Swiss German and Swiss Standard German 57

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Swiss German and Swiss Standard German 57 Copyright by Christian Matthias Fingerhuth 2017 The Dissertation Committee for Christian Matthias Fingerhuth certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: Grammatical Variation in Standard German, 1900-1999: A Contrastive Corpus-Linguistic Study of Germany and Switzerland Committee: Marc Pierce, Supervisor Lars Hinrichs Peter Hess Stephan Elspaß Hans C. Boas Grammatical Variation in Standard German, 1900-1999: A Contrastive Corpus-Linguistic Study of Germany and Switzerland by Christian Matthias Fingerhuth Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Texas at Austin, 2017 in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin August 2017 Acknowledgements Even more than empirical data, the foundation of this dissertation is support - moral, monetary, hands-on, and academic. Naming the sources of funding is the easiest task. Without travel and summer funding from The Department of Germanic Studies at The University of Texas at Austin I would not have had numerous conversations that helped me develop and complete this project. Completing it in only 2 years was possible only with the generous funding from the Graduate School at The University of Texas at Austin that relieved me of my teaching duty for 2 semesters. In more than 10 years as a student I have lost count of my teachers. I will name only three, despite the injustice this does to all those who remain unmentioned. As my adviser, Marc Pierce deserves particular credit. Without his open door and keen eye this dissertation would look markedly different. The use of the Oxford Comma is a testimony to his persistence. He, Katherine Arens, and Hans C. Boas are probably the largest contributors to my growth as a scholar in the past years. I am grateful for the time they devoted to me. Graduate school would have been impossible without friends. They are, again, too many to mention. In Austin, Collin Brown and Jason Roberts deserve special credit for going out of their way to help me getting set up. Alexander Lorenz has been crucial in the precarious logistics of my life on two sides of the Atlantic Ocean. The ways my family contributed to this project could fill a book. I thank my parents Manfred and Maria Fingerhuth and my sisters Judith and Stephanie for their support over the last decades. iv Grammatical Variation in Standard German, 1900-1999: A Contrastive Corpus-Linguistic Study of Germany and Switzerland by Christian Matthias Fingerhuth, PhD The University of Texas at Austin Supervisor: Marc Pierce This study examines the development of grammatical variation in German and Swiss Standard German during the 20th century in the framework of German as a pluricentric language, i.e. as a language with multiple regional or national standard varieties. Starting from features seen as specific for Swiss Standard German at the beginning of the 21st century, it traces the development of these features back to the beginning of the 20th century using written corpora of Standard German. The dissertation builds on a review of the history of the concept of and research on German as a pluricentric language, as well as a discussion of the concept of standard language. It then focuses on diglossia in German-speaking Switzerland, i.e. the context- specific use of dialect and standard language, with a focus on the 20th century, and discusses the relevance of language in the construction of Swiss identity. Subsequently, the composition of the corpora used is discussed. In this context, the relevance of the use of different text types is discussed. The following analysis draws the following conclusions: (1) The data show no uniform development across the features investigated. (2) The Swiss corpus appears to v show more variation than the German corpus. (3) It is an exception that forms that are only used rarely in Switzerland in the beginning of the 20th century become dominant over the course of the 20th century. (4) Text type appears not to influence the use of variants in the Swiss corpus. The findings add to previous research and complicate the understanding of the development of variation in Standard German. In numerous instances, Swiss Standard German appears already distinct from German Standard German at the beginning of the 20th century. Comparison with recent studies further raises theoretical questions on the conception of standard language that may have consequences for future corpus design. vi Contents 1 Introduction1 2 German as a Pluricentric or Pluriareal Language9 2.1 Standard language................................. 11 2.1.1 Standard language and Standard German: old and new terminology 11 2.1.2 Towards a working definition of Standard German......... 