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When Wurst comes to Wurscht: Variation and koiné formation in Texas German

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2019

Luke Lindemann
Luke Lindemann*
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
*
Author for correspondence: Luke Lindemann, Email: luke.lindemann@yale.edu
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Abstract

Texas German is a new world language variety that shows some evidence of koiné development but also presents with substantial variation at many levels of structure. I present a case study on the variant pronunciation of sibilants in Texas German consonant clusters. This feature is fairly frequent and found throughout the regions of German settlement in Central Texas. After a discussion of the presence of this feature in the donor dialects, I investigate the factors that correlate with variation in the modern language. From an analysis of local and global spatial autocorrelation, I argue that variation is not significantly associated with particular geographic regions and is compatible with stable and homogenous variation. This provides insight into our understanding of new dialect emergence and the mechanisms by which dialect features are leveled over multiple generations.

Keywords

Texas GermanGermankoinéizationdialect formationvariationdialectologygeospatial analysisheritage varietiesspatial autocorrelationsibilants
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Linguistic Geography , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , April 2019 , pp. 33 - 45
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2019 

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