Abstract
German-speaking Switzerland can certainly be regarded as one of the liveliest and at the same time best researched dialect areas in Central Europe. It is all the more surprising that dialectometric analyses in this area have only recently been performed and none of them included an investigation into the level of syntax. In this paper we pursue two goals: First, we present digital data that has been made available in recent years on the basis of the Sprachatlas der deutschen Schweiz (SDS) and the Syntaktischer Atlas der deutschen Schweiz (SADS). Our second goal is to present dialectometric analyses performed with this data. A special focus is put on the comparison of different linguistic levels (lexis, phonology, morphology and syntax). Our methods include hierarchical cluster analyses (of the whole dataset as well as of the linguistic levels), correlations (between pairs of linguistic levels and between linguistic levels and geography) and parameter maps which allow us to draw conclusions about the distributions of innovative and conservative regions, dialect centers and transition zones. Our results show that while all four levels generally yield similar geographic patterns (dynamic areas in the North vs. conservative areas in the South, agreement of dialect and cantonal borders, high correlations with geography), syntax deviates most from the other levels.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the Swiss National Science Foundation for supporting their research through the project “Modelling morphosyntactic area formation in Swiss German (SynMod)” (SNF Project no. 140716) as well as the University Research Priority Program “Language and Space” for granting Yves Scherrer a short-term fellowship at the University of Zurich.
References
Aurenhammer, Franz. 1991. Voronoi diagrams – A survey of a fundamental geometric data structure. ACM computing surveys 23: 345–405.10.1145/116873.116880Search in Google Scholar
Barbiers, Sjef, Hans Bennis, Gunther de Vogelaer, Magda Devos & Margreet van der Ham. 2005. Syntactic atlas of the Dutch dialects, vol. 1. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.10.5117/9789053567005Search in Google Scholar
Beyer, Ernst & Raymond Matzen (eds.). 1969. Atlas linguistique et ethnographique de l’Alsace, vol. 1. Paris: Editions du C.N.R.S.Search in Google Scholar
Blancquaert, Edgard & Willem Pée. 1925–1982. Reeks Nederlands(ch)e dialectatlassen. Antwerpen: de Sikkel.Search in Google Scholar
Bösiger, Melanie & Alexandra Schiesser. 2014. Der Engelberger Dialekt – ein Sonderfall. Ängelbärger Zeyt. Engelberger Jahrbuch 2015: 140–146.Search in Google Scholar
Bothorel-Witz, Arlette, Marthe Philipp & Sylviane Spindler (eds.). 1984. Atlas linguistique et ethnographique de l'Alsace, vol. 2. Paris: Editions du C.N.R.S.Search in Google Scholar
Bucheli Berger, Claudia. 2008. Neue Technik, alte Probleme: Auf dem Weg zum Syntaktischen Atlas der Deutschen Schweiz (SADS). In Sprachgeographie digital. Die neue Generation der Sprachatlanten, 29–44. Eds. Stephan Elspass & Werner König. Hildesheim: Olms.Search in Google Scholar
Bucheli Berger, Claudia. 2010. Dativ für Akkusativ im Senslerischen (Kanton Freiburg). In Alemannische Dialektologie: Wege in die Zukunft. Beiträge zur 16. Arbeitstagung für alemannische Dialektologie in Freiburg/Fribourg vom 07.‒ 10.09.2008, 71–83. Eds. Helen Christen, Sibylle Germann, Walter Haas, Nadia Montefiori & Hans Ruef. Stuttgart: Steiner.Search in Google Scholar
Bucheli, Claudia & Elvira Glaser. 2002. The syntactic atlas of Swiss German dialects: Empirical and methodological problems. In Syntactic microvariation (Meertens Institute Electronic Publications in Linguistics 2), 41–74. Eds. Sjef Barbiers, Leonie Cornips & Susanne van der Kleij. Amsterdam: Meertens Instituut.Search in Google Scholar
Chambers, Jack K. & Peter Trudgill. 2004. Dialectology, 2nd edn. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Cronbach, Lee. 1951. Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests. Psychometrika 16: 279–334.10.1007/BF02310555Search in Google Scholar
Embleton, Sheila. 1993. Multidimensional scaling as a dialectometrical technique: outline of a research project. In Contributions to quantitative linguistics. Proceedings of the first international conference on quantitative linguistics (QUAL-ICO), 267–276. Eds. Reinhard Köhler & Burghard B. Rieger. Dordrecht & Boston: Kluwer Academic Publishers.10.1007/978-94-011-1769-2_19Search in Google Scholar
Everitt, Brian S., Sabine Landau, Morven Leese & Daniel Stahl. 2011. Cluster Analysis. 5th edn. Chichester, U.K.: Wiley.10.1002/9780470977811Search in Google Scholar
Goebl, Hans. 1984. Dialektometrische Studien: Anhand italoromanischer, rätoromanischer und galloromanischer Sprachmaterialien aus AIS und ALF. 3 vols. Tübingen: Niemeyer.Search in Google Scholar
Goebl, Hans. 2005. La dialectométrie corrélative: un nouvel outil pour l’étude de l’aménagement dialectal de l’espace par l’homme. Revue de Linguistique Romane 69 : 321–367.Search in Google Scholar
Goebl, Hans. 2010. Dialectometry and quantitative mapping. In Language and Space. An International Handbook of Linguistic Variation. Vol. 2: Language Mapping (Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft 30.2), 433–457. Eds. Alfred Lameli, Roland Kehrein & Stefan Rabanus. Berlin/ New York: de Gruyter.10.1515/9783110219166.1.433Search in Google Scholar
Goebl, Hans. 2011. Quo vadis, atlas linguistice? Einige wissenschaftshistorische und zeitgeistkritische Reflexionen zur atlasgestützten Geolinguistik. In Sprachkontakte, Sprachvariation und Sprachwandel, 5–27. Eds. Claudia Schlaak & Lena Busse. Tübingen: Narr.Search in Google Scholar
Goebl, Hans & Guillaume Schiltz. 1997. A dialectometrical compilation of CLAE I and CLAE II. Isoglosses and dialect integration. In Computer developed linguistic atlas of England CLAE, vol. 2, 13–21. Eds. Wolfgang Viereck & Heinrich Ramisch. Tübingen: Niemeyer.Search in Google Scholar
Goebl, Hans, Yves Scherrer & Pavel Smečka. 2013. Kurzbericht über die Dialektometrisierung des Gesamtnetzes des „Sprachatlasses der deutschen Schweiz“ (SDS). In Vielfalt, Variation und Stellung der deutschen Sprache, 153–176. Eds. Karina Schneider-Wiejowski, Birte Kellermeier-Rehbein, Jakob Haselhuber. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter.10.1515/9783110309997.153Search in Google Scholar
Glaser, Elvira. 2013. Area formation in morphosyntax. In Space in language and linguistics. Geographical, interactional, and Cognitive perspectives (linguae & litterae 24), 195–221. Eds. Peter Auer, Martin Hilpert, Anja Stukenbrock & Benedikt Szmrecsanyi. Berlin & Boston: de Gruyter.10.1515/9783110312027.195Search in Google Scholar
Glaser, Elvira. 2014. Wandel und Variation in der Morphosyntax der schweizerdeutschen Dialekte. Taal en Tongval 66: 21–64.10.5117/TET2014.1.GLASSearch in Google Scholar
Gries, Stefan. 2008. Statistik für Sprachwissenschaftler (Studienbücher zur Linguistik 13). Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.10.1515/glot-2009-0025Search in Google Scholar
Grieve, Jack. 2014. A comparison of statistical methods for the aggregation of regional linguistic variation. In Aggregating dialectology, typology, and register analysis. Linguistic variation in text and speech (linguae & litterae 28), 53–88. Eds. Benedikt Szmrecsanyi & Bernhard Wälchli. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter.10.1515/9783110317558.53Search in Google Scholar
Haas, Walter. 2000. Die deutschsprachige Schweiz. In Die viersprachige Schweiz (Sprachlandschaft 25), 57–138. Eds. Hans Bickel & Robert Schläpfer. Aarau: Sauerländer.Search in Google Scholar
Heeringa, Wilbert. 2004. Measuring dialect pronunciation differences using levenshtein distance. Groningen: University of Groningen PhD thesis.Search in Google Scholar
Heeringa, Wilbert & John Nerbonne. 2001. Dialect areas and dialect continua. Language Variation and Change 13: 375–400.10.1017/S0954394501133041Search in Google Scholar
Hotzenköcherle, Rudolf, Robert Schläpfer, Rudolf Trüb & Paul Zinsli (eds.). 1962‒1997. Sprachatlas der deutschen Schweiz. Bern/Basel: Francke.Search in Google Scholar
Hotzenköcherle, Rudolf. 1984. Die Sprachlandschaften der deutschen Schweiz. Ed. Niklaus Bigler & Robert Schläpfer. Aarau: Sauerländer.Search in Google Scholar
Jaccard, Paul. 1912. The distribution of the flora in the alpine zone. New Phytologist 11: 37–50.10.1111/j.1469-8137.1912.tb05611.xSearch in Google Scholar
Jenks, George F. 1967. The data model concept in statistical mapping. International yearbook of cartography 7: 186–190Search in Google Scholar
Jeszenszky, Péter & Robert Weibel. forthc. Exploring global and local patterns in the correlation of geographic distances and morphosyntactic variation in Swiss German.Search in Google Scholar
Kelle, Bernhard. 2001. Zur Typologie der Dialekte in der deutschsprachigen Schweiz: Ein dialektometrischer Versuch. Dialectologia et Geolinguistica 9: 9–34.10.1515/dig.2001.2001.9.9Search in Google Scholar
Kellerhals, Sandra. 2014. Dialektometrische Analyse und Visualisierung von schweizerdeutschen Dialekten auf verschiedenen linguistischen Ebenen. Zürich: Universität Zürich MSc thesis.Search in Google Scholar
Lee, Jay & William A. Kretzschmar. 1993. Spatial analysis of linguistic data with GIS functions. International Journal of Geographical Information Systems 7: 541–560.10.1080/02693799308901981Search in Google Scholar
Löffler, Heinrich. 2003. Dialektologie. Eine Einführung. Tübingen: Narr.Search in Google Scholar
Lötscher, Andreas. 2004. Dialektsyntax oder Syntax der gesprochenen Sprache? Eine Fallstudie anhand von Nebensatzproblemen im Schweizerdeutschen. Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik 71: 156–179.Search in Google Scholar
Mantel, Nathan. 1967. The detection of disease clustering and a generalized regression approach. Cancer Research 27: 209–220.Search in Google Scholar
Montemagni, Simonetta. 2008. The space of Tuscan dialectal variation. A correlation study. International Journal of Humanities and Arts Computing 2: 135–152.10.3366/E1753854809000354Search in Google Scholar
Nerbonne, John & Wilbert Heeringa. 2010. Measuring dialect differences. In Language and space. An international handbook of linguistic variation. Vol. 1: theories and methods (Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft 30.2), 550–567. Eds. Peter Auer & Jürgen Erich Schmidt. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter.10.1515/9783110220278.550Search in Google Scholar
Nerbonne, John & Peter Kleiweg. 2003. Lexical distance in LAMSAS. Computers and the humanities 37: 339–357.10.1023/A:1025042402655Search in Google Scholar
Nerbonne, John & Peter Kleiweg. 2007. Toward a dialectological yardstick. Journal of Quantitative Linguistics 14: 148–166.10.1080/09296170701379260Search in Google Scholar
Nunnally, Jum C. & Ira H. Bernstein. 1994. Psychometric theory. 3rd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.Search in Google Scholar
Shackleton Jr., Robert G. 2007. Phonetic variation in the traditional English dialects: A computational analysis. Journal of English linguistics 35: 30–102.10.1177/0075424206297857Search in Google Scholar
Scherrer, Yves. 2011. Morphology generation for Swiss German dialects. In Systems and frameworks for computational morphology (Second International Workshop, SFCM 2011, Zurich, Switzerland), 130–140. Eds. Cerstin Mahlow & Michael Piotrowski. Berlin/Heidelberg: Springer.10.1007/978-3-642-23138-4_9Search in Google Scholar
Scherrer, Yves. 2014. Computerlinguistische Experimente für die schweizerdeutsche Dialektlandschaft: Maschinelle Übersetzung und Dialektometrie. In Alemannische Dialektologie – Dialekte im Kontakt (Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik – Beihefte 155), 261–278. Ed. Dominique Huck. Stuttgart: Steiner.Search in Google Scholar
Séguy, Jean. 1973. La dialectométrie dans l’Atlas linguistique de la Gascogne. Revue de linguistique romane 37: 1–24.Search in Google Scholar
Seiler, