The History of Dialectology An Overwiew

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The History of DialectologyAn Overwiew

• Maria-Joanna Ermlich
• BA Anglistik/Amerikanistik
• Seminar Dialectology
• Chemnitz University of Technology
• maryjo87_at_web.de

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Table of Contents

• 1. Development of Dialect Geography in Europe
• 1.1. Germany
• 1.2. France
• 1.3. England
• 1.4. Scotland
• 1.5. Denmark
• 2. Dialect Study in USA
• 3. Social Dialectology
• 4. Sources

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1.1. Development of Dialect Geography in Germany

• Development of Dialect Geography the study of
  language variety by any methodology
• 1821 The Dialects of Bavaria by Johann Andreas
  Schmeller
• ? first grammar treated all the dialects of an
  area and not only one
• gave a historical-geographical-grammatical
  presentation of the German
• language
• ? included the first minilinguistic atlas ( a
  small map classifying Bavarian dialects)
• 1876 First Great Dialect Survey
• gt this year was a milestone in the history of
  both dialectology and linguistics

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1.1. Development of Dialect Geography in Germany

• four important events happened in Germany
• gt Eduard Sievers published Elements of Phonetics
  ( phonetics became more precise science -gt this
  provided an important medium for all linguistic
  investigations)
• gt the Neogrammarians ( Junggrammatiker a
  group of scholars, e.g. Karl Burgmann, August
  Leskien and Hermann Paul)
• ? they claimed that sound laws admit of no
  exceptions
• - Jacob Grimm described the changes as Germanic
  developed from Indo
• European gt Grimms Law ( sound law)
• - Oskar Verner ( a Danish scholar) discovered a
  corollary to Grimms Law
• which covered the major exceptions gt Verners
  Law gt sound changes are
• rule-governed

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1.1. Development of Dialect Geography in Germany

• - the principle of immutability of sound change
  ( Ausnahmelosigkeit der
• Lautgesetze) dominated European linguistics for
  several decades -
• 1875 Alexander Ellis (English dialect
  collector) said Collecting country
• words is looked upon as an amusement, not as
  laying a brick in the temple of
• science.
• gt Jost Winteler ( a Swiss student of Sievers)
  published a monograph The Speech of Kerenzen in
  the Canton of Glarus Switzerland
• gt Georg Wenker ( young schoolteacher from
  Düsseldorf) began to work on a
• survey of the dialects in Düsseldorf to develop
  the first great dialect survey
• ? he studied dialect of a single locality

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1.1. Development of Dialect Geography in Germany

• ? he sent out questionnaire to every village with
  school
• ? they included forty sentences, which the
  teacher was asked to translate into the local
  dialect e.g. In winter dry leaves fly around the
  air.
• problems
• at that time science of phonetics and systems of
  phonetic transcription were rather undeveloped
• the interpretation of the data , of understanding
  which sounds were represented by the
  transcription of any one schoolmaster
• ? six maps based on his materials were published
  originally, but the
• difficulties in interpreting the data still
  exist
• the dogma of the immutability of sound change
  wasnt particularly supported by Wenkers
  findings
• gtonce a word begins to spread into other
  dialects, the regularity of the sound change
  breaks down

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1.1. Development of Dialect Geography in Germany

• 1881 Wenker published the first linguistic atlas
  by hand
• Sprachatlas des Deutschen Reiches
• 1926 first volume of the Deutscher Sprachatlas
  by Ferdinand Wrede
• ? linguistic maps began to turn up
• 1933 for most European countries and other parts
  of the world surveys have
• been conducted and atlases published
• 1939 Walter Mitzka posted a questionnaire to 50
  000 schools in all parts of
• Germany and Austria because Wenkers
  material was too little
• ? asking regional synonyms
• gt it included 200 questions ? single words (
  nouns such as parts of the body, plants,
  trees,)? 12 sentences for translation

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1.2. Development of Dialect Geography in France

• 1880 Jules Gilliéron ( a Swiss scholar)
  published a linguistic atlas ( this atlas
• covered 25 localities in the
  French-speaking area of Switzerland
• south of the Rhone)
• 1888 second great national survey was started in
  France
• ? Gaston Paris ( a paper published) treated
  survey of the local dialects
• 1897-1901 fieldwork for the Atlas Linguistique
  de la France
• ? Edmond Edmont ( a grocer) helped Gilliéron and
  cycled through 639 localities in France and the
  French-speaking parts of Belgium, Switzerland and
  Italy)
• ? he collected phonetic data transcribed in a
  consistent phonetic alphabet

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1.2. Development of Dialect Geography in France

