Languages and dialects in Alsace
The languages and dialects in Alsace include the traditional and new languages and dialects that are or have been used in Alsace . Traditional standard languages are French and German . The traditional dialects belong mainly to the Germanic language family , these are summarized under the term Alsatian . In some peripheral regions of today's Alsace, Romance dialects also exist (see the article Romance dialects in Alsace ).
General
The idioms used in Alsace are traditionally shaped by their geographical and political borderline between Germanic and Romance language and dialect areas. Due to the modern immigration associated with the global economic boom since the 1950s, the languages and dialects of immigrants have been added for several decades.
Brief overview
During the Iron Age and ancient times , Celtic and Latin idioms predominated in what is now Alsace . With the Great Migration came Germanic languages added and Alsace became a predominantly German-speaking region. In the early modern period , French gained influence, partly due to the reputation of French and partly due to the political conquest of most of Alsace by France in the 17th century. As a result, Alsace became the scene of repeated restrictive language policy measures, which, depending on political affiliation, emanated either from France or the German Empire. The milestones in this development are the phase of the French Revolution (1789–1815), membership of the German Empire (1871–1914) and the National Socialist German Reich (1940–1944) as well as the reintegration of Alsace into France after the First and Second World Wars (1918 ff. and 1945 ff.).
Today Alsace is characterized by a partial diglossia between French as the lingua franca , official and school language on the one hand, and German dialects that tend towards standardization (summarized under the term Alsatian ) on the other. The latter experienced severe erosion in the first post-war decades, along with the decline in knowledge of standard German. Today certain forms of partial and voluntary use of German dialects or German standard language have established themselves somewhat (school lessons, writers, theater, media, street signs, etc.).
Due to the decoupling from standard German as the umbrella language, there are tendencies in the area of German dialects, Alsatian , to standardize and establish dialect forms as written and standard forms (cf. Orthal ).
Language and dialect history
Compare: History of Alsace
Since around 600 BC Celtic resident in Alsace was supplemented or replaced by Latin during the Roman period (approx. 60 BC to approx. 400 AD) .
Since the Great Migration , Germanic dialects have spread in Alsace and were spoken throughout almost the entire region in the Middle Ages. These Alemannic and Franconian dialects are summarized today under the term " Alsatian " (more rarely also "Alsatian German"). The most widespread are Alemannic dialects , predominantly Upper Rhine- Alemannic , in the far south also High Alemannic . South Franconian is spoken in the far north around Weißenburg as well as Lauterburg and Rheinfränkisch in the northwestern corner of the Crooked Alsace around Saar-Union. Since the early modern period , the use of the German standard language as the associated umbrella language of the Germanic dialects has been dependent on political circumstances.
In the early Middle Ages, however, not all of today's Alsace was linguistically Germanized: Romance dialects ( patois ) or the French language are traditional in some areas of the Vosges (upper Breuschtal, parts of the hamlet valley, around Ste.-Marie-aux-Mines and around Lapoutroie) and anchored in the western Sundgau (around Montreux) (see Romanesque dialects in Alsace and border towns of the Alemannic dialect area ) . Today's Territoire de Belfort , which was part of the Habsburg or royal French Sundgau until 1648 or 1789 and was only separated from the Haut-Rhin department in 1871 , is traditionally Romansh or French-speaking.
French gradually gained in importance, especially between the 16th and 20th centuries. This is primarily related to political history, but also partly to the reputation that French enjoyed among the nobility and the upper middle class across Europe , especially in the early modern period .
After the conquest by French troops in 1639–1681, French came to Alsace with the royal administrators as well as immigrants and traders from central France. The majority of the population continued to use German or their respective Germanic or Romance dialect.
French spread throughout Europe, and even more so in Alsace, as the administrative, commercial and diplomatic language within the urban and rural elites. Otherwise the Germanic (and Romance) Alsatian dialects and the German language were retained; at the University of Strasbourg, for example, teaching was still in German.
After the French Revolution , the language policy of the French state changed, which now advocated linguistic unity for France. In addition, French found its way into those sections of the population who sympathized with the ideas of the revolution. German or the German dialects were now part of a development towards partial bilingualism . In the areas of the patois, French prevailed because of the school lessons. As in other non-French-speaking regions of France or other minority regions of other European countries, the minority language, especially in schools, has increasingly been supplemented or replaced by the language of the majority.