14 2.2 Standard German in a historical perspective................. 27 2.3 Pluricentricity ................................... 30 2.3.1 History of the Concept and Research................. 30 2.3.2 Pluriareality vs. Pluricentricity: The role of borders in language development ............................... 35 2.4 Research into the Pluricentric Standardization................ 43 2.4.1 The Pluricentric Standardization of German............. 43 2.4.2 A glance at the Pluricentric Standardization of English . 52 3 German in Switzerland: Swiss German and Swiss Standard German 57 3.1 Diglossia in German-Speaking Switzerland.................. 58 3.2 Swiss Diglossia: History of terminology and research............ 62 3.2.1 Terminological considerations..................... 62 3.2.2 The historical development of diglossia ............... 68 vii 3.3 German in Multilingual Switzerland...................... 76 3.4 Language and Identity in German-Speaking Switzerland.......... 81 3.4.1 The construction of Swiss German identity against Germany through language around the end of the 20th century............ 81 3.4.2 The construction of Swiss German identity against Germany through- out the 20th century........................... 90 3.5 Grammatical Variation in Swiss Standard German.............. 97 4 Corpora 100 4.1 Overview of the corpora used.......................... 100 4.2 Text type and standard language ........................ 104 5 Analysis 108 5.1 Introductory remarks............................... 108 5.2 Adverbial morphology .............................. 111 5.2.1 da-/dar- .................................. 111 5.2.2 -weg/-wegs ................................ 122 5.2.3 Hier-/Hie-................................. 125 5.2.4 -weils/-weilen............................... 154 5.2.5 Summary.................................. 157 5.3 Particle/prefix verbs................................ 159 5.3.1 Anerkennen................................ 160 5.3.2 Anvertrauen................................ 162 5.3.3 Auferlegen................................. 165 5.3.4 Fernsehen................................. 168 5.3.5 Überfließen ................................ 170 viii 5.3.6 Überlaufen................................. 172 5.3.7 Unterordnen................................ 175 5.3.8 Widerhallen................................ 178 5.3.9 Widerspiegeln............................... 182 5.3.10 Summary.................................. 187 5.4 Linking elements.................................. 189 5.4.1 Ausrufezeichen/Ausrufzeichen..................... 193 5.4.2 Badezimmer/Badzimmer........................ 194 5.4.3 Fegefeuer/Fegfeuer............................ 199 5.4.4 Gesetzentwurf/Gesetzesentwurf.................... 202 5.4.5 Hemdsärmel/Hemdärmel........................ 205 5.4.6 Jahreszahl/Jahrzahl............................ 208 5.4.7 Kirchengemeinde/Kirchgemeinde................... 209 5.4.8 Klebeband/Klebband .......................... 212 5.4.9 Klebestreifen/Klebstreifen ....................... 216 5.4.10 Lastzug/Lastenzug............................ 216 5.4.11 Mitgliedsbeitrag/Mitgliederbeitrag .................. 217 5.4.12 Modenschau/Modeschau........................ 222 5.4.13 Pressefreiheit/Pressfreiheit ....................... 225 5.4.14 Rinderbraten/Rindsbraten ....................... 226 5.4.15 Schattenseite/Schattseite........................ 228 5.4.16 Schweinebraten/Schweinsbraten ................... 229 5.4.17 Störenfried/Störefried.......................... 234 5.4.18 Tagebau/Tagbau ............................. 236 5.4.19 Tagesreise/Tagreise............................ 239 ix 5.4.20 Tannenzapfen/Tannzapfen....................... 242 5.4.21 Uhrmacher/Uhrenmacher ....................... 245 5.4.22 Wartesaal/Wartsaal............................ 248 5.4.23 Wartezeit/Wartzeit............................ 253 5.4.24 Zeigefinger/Zeigfinger.......................... 253 5.4.25 Summary.................................. 255 5.5 Absolute vs. reflexive verbs............................ 260 5.5.1 Ändern................................... 260 5.5.2 Bessern................................... 262 5.5.3 Rentieren.................................. 264 5.5.4 Summary.................................. 269 5.6 Umlaut ....................................... 270 5.6.1 -nutzen/-nützen ............................. 271 5.6.2 -lohnen/-löhnen ............................. 285 5.6.3 Summary.................................. 294 5.7 Prepositional case assignment.......................... 296 5.7.1 Dank .................................... 296 5.7.2 Während.................................. 303 5.7.3 Summary.................................. 309 5.8 Substantival attributes without genitive.................... 311 5.9 Bereits in the Vorfeld ..............................
