Basic Issues: Placing the Study of Dialect Syntax in Context Structure of the Talk
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V Variation matters! Structure of the talk 1. Dialect syntax in dialectology and modern Basic issues: Placing the Study of linguistic theory Dialect Syntax in Context 2. The partnership between dialectology and typology: the current state 3. New data sources 4. Areality of syntactic phenomena Bernd Kortmann 5. Some generalizations to be explored in the future (Freiburg University) 2 Dialect syntax in past and present dialectology • hardly any studies on syntax in dialect • variation (including regional variation) research for all periods of English starts to matter only from 1980s onwards • problems of the SED data (Survey of English Dialects) • interest from 2 directions: • dialect research (Anglo-American, Germanic) at the end of 20th century: study of dialect • formalist syntactic models syntax still plays a minor role • functional typology 3 4 • generative grammar: • language typology: a typological approach to the (a) Principles & Parameters Approach study of dialect syntax (Freiburg project) (b) from cross-linguistic to language-internal variation (macroparametric syntax > microparametric (a) cross-dialectal variation in light of cross- syntax); hopes for further development of linguistic variation generative theory: more insights into (i) form and range of syntactic parameters, and (ii) variation (b) a corrective for the preoccupation of language along a single parameter typology with standard varieties; note in (c) variation in Optimality Theory (1990s): the particular: “the distinction between spoken and significance of (violable universal) constraints and written varieties has consequences for (language-particular) constraint rankings; language typology." (Miller, J./R. Weinert 1998: Æ Stochastic OT 338) Literature: Abraham/Bayer 1993; Benincá 1989; Black/Motapanyane 1996; Barbiers et al. 2002; Bresnan/Deo 2001; Adger/Trousdale. to appear. 5 6 1 The Freiburg project on English dialect syntax English Dialect Syntax from a Typological Perspective: The Freiburg Project 2. The partnership between (March 2000 until September 2005) dialectology and typology: aim: exploring cross-dialectal variation in light of cross- linguistic variation the current state funded by DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) for further information consult homepage: http://www.anglistik.uni-freiburg.de/institut/lskortmann/ 7 8 Since the distinction between language and dialect is to a Towards a unified account of linguistic variation large extent grammar-external, typologists who aim at discovering the range of attested variation may miss some Croft: integrative functionalism, or: the dynamic of it if they concentrate on languages without taking into paradigm in the study of linguistic variation, i.e. account the potential of structural variation hidden behind the term of “language”. integrating what we know about The following quotation from DuBois (1985) clearly describes how easily relevant pieces of linguistic variation • cross-linguistic variation even within dialects may be overlooked: • intra-linguistic variation Volumes of so-called functionalism are filled with ingenious appeals to perception, cognition or other system-external • historical variation functional domains, which are used to ‘explain’ why the (e.g. ongoing language change; grammaticalization language in question simply has to have a grammatical particularity that it does – when a moment’s further reflection processes; socially driven language change, role of would show that another well-known language, or even just language contact in language change) the next dialect down the road, has a grammatical structure diametrically opposed in the relevant parameter. (DuBois cf. also Bisang 2004, pp.13-15 9 1985: 353) 10 What typology can contribute to dialectology (e.g. the study of English dialect syntax) Figure 1': The new role of typology in exploring linguistic • findings, generalizations, explanations in language variation ('dynamic typology' Croft 1990) typology as additional reference frame for evaluating language-internal syntactic variation historical linguistics (-> correspondingly: microparametric variation in light of macroparametric variation) • non-standard varieties more "well-behaved" than contrastive linguistics (functional) typology dialectology StE: in many domains conform to majority patterns in the world's languages and cross-linguistic tendencies where StE does not (e.g. PROG > dialectology: more than just the junior partner of typology? IMPFCT, negative concord in a European context, zero relativization (gapping) in subject position) 11 12 2 What dialectology can contribute to typology • serving as a crucial corrective: (a) doing away with the convenient fiction of homogeneous • rich additional data