A STUDY OF THE VARIATION AND CHANGE IN THE VOWELS OF THE ACHTERHOEKS DIALECT MELODY REBECCA PATTISON PhD UNIVERSITY OF YORK LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTIC SCIENCE JANUARY 2018 Abstract The Achterhoeks dialect, spoken in the eastern Dutch province of Gelderland near the German border, is a Low Saxon dialect that differs noticeably from Standard Dutch in all linguistic areas. Previous research has comprehensively covered the differences in lexicon (see, for example, Schaars, 1984; Van Prooije, 2011), but less has been done on the phonology in this area (the most notable exception being Kloeke, 1927). There has been research conducted on the changes observed in other Dutch dialects, such as Brabants (Hagen, 1987; Swanenberg, 2009) and Limburgs (Hinskens, 1992), but not so much in Achterhoeks, and whether the trends observed in other dialects are also occurring in the Achterhoek area. It is claimed that the regional Dutch dialects are slowly converging towards the standard variety (Wieling, Nerbonne & Baayen, 2011), and this study aims to not only fill some of the gaps in Achterhoeks dialectology, but also to test to what extent the vowels are converging on the standard. This research examines changes in six lexical sets from 1979 to 2015 in speakers’ conscious representation of dialect. This conscious representation was an important aspect of the study, as what it means to speak in dialect may differ from person to person, and so the salience of vowels can be measured based on the number of their occurrences in self-described dialectal speech. Through a perception task, this research also presents a view of the typical Achterhoeks speaker as seen by other Dutch speakers, in order to provide a sociolinguistic explanation for the initial descriptive account of any vowel change observed in dialectal speech. Subtle changes in the Achterhoeks vowels were observed, suggesting a lack of stability, but not yet at the stage of functional dialect loss. The most noticeable difference within the Achterhoek area occurs with the pronunciation of what we term the HUIS vowel when it appears after /r/, realised as either [u] or [y]. The lexical sets of PRAAT, KAART, and KAAS were presented in three groups: as front, Standard and back vowels, with pronunciation patterns attributed to post-Westphalian breaking processes, grammatical rules, and trajectories associated with the original West Germanic vowels. The accompanying perception study provided a partner to the main research, suggesting subconscious social information behind what it means to speak in dialect. 2 Acknowledgements I would firstly like to thank my supervisors, Paul Kerswill and Dominic Watt, for their continued support and guidance throughout this thesis. Their input has been vital, and is gratefully acknowledged. I would also like to thank Richard Ogden and Carmen Llamas, both of whom spent time as members of my Thesis Advisory Panel. Thank you also to Leendert van Prooije, Francis Nolan, Henk Nijman (and all at ECAL Doetinchem), Huw Llewelyn-Jones, Chris Mellor, Gijsbert Rutten, and Peter Reynders, all of whom have provided invaluable help at different stages of my research. I don’t know where this research or thesis would be without any of you! Thank to you my wonderful husband, Rowan, for everything. And, of course, to Mum, Dad, Vija, Uncle Hans, and the rest of my family (but that also goes without saying!). A special mention must go to my cousin, Mark, and his partner, Martina, for always providing me with a place to stay during my many trips to the Achterhoek – as well as their friend, Erwin, for driving me around and helping me to find participants. I would also like to thank everybody who participated in my research. Whether this was providing their voices or providing their perceptions, this research would not exist without any of them. This thesis is in memory of my grandparents, Cliff and Elizabeth “Betty” Mott, and my father-in-law, Ralph Pattison. 3 Table of Contents Abstract 2 Acknowledgements 3 Table of Contents 4 List of Figures 9 List of Tables 18 Declaration 20 1. Introduction 21 1.1. Research Questions 23 1.2. Outline of Thesis 25 1.3. Overview of Terms 25 2. Literature Review: Background 28 2.1. Some History 28 2.2. Sociolinguistic Attitudes in the Achterhoek 37 2.3. Vowels in Standard Dutch and the Achterhoek 40 2.3.1. The Hollandse Expansie Theory 43 2.3.2. Vowel Systems and History 47 2.4. The Rhotic Consonant 59 2.5. Orthography and Grammar in Dutch and Achterhoeks 65 2.6. Achterhoeks or Liemers? 68 4 2.7. Summary 76 3. Literature Review: Concepts in Dialectology and Language Change 78 3.1. Dialect Levelling 78 3.1.1. The Cone Model 84 3.2. Accommodation 86 3.3. Standardisation 87 3.4. Other Previous Research 89 3.4.1. Schaars (1987) Woordenboek and Van Prooije (1984) De Vakleu en et Vak 89 3.4.2. Heeringa and Hinskens (2015) 90 3.5. Overview 93 4. Pilot Study: Initial Findings 95 4.1. Methodology 95 4.2. Results and Discussion 99 4.2.1. 1979 – KAART, PRAAT, KAAS and PAARD 99 4.2.2. 1979 - KIJK 106 4.3. 