Should German count as only one language?

[memphis]

I am heartened by the fact that not only are our European posters not ashamed to admit that they have a dialect but openly boast about theirs and discuss it publically.  I wonder if dialect-shame is a concept unique to the US

I wonder if teaching kids that how they speak at home is "wrong" is a concept unique to the US...

God, no.

So, I don't know the first thing about German schools. Please elaborate. I would sincerely like to know how things work over there. In America, we are taught in school to write "correctly." There is no mention of dialects or anything other than "right" or "wrong." And I get why having a standard is useful and necessary but I think "standard" and "non-standard" would be fairer and less judgemental. In  my hometown, most blacks grow up with their dialect, which really isn't that different than the standard, but is highly stigmatized. And he is told everyday how he speaks is wrong and that how the white people typically speaks is right. Of course he isn't told that directly, but it's very well understood. What happens with the kid in Bavaria?

[ZuWo]

I am heartened by the fact that not only are our European posters not ashamed to admit that they have a dialect but openly boast about theirs and discuss it publically.  I wonder if dialect-shame is a concept unique to the US

I wonder if teaching kids that how they speak at home is "wrong" is a concept unique to the US...

God, no.

So, I don't know the first thing about German schools. Please elaborate. I would sincerely like to know how things work over there. In America, we are taught in school to write "correctly." There is no mention of dialects or anything other than "right" or "wrong." And I get why having a standard is useful and necessary but I think "standard" and "non-standard" would be fairer and less judgemental. In  my hometown, most blacks grow up with their dialect, which really isn't that different than the standard, but is highly stigmatized. And he is told everyday how he speaks is wrong and that how the white people typically speaks is right. Of course he isn't told that directly, but it's very well understood. What happens with the kid in Bavaria?

I can't tell you much about Germany, but at least something about Switzerland. In our country there is an elegant solution; Standard German is what children are supposed to talk and write at school, while every native Swiss-German person speaks a dialect at home (diglossia). The usage of dialects is very natural and an important part of the Swiss-German identity, that's why the notion of dialects as "wrong speech" is not known at all here. On the contrary, dialects are valued highly, and the wealth of different dialects is considered an asset and a reason of pride by most.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not

A bit extreme as an example, as that's not even an issue of dialects. But even in England (and other English speaking areas) the idea that there is a correct form of English and that dialects were corruptions of something pure was a major part of the education system until quite recently. It's not uncommon to find people (usually over fifty) who switch their accents and grammar when talking to someone in a formal setting. And, obviously, it hasn't totally disappeared.

[Хahar 🤔]

Linguistic imperialism is a common thing, of course, and it takes many forms. I can't say more than a couple words in my ancestral language, although my dad speaks it fluently.

[memphis]

Linguistic imperialism is a common thing, of course, and it takes many forms. I can't say more than a couple words in my ancestral language, although my dad speaks it fluently.

I'm gonna go out on a limb as say it's because you grew up in the United States and he didn't...

[Хahar 🤔]

Linguistic imperialism is a common thing, of course, and it takes many forms. I can't say more than a couple words in my ancestral language, although my dad speaks it fluently.

I'm gonna go out on a limb as say it's because you grew up in the United States and he didn't...

I don't think even my cousins in Dhaka speak Sylheti.

[memphis]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not

A bit extreme as an example, as that's not even an issue of dialects. But even in England (and other English speaking areas) the idea that there is a correct form of English and that dialects were corruptions of something pure was a major part of the education system until quite recently. It's not uncommon to find people (usually over fifty) who switch their accents and grammar when talking to someone in a formal setting. And, obviously, it hasn't totally disappeared.

Wow. That's crazy. Didn't know about that. But I remember something vaguely similar from my high school French class about how the French government used to ban the Breton language in schools or something like that. The various American dialects are all pretty similar though. Nothing like in the UK and certainly not like in Germany. Maybe it's easier to hold the standard up as golden when everybody is so close to begin with.