• ? he interviewed males aged between 15 and 85
  (they were local intellectuals and folk
  speakers)
• ? publication of this fieldwork 13 volumes,
  including 1920 maps, appeared between 1902 and
  1910
• Gilliérons and Edmonts work supplied the model
  for later dialect surveys in Europe and the
  United States French survey great influence
• different methods in French and German
  questionnaires, but in one important way they
  were the same
• Wenker asked his schoolmasters to transcribe
  sentences from standard German into local dialect
• Edmont asked his informants direct questions in
  standard French, e.g. He asked in French How do
  you say head?
• gt we dont know for sure if all information are
  true, we have no way to check the exactness of
  Edmonts transcriptions ? kind of oral tradition

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1.2. Development of Dialect Geography in France

• gt linguistic atlases had a general problem with
  such variations before modern technology (e.g.
  the portable tape recorder) developed
• 1928-1940 Karl Jaberg ( a student of Gilliéron,
  who in 1908 had published an
  interpretive introduction to the French atlas)
  and Jakob Jud (also a student of
  Gilliéron) published eight volumes of the atlas
• 1931 ? they used their teachers techniques in
  their own atlas of the dialects of Italy and the
  Italian speaking part of Switzerland Sprach- und
  Sachatlas Italiens und der Südschweiz
• ? they improved on the work of their teacher and
  employed three questionnaires
• a normal / basic one (contained about 2000
  items, used in 354 localities)
• a short form ( contained 800 items, used in 28
  larger cities and towns)
• long form ( contained 4000 items, used in 30
  places)

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1.2. Development of Dialect Geography in France

• gt for the first time the method of asking was
  indirect
• ? instead of asking, How do you say head? ?
  head was elicited by a gesture and a question
  Whats this?
• 1931 Jakob Jud and Paul Scheuermeier ( main
  fieldworker for the Italian
• atlas) invented the Linguistic Atlas of
  New England (LANE) ( the first
• large-scale atlas-type research in the
  English language)
• 1939 Albert Dauzaut produced the Atlas
  Linguistique de la France
• ? Gilliérons work was improved, the
  questionnaire was divided into a general
• part and a part specific to the particular
  regions

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1.3. Development of Dialect Geography in England

• 1948 Eugen Dieth of Zurich and Harold Orton of
  Leeds started the Survey of
  
• English Dialects (SED)
• the country was divided in four regions
• the north the east west midlands and the south
  ( in each region 70-80 interviews were carried
  out, questionnaire included 1200 items)
• the results were summarised to four volumes of
  Basic Material (each with three parts)
• ? gives a list of informant responses
• reason was that researchers were interested in
  the data in order to frame and test hypotheses on
  linguistic variation
• ? the SED published interpretive volumes with the
  data arranged on maps

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1.3. Development of Dialect Geography in England

• 1964 Phonological Atlas of the Northern Region
  by Edouard Kolb
• 1974 A Word Geography of England by Orton and
  Nathalia Wright
• 1978 The Linguistic Atlas of England by Orton,
  Stewart Sanderson and
• John Widdowson
• 1987 Word Maps by Clive Upton with Sanderson and
  Widdowson
• 1994 Dictionary and Grammar by Upton, David
  Parry and Widdowson
• 1996 An Atlas of English Dialects by Upton and
  Widdowson

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1.3. Development of Dialect Geography in England

• William Kretzschmar, Schneider and Johnson said
• the development of dialect studies, whether
  geographical or sociolinguistic, has always been
  hampered by a superfluity of data Even smaller
  surveys have had to settle for selective analysis
  of their data because the wealth of possibilities
  for analysis overran the editors time and the
  human capacity for holding in mind only so much
  information at once. Computers can help overcome
  these problems they are wonderful tools for
  quickly sorting and matching pieces of
  information and for performing complex
  calculations on the results, and these days they
  are practically unlimited in their ability to
  store data. (1989)

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1.4.-1.5. Development of Dialect Geography in
Denmark and Scotland

• 1.4. Denmark
• 1889 Marius Kristensen invented regional
  dialectology in Denmark
• ? publications of the results of the
  questionnaire begun and ended 1912
• gt not longer postal questionnaire trained
  observers were send into the field for
  interviews, recorded the data in a phonetic
  notation
• 1.5. Scotland
• 1952 Angus McIntosh used a postal questionnaire,
  instead of trained
• fieldworkers, in the Survey of Scottish
  Dialects

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2. Dialect Study in USA

• 1889 American Dialect society was formed ?
  publication of Dialect Notes
• gt Hans Kurath director of the Linguistic Atlas
  of the United States and Canada
• gt Linguistic Atlas of New England experimental
  investigation
• ? New England, because marked differences between
  social and regional dialect
• 1930 Linguistic Atlas of the United States and
  Canada (LAUSC) was
• founded
• 1931 Fieldwork begun (416 interviews by nine
  fieldworkers)
• 1933 survey of the Linguistic Atlas of the
  Middle Atlantic and South
• Atlantic States under Gay Lowman and
  Raven McDavid