1979 - Overview 109 4.4. Modern Achterhoeks (Pilot Study) 110 4.5. Discussion 114 4.6. Conclusion 116 5. Methodology 119 5.1. Modifications of Pilot Study 119 5 5.2. Participant Recruitment and Interviews 122 5.3. Data Analysis 126 5.3.1. Normalisation Procedure 126 5.3.2. Praat and Audacity Procedures 127 5.4. Perception Study 128 5.4.1. Rationale and Survey Design 128 5.4.2. Recruitment 139 6. Results 143 6.1. Rural and Non-Rural Variation in the HUIS Vowel in 2015 145 6.2. Comparing the HUIS Vowel in 1979 and 2015 161 6.2.1. An Age-Related Change? 167 6.2.2. The Role of /r/ 171 6.3. The Case of KAART, PRAAT, KAAS and PAARD 176 6.3.1. The KAAS and PAARD Vowels 177 6.3.2. The PRAAT and KAART Vowels 183 6.3.3. Two Realisations of “gaat” 188 6.3.4. Overview 190 6.4. The KIJK Vowel in Achterhoeks 192 6.5. Summary 196 6.6. Survey Results 197 6.6.1. Perceptions of Dialect Speakers vs. Regional Standard Speakers 198 6 6.6.2. Perceptions by Vowel and Word 206 6.6.2.1. Hij heeft al sinds 1940 een paard (PAARD vowel) 208 6.6.2.2. In de keuken staat een oventje (KAAS vowel) 215 6.6.2.3. Hij was stijf van de pijn (KIJK vowel) 222 6.6.2.4. Kun je rauw vlees ruiken? (HUIS vowel) 229 6.6.2.5. We gaan het huis in de breedte bouwen (PRAAT and HUIS vowels) 236 6.6.3. General Remarks 243 6.7. Analysis of Style: Picture Task vs. Sentence Reading Task 248 7. General Discussion 251 7.1. Vowel Change over Time 251 7.2. Revisiting Auer’s Cone Model 255 7.3. What Happened to [u]? 259 7.4. Further Research Ideas Arising from this Study 264 7.5. Conclusion 268 7.5.1. Answering the Research Questions 269 7.5.2. Contribution to Wider Sociolinguistic Research, and Parallels with Other Studies 271 7.5.3. Summary 273 Appendices 274 Appendix 1: Sentence List 274 Appendix 2: Picture Task 275 Appendix 3: Survey Questions 276 7 Appendix 4: Survey Data Tables 284 Appendix 5: Participant Raw Data 287 1979 287 2015 309 References 346 8 List of Figures Figure 1: Map of the Netherlands showing the location and boundary of the Achterhoek area. (Google) ................................................................................................................................... 21 Figure 2: Major Dutch dialect areas. (Compiled from information provided in Daan & Blok, 1969). Map reproduced from the Meertens Instituut (2013-2016). ......................................... 30 Figure 3: Germanic family tree, reproduced from Donaldson (1983, p.118). ......................... 33 Figure 4: Part of Gelderland north of the River Rhine (Map data: Google, n.d). .................... 34 Figure 5: Divergence and convergence along a dialect continuum (reproduced from Auer and Hinskens, 1996, p.17) .............................................................................................................. 35 Figure 6: Kloeke's map of pronunciations of the vowel in "huis" and "muis" in the Netherlands and Belgium (reproduced from Bloomfield, 1933, obtained from the Meertens Instituut, 2013-2016)................................................................................................................ 45 Figure 7: Isoglosses of phonological and morphological features of different regions in the Netherlands (reproduced from Van Bree, 2013, p.103) ........................................................... 55 Figure 8: Map showing where [i:] has diphthongised (areas shown in grey). The cross indicates the location of the town of Nijmegen, and the circle indicates the location of the Achterhoek region. Reproduced from Donaldson (1983, p.147)............................................. 56 Figure 9: Accompanying map for Table 5, showing the location of Low Saxon demarcation referred to in the table and corresponding footnotes. Reproduced from Bloemhoff et al. (2013a, p.459) .......................................................................................................................... 59 Figure 10: Map of towns bordering the Achterhoeks and Liemers dialect areas. The towns which are numbered and circled are those which are important to the discussion of what constitutes Achterhoeks or Liemers. (Map data: Google, n.d). ............................................... 69 Figure 11: Map reproduced and modified from Schaars (1987, p.25) showing dialectal pronunciations of "laag" within the region. The Achterhoek area (above and below the River Berkel) is coloured in green, with the Liemers area (south-west of the River Oude-IJssel) coloured in red. Above the Achterhoek is the province of Overijssel. The squares show “laag” 9 as “laeg” (phonetically similar to /ae/, while the circles show “laag” as “leeg”, phonetically similar to /e:/.. .......................................................................................................................... 70 Figure 12: Map reproduced and modified from Schaars (1987, p.108) showing dialectal pronunciations of "starre" within the region (as outlined in Figure 11). ................................. 71 Figure 13: Map of dialect areas in the Netherlands, reproduced from Rensink (1999, p.6).