During the affiliation to the German Empire ( Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen , 1871-1918), the "language question" was initially regulated in a law of March 1872 in such a way that German was basically determined as the official language . However, in the parts of the country with a predominantly French-speaking population, public notices and enactments should be accompanied by a French translation. Another law of 1873 allowed the use of French as the language of business for those administrative units in which French predominated in whole or in part. In a law on education from 1873 it was regulated that in the German-speaking areas German was the exclusive school language, while in the French-speaking areas the lessons should be held exclusively in French. French-speaking communities and families in Alsace-Lorraine, like the Polish-speaking regions of Prussia, were exposed to attempts at Germanization and assimilation. French was only partly the school and official language there.
The French language policy between 1918 and 1940 was strictly directed against the German language and the Alsatian dialect. The French language was introduced as the compulsory official and school language. Only French was allowed in schools and administration; at times speaking German or dialect was forbidden under penalty of punishment. Since the elections of November 1919 and until the beginning of 2008, however, candidates from the three Alsace-Lorraine departments of Haut-Rhin, Bas-Rhin and Moselle were allowed to distribute campaign pamphlets in both languages, French and, optionally, German.
During the occupation by the National Socialist regime of Germany between 1940 and 1944, Alsace once again experienced an increase in restrictive language policy. This was ruthlessly adapted to the National Socialist ideology . The conversion of French first names into German is certainly one of the more harmless but typical examples. The policy of the NSDAP and the civil administration it ruled (oppression of the population, Germanization policy , grotesque anti-French cultural policy, entry into the Wehrmacht, etc.) sustained the turning of Alsace towards France and, for Michael Erbe, led to the negation of the German side of Alsatian history. This policy also promoted the disintegration of the standard German language in Alsace: the desire, which was widespread until 1940 to hold onto the German language (alongside French) as the official and lingua franca, was hardly found after 1945 and for many decades had no chance of social and political recognition.
Language and dialect in the present
Compare: Alsatian , Romance dialects in Alsace
After the Second World War, French became the lingua franca, official and school language. Knowledge of the autochthonous Alemannic or Franconian dialects (summarized in the term Alsatian ) or standard German has since declined sharply and is mostly limited to the older generation and the rural areas.
The French language policy of the pre-war period continued in principle. The older generations sometimes communicate in Alsatian dialects. The younger generations, especially in the larger cities, mainly use the French language. German is predominantly taught as a foreign language in schools.
According to a 2001 study , 61 percent of the population of Alsace describe themselves as Alsatian. Only one in four young people said they occasionally spoke in the regional language. Only about five percent of those starting school had the appropriate language skills, as only 28.8 percent of parents were teaching their children at least a little Alsatian. There is a clear urban-rural divide. The language was best preserved in the north and northwest, in agricultural professions and in those with a lot of public traffic. In the middle of the 20th century, around 90 percent understood dialect and / or standard German .
According to the Office pour la Langue et la Culture d'Alsace - OLCA ( Office for Language and Culture in Alsace ), 600,000 people still speak "Alsatian" (approx. 34.6% of the population), mainly in rural areas, in villages and smaller towns.
Writers who write or wrote both French and Standard German and dialect include René Schickele , Jean Egen , Auguste Wackenheim and André Weckmann . Under the motto E Friehjohr fer unsi Sproch , theater and music groups, dialect poets, homeland associations and language tutors have come together since 2001 to promote the preservation of Alsatian. The Regional Council also subsidizes Alsatian language courses. France 3 Alsace broadcasts the news program “Rund Um” from Monday to Friday, in which only Alsatian is spoken. There is a danger in the folklore of dialects, a trend that can also be observed in German-speaking countries. The disappearance of German or the German dialects has become the subject of many well-known writers (René Schickele, André Weckmann, Hans Arp and others).
More recently, bilingual classes are being sought. This is not only done by private initiatives, but also increasingly by the administration that wants to preserve the economic factor of bilingualism. Public bilingual schools and kindergartens have existed in Alsace since the early 1990s . The number of children attending these facilities has risen continuously since then. Bilingual schools, some of which are taught in German, were attended by around 7,000 students in 2000, and by around 15,000 in 2005; by 2016 this number had risen to over 34,300. In the school year 2017/18, 16.2% of the Alsatian preschool and elementary school students attended a bilingual school. This proportion is lower in secondary schools, but is also increasing continuously. In Alsace, the proportion of students learning German at least as a foreign language is 82.5%, which is significantly higher than the national average of 16.5%.
Street signs are often bilingual with French and dialect versions. The dialect version is often not a translation of the French name, but falls back on the traditional name. For bilingual street signs, funding can be applied for from the OCLA (Office pour la Langue & la Culture d'Alsace). The dialect version can also be found on some place-name signs next to the official name.