Recommended publications
  • Using 'North Wind and the Sun' Texts to Sample Phoneme Inventories
    Blowing in the wind: Using ‘North Wind and the Sun’ texts to sample phoneme inventories Louise Baird ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, The Australian National University [email protected] Nicholas Evans ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, The Australian National University [email protected] Simon J. Greenhill ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, The Australian National University & Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History [email protected] Language documentation faces a persistent and pervasive problem: How much material is enough to represent a language fully? How much text would we need to sample the full phoneme inventory of a language? In the phonetic/phonemic domain, what proportion of the phoneme inventory can we expect to sample in a text of a given length? Answering these questions in a quantifiable way is tricky, but asking them is necessary. The cumulative col- lection of Illustrative Texts published in the Illustration series in this journal over more than four decades (mostly renditions of the ‘North Wind and the Sun’) gives us an ideal dataset for pursuing these questions. Here we investigate a tractable subset of the above questions, namely: What proportion of a language’s phoneme inventory do these texts enable us to recover, in the minimal sense of having at least one allophone of each phoneme? We find that, even with this low bar, only three languages (Modern Greek, Shipibo and the Treger dialect of Breton) attest all phonemes in these texts.
    [Show full text]
  • Language Contact at the Romance-Germanic Language Border
    Language Contact at the Romance–Germanic Language Border Other Books of Interest from Multilingual Matters Beyond Bilingualism: Multilingualism and Multilingual Education Jasone Cenoz and Fred Genesee (eds) Beyond Boundaries: Language and Identity in Contemporary Europe Paul Gubbins and Mike Holt (eds) Bilingualism: Beyond Basic Principles Jean-Marc Dewaele, Alex Housen and Li wei (eds) Can Threatened Languages be Saved? Joshua Fishman (ed.) Chtimi: The Urban Vernaculars of Northern France Timothy Pooley Community and Communication Sue Wright A Dynamic Model of Multilingualism Philip Herdina and Ulrike Jessner Encyclopedia of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism Colin Baker and Sylvia Prys Jones Identity, Insecurity and Image: France and Language Dennis Ager Language, Culture and Communication in Contemporary Europe Charlotte Hoffman (ed.) Language and Society in a Changing Italy Arturo Tosi Language Planning in Malawi, Mozambique and the Philippines Robert B. Kaplan and Richard B. Baldauf, Jr. (eds) Language Planning in Nepal, Taiwan and Sweden Richard B. Baldauf, Jr. and Robert B. Kaplan (eds) Language Planning: From Practice to Theory Robert B. Kaplan and Richard B. Baldauf, Jr. (eds) Language Reclamation Hubisi Nwenmely Linguistic Minorities in Central and Eastern Europe Christina Bratt Paulston and Donald Peckham (eds) Motivation in Language Planning and Language Policy Dennis Ager Multilingualism in Spain M. Teresa Turell (ed.) The Other Languages of Europe Guus Extra and Durk Gorter (eds) A Reader in French Sociolinguistics Malcolm Offord (ed.) Please contact us for the latest book information: Multilingual Matters, Frankfurt Lodge, Clevedon Hall, Victoria Road, Clevedon, BS21 7HH, England http://www.multilingual-matters.com Language Contact at the Romance–Germanic Language Border Edited by Jeanine Treffers-Daller and Roland Willemyns MULTILINGUAL MATTERS LTD Clevedon • Buffalo • Toronto • Sydney Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Language Contact at Romance-Germanic Language Border/Edited by Jeanine Treffers-Daller and Roland Willemyns.