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2. Dialect Study in USA

• gt dialect situation in America was different
  from Europe ? English has been spoken quite short
  time ? geographical and social mobility ? little
  real dialect and little clear distinction
  between dialect and standard speech
• aim control the effects on speech of the
  classification of society high degree
• of social mobility (two other
  educational types besides the folk speech
• were examined )
• 1939 - 1943 Kurath published his Handbook of the
  Linguistic Geography of
• New England (three massive, folio-size volumes
  with 734 maps) First survey
• 1949 Kurath s Word Geography of the Eastern
  United States appeared
• 1953 E. Bagby Atwood published A Survey of Verb
  Forms in the Eastern
• United States

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2. Dialect Study in USA

• 1961 Kurath and Raven I. McDavid, Jr. appeared
  the next volume The
• Pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States
• 1968 Lee Pederson published the Linguistic Atlas
  of the Gulf States
• ? he used technological advances
• 1986-1992 seven volumes, providing a handbook,
  indexes and mappings
• gt volumes are overwhelming ( huge amount of
  information) ? also experienced atlas users need
  a guide to get oriented
• 1973-1976 The Linguistic Atlas of the Upper
  Midwest (published in three
• volumes) project of the LAUSC
• 1994 William Kretzschmar published the Handbook
• ? computerisation manages the huge database and
  comprehensive electronic publication

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3. Social Dialectology

• study of relationship between language
  variety/dialect and social class
• focus on cities
• dialects are both regional and social ? all
  speakers have a social
• background (e.g. age group, ethnic
  background) as well as a regional
• location
• 1820-1822 already before regional dialectology
  (Wilhelm von Humboldts Essai
• sur les langues du nouveau continent)
• 1906 Antoine Meillet (French linguist) said
  that language is a social institution
• ? linguistic change social change ? language
  changes are consequences
• (mediated and indirect)
• 1933 linguist theory of Bloomfield 1965
  linguist theory of Chomsky
• ? treated language as something apart from
  society
• ? first research was made using American field
  records

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3. Social Dialectology

• 1948 Raven I. McDavid, Jr. published first
  article which approached linguist
• problems from a strictly
  sociolinguistic point of view
• ? he didnt find a significant geographical
  pattern for the presence or absence of the
  construction of postvocalic /r/ ? in words like
  father, beard, worm, barn,. ? these words
  included in context of regional dialectology
  seemed chaotic and casual
• 1953 E. Bagby Atwoods Survey of Verb Forms in
  the Eastern United
• States was also a sociolinguistic study
• 1966 doctoral dissertation of William Labov The
  Social Stratification of
• English in New York City effected that
  scholars with interest in social
• variation in language started to change
  their methods
• ? changes wrought by Labovs work were
  revolutionary
• he criticized the previous work on N.Y. City
  speech
• populations influence dialect patterns

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3. Social Dialectology

• ? urban dialect surveys were concerned with
  phonology and grammar
• ? therefore interviews by asking of questions to
  produce a large amounts
• of talk were tape-recorded
• problem informants were observed and did not
  speak free
• gt Labov named this The Observers Paradox
• linguists want to study informal speech because
  it is systematic and regular
• Labov tried to avoid the observers paradox by
  recording conversations outside the formal
  context of the interview
• ? e.g. asking questions like Have you ever
  been in a situation where you thought you were
  going to be killed?
• ? later Labov and other linguists started to
  interview groups of speakers
• (according to their agency, income, education
  and housing)

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3. Social Dialectology

• 1960s Labov found out that social determinants
  of the use of postvocalic /r/
• exist
• he showed that casual linguistic behaviour is
  part of a well-ordered system
• this was one of the most fascinating studies in
  social dialectology
• he did the shortest questionnaire in history in
  three department stores in N.Y.City
• Kleins shop for lower and working classes
• Macys middle class
• Saks Fifth Avenue upper middle and upper
  classes
• he elicited the response fourth flour in casual
  and careful speech

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3. Social Dialectology

• Fieldworker Where can I find ladies dresses?
• Informant Fourth floor.
• Fieldworker What did you say?
• Informant Fourth floor!!
• ? he recorded the informants behaviour in two
  different linguistic styles
• ? clear class differentiation
• gt linguistic variable ( linguistic variation was
  not really a free variation)
• gt covariation with other social and/or
  linguistic variables
• 1994 Labov worked on the vowel systems,
  reflected influence of structural
• dialectology
• 1998 he encouraged students to apply the
  tools of linguistics to the
• language of everyday life and to set
  aside the barriers between linguistic
• analysis and dialectology

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4. Sources

• 1. Davis, Lawrence M., eds (1983)
• English Dialectology An Introduction
• The University of Alabama Press
• 2. J.K. Chambers and PeterTrudgill, eds (1998)
• Dialectology
• Second edition
• Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics
• 3. K.M. Petyt, eds (1980)
• The Study of Dialect
• An Introduction to Dialectology
• Westview Press

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• Any Questions??????
• Thanks for your attention