source, including typologically rare features languages (-> acknowledging language-internal variation, (e.g. gendered pronouns, Northern Subject Rule, do as a tense frequency of use; impact of society structure, social and aspect marker) and/or features not described for a given attitudes, language contact on language structures and language family or geographical area (e.g. Europe) language change); -> functional explanations alone are not sufficient for explaining language variation and change b) including spoken varieties (especially of well-described • refining typological parameters and formulating more robust languages); note in particular: “the distinction between generalizations (e.g. grammaticalization processes in spoken spoken and written varieties has consequences for language) language typology." (Miller, J./R. Weinert 1998: 338) (c) in individual domains of grammar, non-standard varieties • making significant contributions to areal typology (e.g. linguistic represent a different language type than the (written) convergence areas in Europe, Europe as a linguistic convergence standard varieties area: SAE) -> a methodological issue of fundamental importance 13 14 Anderwald, L. 2002. Negation in non-standard British English: Gaps, regularizations and asymmetries. London/New York: Routledge. Pietsch, Lukas. 2005. Variable grammars: verbal agreement in Northern dialects of English. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Kortmann, B. et al. 2005. A comparative grammar of British English dialects: Agreement, gender, relative clauses. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 3.1 FRED - The Freiburg English Varieties of Kortmann, B. and E. Schneider Dialect Corpus with R. Mesthrie/K. Burridge/C. Eng- in the Upton, eds. 2004. A handbook of English varieties of English. Vol. 1: lish dialects Phonology; Vol. 2: Morphology and syntax. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. world West Germanic > World Germanic Kortmann, B. ed. 2004. Dialect- ology meets Typology. Berlin/New Europe York: Mouton de Gruyter. 15 16 Rationale Procedure • dialect grammar needs much text • archives, museums, libraries, collections • no established dialect corpora • sifting materials • wealth of materials collected for other • re-dialectization of existing transcripts purposes • transcription of lone tapes • Oral History Projects • electronic compilation • temporally homogeneous 17 18 3 FRED Data distribution • 2,5 mio words (excluding interviewer utterances) words in 1,000 • 372 texts, 300 hours of speech 700 600 • 431 speakers 500 400 300 • mainly recorded 1970s and 1980s 200 100 • 4 large dialect areas in England (2 mio words) 0 E s L • 5 small dialect areas in Scotland and Wales S th les an SW r Sc ScH Heb land No Wa f M (500,000 words) id M Isle o 19 20 Informants Informants 2 • FRED contains data from 431 different informants • lower class • 277 (64.3%) are male and 132 (30.6%) are • little formal education female. • manual labour • non-mobile • 77.8% of the textual material is produced by male speakers, and 21.3% by female speakers. • 89% born before 1920 Ö NORMs 21 22 Informants 3 Recordings The material included in FRED has been recorded between The oldest of FRED's informants was born in 1877. 1968 and 2000. A detailed breakdown of recording dates can be seen from the table below. • 13 informants (3.0%)were born between 1880 and 1889, • 62 informants (14.4%) were born between 1890 and 1899, • 101 informants (23.4%) were born between 1900 and 1909, • 64 informants (14.8%) were born between 1910 and 1919. • 89% of all informants in FRED born before 1920. 23 24 4 Data: advantages Data: disadvantages • machine readable: WordSmith, TACT, ... • lower-frequency phenomena: • high-frequency phenomena: qualitative analysis only qualitative and quantitative analyses • some phenomena not represented • regional comparison • no social comparison • statistical evaluation • no age comparison 25 26 Completed PhD and postdoctorate theses: http://www.anglistik.uni- freiburg.de/institut/lskortmann/FRED/index.htm Anderwald, L./S. Wagner. 2006. "The Freiburg English Negation in Non-Standard British English (Lieselotte Dialect Corpus (FRED) – Applying Corpus-Linguistic Anderwald, 2002) Research Tools to the Analysis of Dialect Data." In: J. Non-Standard Verb Paradigms in Traditional British English Beal/K. Corrigan/H. Moisl (eds.) Using Dialects: Morphological Naturalness and Comparative Unconventional Digital Language Corpora. Vol. 1: Dialect Grammar (Lieselotte Anderwald,) Synchronic Corpora. Basingstoke: Palgrave Relative Clauses in English Dialects. A Typological Approach Macmillan. 35-53. (Tanja Herrmann, 2003) Kortmann, B./S. Wagner. 2005. “The Freiburg English Subject-Verb Agreement in English Dialects: The Northern Dialect Project and Corpus”. In: B. Kortmann/T. Subject Rule (Lukas Pietsch, 2003) Herrmann/L. Pietsch/S.