    [Show full text]
  • A Bavarian-Speaking Exception in Alemannic-Speaking Switzerland: the Case of Samnaun 48 Located
    47 A Bavarian -speaking 1. Introduction1 data2 is missing, as the study by Gröger is the Exception in Alemannic- only detailed linguistic description of the speaking Switzerland: he municipality of Samnaun, situated German dialect in Samnaun. in the extreme east of Switzerland, In this paper, I present a new research The Case of Samnaun project which seeks to fill this gap. The T stands out from the rest of German- speaking Switzerland: Samnaun is usually project is dedicated to the current linguistic A Project Presentation described as the only place where not an situation in Samnaun. Its working title is Alemannic, but a Bavarian dialect is spoken Bairisch-alemannischer Sprachkontakt. Das Journal Article (cf., e.g., Sonderegger 2003: 2839; Wiesinger Spektrum der sprachlichen Variation in Susanne Oberholzer 1983: 817). This claim is based on a study by Samnaun (‘Bavarian-Alemannic Language Gröger (1924) and has found its way into Contact. The Range of Linguistic Variation in Samnaun has been described as the only Samnaun’). This paper describes Samnaun Bavarian-speaking municipality in Ale- many linguistic descriptions of (German- mannic-speaking Switzerland on the basis speaking) Switzerland. In the literature, this and summarises the available descriptions of of a study done in 1924. Hints in the viewpoint has been almost unchallenged for its language situation as well as the aims, literature about the presence of other over 90 years. Hints about the presence of research questions, and methods of the varieties for everyday communication – an other varieties (an Alemannic dialect as well planned project. intermediate variety on the dialect- In section 2, I sketch the municipality of standard -axis as well as an Alemannic as an intermediate variety on the dialect- dialect – have not resulted in more recent standard-axis) from the second half of the Samnaun.
    [Show full text]
  • A Latin Etymology for Romanian Da = Yes
    A Latin etymology for Romanian da = yes Keith Andrew Massey County College of Morris, New Jersey <[email protected]> Abstract In this article the author argues that Latin ita is a possible source for Roma- nian da = yes, ordinarily assumed to be a Slavic borrowing. This emerges as phonologically possible, but unprovable. This controversial etymology is given even more credence by the demonstration that the Latin conjunction ita quod is a probable source for the Romanian conditional particle dacă. Keywords: Romanian, Latin, da, dacă, ita quod, yes, sic. Received: .i. – Accepted: .vi. Table of Contents 1 Introduction 2 The Slavic Assumption for da = yes 3 Latin Affirmations and their Romance Counterparts 4 Latin ita > Romanian da? 5 Romanian dacă = if 6 The invisible da in early Romanian 7 Conclusion References 93 Ianua. Revista Philologica Romanica ISSN 1616-413X Vol. 8 (2008): 93–100 http://www.romaniaminor.net/ianua/ c Romania Minor 94 Keith Andrew Massey 1 Introduction Among the Romance languages, the development of Romanian is perhaps the least understood (Rosetti et al. 1969; Du Nay 1996; Sala 2005). There is an interval of several hundred years in which no historical record mentions its exis- tence,1 let alone providing scholars with samples to track its evolution (Rosetti et al. 1969, 481; Sala 2005, 25). Romanian, like all Romance languages, has its own distinct features, owing principally to its particular local influences. This includes a significant influx of Slavic borrowings. One word of apparently Slavic origin in Romanian is da = yes. It seems impossible that any populace would choose to borrow such a basic word from another language.
    [Show full text]
  • The Production of Lexical Tone in Croatian
    The production of lexical tone in Croatian Inauguraldissertation zur Erlangung des Grades eines Doktors der Philosophie im Fachbereich Sprach- und Kulturwissenschaften der Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität zu Frankfurt am Main vorgelegt von Jevgenij Zintchenko Jurlina aus Kiew 2018 (Einreichungsjahr) 2019 (Erscheinungsjahr) 1. Gutacher: Prof. Dr. Henning Reetz 2. Gutachter: Prof. Dr. Sven Grawunder Tag der mündlichen Prüfung: 01.11.2018 ABSTRACT Jevgenij Zintchenko Jurlina: The production of lexical tone in Croatian (Under the direction of Prof. Dr. Henning Reetz and Prof. Dr. Sven Grawunder) This dissertation is an investigation of pitch accent, or lexical tone, in standard Croatian. The first chapter presents an in-depth overview of the history of the Croatian language, its relationship to Serbo-Croatian, its dialect groups and pronunciation variants, and general phonology. The second chapter explains the difference between various types of prosodic prominence and describes systems of pitch accent in various languages from different parts of the world: Yucatec Maya, Lithuanian and Limburgian. Following is a detailed account of the history of tone in Serbo-Croatian and Croatian, the specifics of its tonal system, intonational phonology and finally, a review of the most prominent phonetic investigations of tone in that language. The focal point of this dissertation is a production experiment, in which ten native speakers of Croatian from the region of Slavonia were recorded. The material recorded included a diverse selection of monosyllabic, bisyllabic, trisyllabic and quadrisyllabic words, containing all four accents of standard Croatian: short falling, long falling, short rising and long rising. Each target word was spoken in initial, medial and final positions of natural Croatian sentences.
