The evolution of a Bilingual Discourse Marking System: Modal particles and English markers in German-American dialects

Abstract

Previous studies (Clyne, 1972, 1987; Salmons, 1990) have shown that German dialects in long-term contact with English have both borrowed key English discourse markers (well, you know, and so on) and lost much of the native discourse- marking system of German (most notably the “modal particles”). For the study of language- contact change, discourse markers are particularly interesting, first as items in a sense on the boundary between ordinary lexical items and structural borrowing, and second because they are typically salient to bilingual speakers. This paper uses Myers-Scotton's Matrix Language- Frame model to examine new evidence on the diachronic process leading to this contemporary situation. We draw on the representation of spoken language in two German-language dramas written around the turn of the 20th century, one in Wisconsin and the other in Texas. The data suggest that English markers first entered German speech as emblematic codeswitches and eventually became established borrowings, which then paved the way for loss of the native system.

Keywords

codeswitching discourse marking language contact

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Coetsem, F.van ( 1988). Loan phonology and the two transfer types in language contact. Dordrecht: Foris.

Clyne, M. (1972). Some(German-English)language contact phenomena at the discourse level. In E. Firchow et al. (Eds.), Studies for Einar Haugen (pp. 132-144). The Hague: Mouton.

Clyne, M. (1987). Constraints on codeswitching: How universalare they? Linguistics, 25, 739-764.

Clyne, M. (1996). Sprache,Sprachbenutzer und Sprachbereich.In H. Goebl , P.H. Nelde , Z.Starý & W. Wölck (Eds.), Kontaktlinguistik, contact linguistics, linguistique de contact, Vol. 1 (pp. 12-22). Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter .

Goss, E.L. , Hendriks, J.B. , & Howell, R.B. (1997). Language change and gender differentiation in early modern Germany and Holland: A sociohistorical study of women's correspondance . Paper presented at the Germanic Linguistics Annual Conference(GLAC)III, UCLA.

Gugler, J. (1892). Dramatisches. Milwaukee: Selbstverlag.

Hendriks, J.B. (1998). Immigration and linguistic change: A sociohistorical linguistic study of the effect of German and southern Dutch immigration on the development of the northern Dutch vernacular in 16th/17th century Holland. Ph.D. dissertation,University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Hense-Jensen, W. , & Bruncken, E. (1902). Wiskonsin's Deutsch-Amerikaner bis zum Schluß des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts.Vol.2. Milwaukee: Verlag der Deutschen Gesellschaft.

Howell, R.B. (1992).Flemings,Brabanders and Hollanders in the urban melting pot: Development of the northern Dutch vernacular in the 17th century . In R. Lippi - Green (Ed.), Recent developments in Germanic linguistics(pp.33-46). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

10.

Mougeon, R. , & Beniak, E. (1987). The extralinguistic correlates of core lexical borrowing. In K. Denning et al. (Eds.), Variation in language: New ways of analyzing variation (pp. 337-347). Stanford: Stanford University Press.

11.

Myers-Scotton, C. (1993a). Duelling languages: Grammatical structure in codeswitching. Oxford: The Clarendon Press.

12.

Myers-Scotton, C. (1993b). Social motivations for codeswitching: Evidence from Africa. Oxford: The Clarendon Press.

13.

Myers-Scotton, C. (1998). A way to dusty death: The Matrix Language turnover hypothesis. In L. A. Grenoble & L. J. Whaley (Eds.), Endangered languages: Current issues and future prospects (pp. 289-316). Cambridge,U.K .: Cambridge University Press.

14.

Myers-Scotton, C. , & Jake, J. (1995). Matching lemmas in a bilingual language production model: Evidence from intrasentential codeswitching. Linguistics , 33, 981-1024.

15.

Salmons, J. (1988). The question of a German-American vocabulary. In E. Antonsen & H. H. Hock (Eds.), Germanic linguistics II (pp. 102-111). Bloomington: IULC.

16.

Salmons, J. (1990). Bilingual discourse marking: Codeswitching,borrowing,and convergence in some German-American dialects. Linguistics , 28, 453-480.

17.

Salmons, J. (1994). Naturalness and morphological change in Texas German. In N. Berend & K. J. Mattheier (Eds.), Deutsche Sprachinselforschung:Eine Gedenkschrift für Hugo Jedig (pp. 59-72). Bern: Peter Lang.

18.

Savić J.M. (1996). Codeswitching: Theoretical and methological issues . Belgrade: College of Philology,Belgrade University,Special Publications,81.

19.

Schiffrin, D. (1996). Discourse analysis and pragmatics. In H. Goebl , P. H. Nelde , Z. Starý & W. Wölck (Eds.), Kontaktlinguistik, contact linguistics, linguistique de contact, Vol. 1 (pp. 138-144). Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter.

20.

Thomason, S.G. , & Kaufman, T. , (1988). Language contact, creolization and genetic linguistics . Berkeley: University of California Press

21.

Trenckmann, W.A. (1903). Die Schulmeister von Neu-Rostock. Texanisches Volksstück in zwei Akten. (Published as a supplement to vol. 13, no. 13 of the Bellville Wochenblatt, Bellville, Texas.)