In the political debate about the preservation of German, a clear preference has been set in favor of the dialects and against standard German. The focus is less on Switzerland , where dialect and the associated standard language coexist ( diglossia ), but more on language models such as Luxembourg , where the dialect is valued more highly than the associated standard language and is even expanded into a written language . In Strasbourg , for example, in connection with the documentation of German street names on street signs, after a long discussion the decision was made not to use standard German, but rather to use the Strasbourg dialect. The problem with the higher valuation of the dialects compared to the associated standard language is that regional and social dialects also show strong regional and social differences in Alsace. The survival of the dialects then possibly also depends on the extent to which a “standard Alsatian” can be established.
Philipps sees a contrast between regional and national arguments. The former would complain less about the disadvantage of the standard German language, but above all about the suppression of the dialects. The latter opposed the fact that French language policy affects not only the Alsatian dialects, but all minority languages in France.
literature
In descending order by year of publication.
- Robert Greib, Frédéric Hartweg, Jean-Michel Niedermeyer, François Schaffner, foreword by Bernard Vogler, Language & Culture in Alsace: A Story , Salde, 2016, ISBN 978-2-903850-40-1
- Michael Erbe (Ed.): The Alsace. Historical landscape through the ages , 198 pp., Ill., Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2002, ISBN 3-17-015771-X
- Johanna Maurer: Alsatian and French. The function of their alternation in discourse, Kiel 2002
- Frédéric Hartweg: The Languages in Alsace: Cold War or Reconciled Coexistence? , in: Ingo Kolboom and Bernd Rill (eds.): Francophonie - national and international dimensions . Arguments and materials for Zeitgeschehen 35, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-88795-249-9 , online version as PDF file , concise and brief overview of the language and dialect history of Alsace, ideal as an introduction to the subject
- Werner König and Renate Schrambke: The language atlases of the Swabian-Alemannic area. Baden-Württemberg, Bavarian Swabia, Alsace, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Vorarlberg , Bühl 1999
- Frédéric Hartweg: Evolution et Statut des Variantes Standard et Dialectales de l'Alleman en Alsace , in: Ammon / Hellinger (ed.): Status Change of Languages , Berlin 1992, pp. 371–387
- Lothar Wolf: Le français régional d'Alsace. Étude critique des alsacianismes , avec la collaboration de Paul Fischer, Paris 1983
- Eugène Philipps : Fate Alsace. Crisis of a Culture and a Language , Karlsruhe 1980, pp. 122–168
- Atlas Linguistique et Ethnographique de l´Alsace , Strasbourg 1969 ff.
- Ernest Beyer: A la limite des dialectes alsaciens et lorraines , in: L'ouvrage de la Societé Savante d'Alsace et des Régions de l'Est, 1957, pp. 335-383, 15 maps
- Georg Wolfram and Werner Gley, Alsace-Lothringischer Atlas , Frankfurt a. M. 1931
- Paul Lévy : Chats about Alsatian language and culture. Editions des Dernières Nouvelles 1930. 2016 balance.
- German Linguistic Atlas , started by Ferdinand Wrede based on the Linguistic Atlas of the German Empire by Georg Wenker, continued by Walther Mitzka and Bernhard Martin, Marburg 1927–1956
- Ernst Martin / Hans Lienhart: Dictionary of Alsatian dialects , Strasbourg 1899–1907 ( online version )
Web links
Remarks
- ^ Parliamentary question by the deputy Jean-Louis Masson from the Dept. Moselle to the French Minister of the Interior on December 9, 1991
- ↑ See Erbe 2002, pp. 164–180, especially 167–170, 174–175 u. 177-179. For the concept of negation used by Michael Erbe, see p. 178.
- ↑ DNA / ISERCO study, published in the Dernières Nouvelles d'Alsace of September 21, 2001, article Erosion naturelle by Claude Keiflin
- ↑ a b Office pour la Langue et la Culture d'Alsace - OLCA (Office for Language and Culture in Alsace) , accessed on March 3, 2014
- ↑ ABCM bilingualism. Association pour le Bilinguisme en Classe dès la Maternelle
- ↑ http://www.alsace-lorraine.org/blog/2017-2/126-zur-situation-des-deutschunterrichts-im-elsass.html
- ↑ https://www.ac-strasbourg.fr/delecoleausuperieur/cursus-bilingue-allemand/
- ↑ https://www.ac-strasbourg.fr/fileadmin/public/statistiques/2018_LANGUES.pdf
- ↑ Philipps 1980, pp. 122-168.