    [Show full text]
  • Zihlmann-Vowel Consonant Length
    Zurich Open Repository and Archive University of Zurich Main Library Strickhofstrasse 39 CH-8057 Zurich www.zora.uzh.ch Year: 2020 Vowel and consonant length in four Alemannic dialects and their influence on the respective varieties of Swiss Standard German Zihlmann, Urban Abstract: Dass die Alemannischen Dialekte (ALM) die Vokalqualität des Schweizerhochdeutschen (SHD) prägt, wurde bereits mehrmals untersucht. Hingegen liegen noch keine systematischen Studien über die dialektale Prägung der Vokal- und Konsonantenquantität im SHD vor. Diese Studie erforscht deshalb bei vier Dialekten, wie sich ALM auf die Länge der Vokale (V) und Konsonanten (K) in den jeweiligen SHD-Varietäten auswirkt. Segmentdaueranalysen zweisilbigerWörter mit kurzen/langen V/K zeigten, dass (1) die vier Dialekte im Prinzip das gleiche V/K-Quantitätssystem aufweisen (trotz z.T. unter- schiedlicher Verteilung der Vokalquantitäten bei bestimmten Wörtern) und dass dieses System auch im SHD angewendet wird. (2) Statistisch signifikante Dauerunterschiede in den regionalen SHD-Varietäten wurden nur bei Wörtern gefunden, bei denen ein phonologischer Quantitätsunterschied zwischen den ALM- und SHD-Äquivalenten vorliegt. Diese Unterschiede sind jedoch nicht dialektspezifisch, sondern können bei allen Dialekten mit diesen Quantitätsunterschieden vorkommen. Other titles: Vowel and consonant length in Alemannic and Swiss Standard German Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-186717 Journal Article Published Version Originally published at: Zihlmann, Urban (2020). Vowel and consonant length in four Alemannic dialects and their influence on the respective varieties of Swiss Standard German. Wiener Linguistische Gazette, 86:1-46. Vowel and consonant length in four Alemannic dialects and their influence on the respective varieties of Swiss Standard German Urban B.
    [Show full text]
  • Myth and Reality. Changing Awareness of Transylvanian Identity
    Sándor Vogel Transylvania: Myth and Reality. Changing Awareness of Transylvanian Identity Introduction In the course of history Transylvania has represented a specific configuration in Eur­ ope. A unique role was reserved for it by its three ethnic communities (Hungarian, Romanian and Saxon), its three estates in politicallaw, or natio (nations), Hungarian, Szekler and Saxon existing until modern times, and its four established religions (recepta re/igio), namely Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist and Unitarian, along with the Greek Orthodox religion of Romanians which was tolerated by Transylvania's political law. At the same time the Transylvanian region was situated at the point of contact or intersection oftwo cultures, the Western and the East European. A glance at the ethnic map - displaying an oveIWhelming majority of Hungarians and Saxon settlers in medieval times - clearly reveals that its evolution is in many respects associated with the rise ofthe medieval State of Hungary and resultant from the Hungarian king's con­ scious policies of state organization and settlement. lts historical development, social order, system of state organization and culture have always made it a part of Europe in all these dimensions. During the centuries ofthe Middle Ages and early modern times the above-mention­ ed three ethnic communities provided the estate-based framework for the region's spe­ cial state organization. The latter served in turn as an integument for the later develop­ ment of nationhood for the Hungarian and Saxon communities, and as a model for the Romanian community. During the 16th and 17th centuries, the period of the Ottoman State's expansion, the Transylvanian region achieved the status of an independent state in what was referred to in contemporary Hungarian documents as the 'shadow ofthe Turkish Power', thereby becoming the repository ofthe idea of a Hungarian State, the ultimate resource of Hungarian culture and the nerve center of its development.