[ilikeverin]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not

Oh my goodness, that's the saddest thing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not

A bit extreme as an example, as that's not even an issue of dialects. But even in England (and other English speaking areas) the idea that there is a correct form of English and that dialects were corruptions of something pure was a major part of the education system until quite recently. It's not uncommon to find people (usually over fifty) who switch their accents and grammar when talking to someone in a formal setting. And, obviously, it hasn't totally disappeared.

Wow. That's crazy. Didn't know about that. But I remember something vaguely similar from my high school French class about how the French government used to ban the Breton language in schools or something like that.

Oh, derp, France completely slipped my mind somehow.  Yeah, they're probably even worse than English-speaking countries in some ways.

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Eh, I would say American dialects are further apart than you'd think.  And the pace of regionalization is increasing.

[memphis]

Linguistic imperialism is a common thing, of course, and it takes many forms. I can't say more than a couple words in my ancestral language, although my dad speaks it fluently.

I'm gonna go out on a limb as say it's because you grew up in the United States and he didn't...

I don't think even my cousins in Dhaka speak Sylheti.

Why would they? They live in Dhaka, not Sylhet.

[memphis]

Eh, I would say American dialects are further apart than you'd think.  And the pace of regionalization is increasing.

Really? I've been to nearly every state in the Union. Everybody speaks more or less the same. You may have a Great Lake Vowel Shift here and a country twang there, but it's nothing like Newcastle versus Cornwall.

[Gustaf]

I'll just note that dialect shame definitely exists in Sweden. There was even a big hit some years ago referencing someone getting rid of their stupid dialect to make it in Stockholm.

[Insula Dei]

Dutch in Flanders does have a sort of weird status. On the one hand most people will shamelessly speak to one another in what's often been dubbed 'Verkavelingsvlaams', which is a sort of transregional Flemish spin on the Dutch language, notably with some for of 'Gij/Ge' (comparable to 'thou') rather than the standard 'jij/u' (informal and formal 'you' in Standard Dutch'). On the other hand, when we're expected to use Standard Dutch (in writing, in more formal contexts,..) we tend to use it in a more strict and grammatically flawless way than our neighbours to the North.

Historically the issue of Standard Dutch vs. 'Standard Flemish' has been a very active discussion within the Flemish Movement, with the greatest poet of the Flemish 19th Century, Guido Gezelle ('O krinkelend, winkelend waterding') notably on the side of a more typically Flemish language.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not

A bit extreme as an example, as that's not even an issue of dialects. But even in England (and other English speaking areas) the idea that there is a correct form of English and that dialects were corruptions of something pure was a major part of the education system until quite recently. It's not uncommon to find people (usually over fifty) who switch their accents and grammar when talking to someone in a formal setting. And, obviously, it hasn't totally disappeared.

Wow. That's crazy. Didn't know about that. But I remember something vaguely similar from my high school French class about how the French government used to ban the Breton language in schools or something like that. The various American dialects are all pretty similar though. Nothing like in the UK and certainly not like in Germany. Maybe it's easier to hold the standard up as golden when everybody is so close to begin with.

Far from the worst - just off the top of my head:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain#Nationalism (Under the bit that says "Franco also used language policies". It's the reason why today in Catalonia practically everyone speaks Catalan (as the language of the house) but a lot of olds can't write it. The examples are infinite though, America is actually one of the better countries (historically).

[minionofmidas]

People speaking fully-formed dialect  are usually what you'd term the traditional working class, especially rural working class.

I mean, I know men who come from villages around Butzbach or Bad Nauheim, commute to work in Vilbel, are only in their fourties, and who couldn't order a sandwich unassisted anywhere north of Frankenberg or south of Mannheim. But anybody from Frankfurt or Vilbel of whom you could say that is a farmer past the age of retirement.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

You can rework the above post for just about anywhere in England.

[ilikeverin]

It's not school that did them in - school used to try for ages but failed. It's tv and the transportation revolution.

It's actually almost certainly not TV; every study trying to link TV to language change (e.g., one looking at the influence of EastEnders on Glaswegian English) has found only very sparse evidence that mass media contributes anything. (Again, the US is a good counterexample: regional changes are accelerating despite the strong media here.)  Changes in transportation and mobility are definitely the key.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

An article on the influence of EastEnders on Glaswegian English? I do hope that the people who did that did not receive any funding to do so...

