Staatenbildung und Grenzverschiebungen von Staaten bis ins 20. Jahrhundert an. Dabei orientierten sich die neuen Grenzziehungen nun nicht an sprachlichen Räumen, sondern durchquerten und zerteilten sie vielmehr. Dies betrifft das Aufeinandertreffen von Germania und Romania in besonderem Maße. So verläuft die Staatsgrenze zwischen Deutschland und dem nordöstlichen Frankreich seit 1957 (wieder) südlich von Merzig – Saabrücken – Zweibrücken – Landau (Pfalz). Bezogen auf die sprachlich‐dialektale Ebene liegen somit große Teile des Mosel‐ und Reinfränkischen im deutschen Staatsgebiet, während sie in Ost‐Lothringen Teil des französischen Diasystems sind. In den letzten 150 Jahren hat dieses Gebiet vier Herrschaftswechsel erlebt. Frühere Maßnahmen zur Französisierung Ost‐Lothringens zeigten nur geringe Effekte. Jedoch haben die Ereignisse v.a. des 2. Weltkriegs ein kollektives Trauma bei der Bevölkerung ausgelöst, das eine eigenständige Identität auf der Basis ihres germanophonen Dialekts massiv erschwerte. In der Folge wurde die Förderung des Französischen mit wenig Widerstand hingenommen und in vielen Familien die Weitergabe des Lothringer Platt aufgegeben (Dorner 2012). Im Rahmen eines Projekts am Leibniz‐Institut für Deutsche Sprache werden zur Zeit umfassende Datenerhebungen durchgeführt, die den Gebrauch der Regionalsprache und seine soziosituativen Bedingungen in ihrem spezifischen mehrsprachigen Kontext dokumentieren. Neben dialektalen Übersetzungstests und standarddeutschen Vorlesetests umfassen die Daten auch freie Rede in Freundesgesprächen und in sprachbiographischen Interviews. Die Erhebungen im gesamten germanophonen Gebiet Ost‐Lothringen sowie von mehreren Generationen ermöglichen zudem Analysen der diatopischen und intergenerationellen Variation. Bisher liegen über 90 Stunden Datenmaterial von 53 Informantinnen und Informanten vor. Im Beitrag sollen erste Ergebnisse der Inhaltsanalyse der Interviews vorgestellt werden. Dabei ergibt sich folgendes Bild: Die Sprecher der Geburtenjahrgänge 1928‐1960 hatten zwar größtenteils Französisch als Unterrichtssprache in der Schule, wuchsen aber in einem dialektsprachigen Elternhaus auf. In den folgenden Generationen (*1961‐1996) wird der Faktor "Region" relevant: Während im Osten der autochthone Dialekt noch recht verbreitet war, wuchs im Westen kaum jemand mit ihm auf. Dorner, Daniela (2012) „Social actors and the language policy and planning process: A case study from German‐speaking Lorraine (France).“ In: Studer, Patrick/Werlen, Iwar (Hrsg.) Linguistic Diversity in Europe. Current trends and Discourses. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter: 157‐175. III. Vielfaltslinguistik (Köln) – Abstract Paul Compensis, Universität zu Köln Clitic doubling in Molise Slavic. A corpus-based classification. Molise Slavic is a Slavic micro-language in Italy, closely related to istrian-ikavian dialects. Although belong to the Western South Slavic branch, Molise Slavic exhibits the syntactic construction clitic doubling (CD). CD (sometimes called object doubling) is a construction in which a direct or indirect object is doubled with a clitic form of a pronoun. This construction type is well-known in languages of the Balkan sprachbund (Albanian, Bulgarian, Greek, Macedonian and Romanian) and in some Romance varieties (Spanish, Southern Italian etc.). In some languages, CD might be an obligatory process, dependent on definiteness (Macedonian), topicality (Bulgarian) or else, while in other languages it can be
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