    [Show full text]
  • The Politics and Ideologies of Pluricentric German in L2 Teaching
    Julia Ruck Webster Vienna Private University THE POLITICS AND IDEOLOGIES OF PLURICENTRIC GERMAN IN L2 TEACHING Abstract: Despite a history of rigorous linguistic research on the regional variation of German as well as professional initiatives to promote German, Austrian, and Swiss Standard German as equal varieties, there is still a lack of awareness and systematic incorporation of regional varieties in L2 German teaching. This essay follows two goals: First, it reviews the development of the pluricentric approach in the discourse on L2 German teaching as well as the political and ideological preconditions that form the backdrop of this discussion. Particular emphasis will be given to institutional tri-national collaborations and the standard language ideology. Second, by drawing on sociolinguistic insights on the use and speaker attitudes of (non-)standard varieties, this contribution argues that the pluricentric focus on national standard varieties in L2 German teaching falls short in capturing the complex socioculturally situated practices of language use in both (often dialectally-oriented) everyday and (often standard-oriented) formal and official domains of language use. I argue that the pluricentric approach forms an important step in overcoming the monocentric bias of one correct Standard German; however, for an approach to L2 German teaching that aims at representing linguistic and cultural diversity, it is necessary to incorporate both standard and non-standard varieties into L2 German teaching. Keywords: L2 German w language variation w language ideologies w language politics Ruck, Julia. “The Politics and Ideologies of Pluricentric German in L2 Teaching.” Critical Multilingualism Studies 8:1 (2020): pp. 17–50. ISSN 2325–2871.
    [Show full text]
  • Download This Issue
    COVID ECONOMICS VETTED AND REAL-TIME PAPERS ECONOMIC EPIDEMIOLOGY: ISSUE 48 A REVIEW 10 SEPTEMBER 2020 David McAdams INDIVIDUALISM Bo Bian, Jingjing Li, Ting Xu FORECASTING THE SHOCK and Natasha Z. Foutz Felipe Meza ENTREPRENEUR DEBT AVERSION IS WHO TRUSTED? Mikael Paaso, Vesa Pursiainen Nirosha Elsem Varghese, Iryna and Sami Torstila Sabat, Sebastian Neuman‑Böhme, SUPPLY CHAIN DISRUPTION Jonas Schreyögg, Tom Stargardt, Matthias Meier and Eugenio Pinto Aleksandra Torbica, Job van Exel, PANDEMICS, POVERTY, AND Pedro Pita Barros and Werner Brouwer SOCIAL COHESION ECONOMISTS: FROM VILLAINS Remi Jedwab, Amjad M. Khan, Richard TO HEROES? Damania, Jason Russ and Esha D. Zaver Diane Coyle Covid Economics Vetted and Real-Time Papers Covid Economics, Vetted and Real-Time Papers, from CEPR, brings together formal investigations on the economic issues emanating from the Covid outbreak, based on explicit theory and/or empirical evidence, to improve the knowledge base. Founder: Beatrice Weder di Mauro, President of CEPR Editor: Charles Wyplosz, Graduate Institute Geneva and CEPR Contact: Submissions should be made at https://portal.cepr.org/call-papers- covid-economics. Other queries should be sent to [email protected]. Copyright for the papers appearing in this issue of Covid Economics: Vetted and Real-Time Papers is held by the individual authors. The Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) The Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) is a network of over 1,500 research economists based mostly in European universities. The Centre’s goal is twofold: to promote world-class research, and to get the policy-relevant results into the hands of key decision-makers. CEPR’s guiding principle is ‘Research excellence with policy relevance’.
    [Show full text]
  • Are Doubly-Filled Comps Governed by Prosody in Swiss German? the Chameleonic Nature of Dass ‘That’1
    Are doubly-filled COMPs governed by prosody in Swiss German? The chameleonic nature of dass ‘that’1 1. Introduction Several decades ago, Chomsky and Lasnik (1977) stipulated the doubly-filled COMP filter according to which the co-occurrence of a wh-constituent and a complementizer is banned. In those days, COMP was a single position that could either contain a wh-constituent or a complementizer, but not both. Nowadays two positions, SpecCP, hosting maximal projections, and C, hosting heads, correspond to what was once labelled as COMP. There is thus no a priori reason why a wh-constituent in SpecCP could not co-occur with a complementizer in C, since these two elements do not compete for the same position. Indeed, many languages exist that violate the doubly-filled COMP filter. In some, doubly-filled COMPs (DFCs) are obligatory, e.g. West Flemish (see Haegeman 1992) and in others, DFCs are optional, at least to a certain extent, e.g. Bavarian and Alemannic (see Bayer and Brandner 2008a, 2008b; Bayer 2015; and Penner and Bader 1995; Penner 1986 for Bernese Swiss German; Schönenberger 2010 for Lucernese Swiss German) and Belfast English (Henry 1995). In yet others, they seem to be banned, e.g. Standard German and Standard English, but this may be due to normative pressure, since earlier stages of these languages allowed them. Zwicky (2002), for instance, lists various examples with DFCs produced by speakers of different varieties of modern English (see [1] and [2]). (1) We asked what sort of health care that they rely on. (2) What a mine of useless information that I am! Based on acceptability judgement data, Bayer and Brandner advance a structural account for DFCs in Alemannic and Bavarian, in which wh-words are generally incompatible with dass ‘that’ while wh-phrases generally require the presence of dass.
    [Show full text]
  • Erwachsenenschutzrechtsreform
    Erwachsenenschutzrechtsreformen im deutschen und französischen Sprachraum: Terminologische Entwicklung und Übersetzungsprobleme Suzanne Ballansat-Aebi Universität Genf New legislation about the legal protection of adults in European countries with German and/or French as official languages: terminological choices and translation problems – Abstract The new provisions of five European countries (Germany, Austria, France, Switzerland and Belgium) about the legal protection of adults all implement the principle of self-determination, but there are still fundamental conceptual differences between the statutory instruments of protection. An analysis of the terminological choices for three key concepts (legal instrument, protecting person, protected person) reveals that legislators have either opted for the use of traditional terminology or created new terms. Discriminating and stigmatizing language was avoided in many respects, but has not disappeared. A comparison of the German and French version of the Swiss and Belgian legislation shows that these concerns are given more importance in the German than in the French language. The terminological evolution in the field of the legal protection of adults has led to new translation problems, illustrated by the solutions for the three key concepts found in a French translation of the German Civil Code, scholarly articles and information material for citizens. It is argued that source text oriented translation methods provide more adequate information to these target recipients than functional equivalents.
    [Show full text]
  • Discourse Markers of Clarification and Causality in Maghrebi and Egyptian Dialects: a Socio-Pragmatic Perspective
    DISCOURSE MARKERS OF CLARIFICATION AND CAUSALITY IN MAGHREBI AND EGYPTIAN DIALECTS: A SOCIO-PRAGMATIC PERSPECTIVE BY ABDELAADIM BIDAOUI DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2015 Urbana, Illinois Doctoral Committee: Associate Professor Marina Terkourafi, Chair Professor Elabbas Benmamoun Associate Professor Anna Maria Escobar Associate Professor Zsuzsanna Fagyal ABSTRACT Discourse Markers (DMs) have traditionally been viewed as elements which do not contribute to the truth-conditional meaning of an utterance or to its syntactic and semantic make-up. Contrary to those linguists who found the study of DMs marginal, other researchers have been interested in the study of these expressions. Using a Relevance Theoretic framework (Sperber and Wilson, 1986, 1995; Blakemore, 1987), this dissertation posits that DMs signal pragmatic inferences that are performed by the addressee. Specifically, I argue that the notion of procedural meaning, a set of instructions which guides the inferential phase of utterance interpretation, offered by Relevance Theory (Sperber and Wilson, 1995; Blakemore, 2002) should be at the core of utterance interpretation in general and interpretation of DMs in particular. This dissertation is based on two complementary studies: the main and supplementary study. The main study consists of data collected during face-to-face interactions, while the supplementary study consists of online data taken from the news outlet Al Jazeera. The partcipants in the main study are members of an Arabic diasporic community in the U.S. and represent three dialects of Arabic: Moroccan, Algerian, and Egyptian dialect.
    [Show full text]