[ilikeverin]

An article on the influence of EastEnders on Glaswegian English? I do hope that the people who did that did not receive any funding to do so...

Why not?  Did you take a look at the article?  Glaswegians are starting to front "th" like speakers of Cockney English (saying "fink" for what most people have as "think"), and linguists are unsure why the sound change would travel as it has.  One of the most popular canards is that the influence of English mass media (as exemplified by the supposedly Cockney-glorifying EastEnders) has brought Cockney patterns of speech, such as th-fronting, into prominence across the UK, and that speakers of Glaswegian English are adapting the speaking norms of the south because of that influence.  The paper in question tests that hypothesis by seeing whether there's any relation between how fervently Glaswegians follow and obsess over English programs (such as EastEnders) and how often they front "th", and found that there wasn't much of a relationship, indicating that exposure to English mass media is probably unrelated to this sound change in progress.  (The limited relationship they did find seems to have something to do with the fact that people who are obsessed with EastEnders in Glasgow just seem to like everything about England better than people who don't, and have more contact with people who live around London in general.)

I mean, it is a sociolinguistic study, so I can't defend it too much.  The impossibilities of making sociolinguistics truly scientific are why I'm not very interested in sociolinguistics.  But they tested a hypothesis that people repeat over and over and over again without much evidence at all, found it lacking, and presented evidence to that effect.  Not too much out of the ordinary there.

[ZuWo]

It's not school that did them in - school used to try for ages but failed. It's tv and the transportation revolution.

It's actually almost certainly not TV; every study trying to link TV to language change (e.g., one looking at the influence of EastEnders on Glaswegian English) has found only very sparse evidence that mass media contributes anything. (Again, the US is a good counterexample: regional changes are accelerating despite the strong media here.)  Changes in transportation and mobility are definitely the key.

Funny that you mention this - in a recent guest lecture by linguist David Britain at my university this study has been mentioned as well. He drew the same conclusions as you do. (The general lecture course had a focus on "Principles of Language Change" and the guest lecture in question had the title "The Spatial Diffusion of Linguistic Innovations").

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Why not?

Waste of money that could have been spent on worthwhile projects. Even in the same subject area. The answer was obviously going to be 'no', and the sort of 'no' that would not exactly elucidate...

[ZuWo]

Why not?

Waste of money that could have been spent on worthwhile projects. Even in the same subject area. The answer was obviously going to be 'no', and the sort of 'no' that would not exactly elucidate...

That's easy to say in hindsight, and I disagree. Indeed, I think the hypothesis that the mass media and, for example, popular television programs have a considerable impact on language is quite plausible. The fact that this study shows that there is probably no such influence in the case of EastEnders suggests that this hypothesis may have to be rejected - even though one has to keep in mind that more research has to be done, of course.

[ilikeverin]

Why not?

Waste of money that could have been spent on worthwhile projects. Even in the same subject area. The answer was obviously going to be 'no', and the sort of 'no' that would not exactly elucidate...

That's easy to say in hindsight, and I disagree. Indeed, I think the hypothesis that the mass media and, for example, popular television programs have a considerable impact on language is quite plausible. The fact that this study shows that there is probably no such influence in the case of EastEnders suggests that this hypothesis may have to be rejected - even though one has to keep in mind that more research has to be done, of course.

Exactly.  I mean, you saw the hypothesis made that mass media affects dialects already in this thread, and it's expressed all over the place.  I'm not sure how results to the contrary are "obvious" and not "worthwhile".

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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Oh no, not this again...

[ilikeverin]

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Oh no, not this again...

Okay, okay, gratuitous attacks on correlational designs aside I think the debate here is more about whether the topic is a valid and interesting topic to study, and I don't really see how it's not.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

That's easy to say in hindsight, and I disagree.

No, it's obvious to anyone who knows anything about Glasgow, and to anyone who (alas) has at least a passing familiarity with a dreadful soap (what my Grandad would have called ket) set in a mythical Bangladeshi-free East End (a soap that is, by the way, not generally noted for its accurate rendition of current or former working class London dialects).

In any case, who said we were talking about accents?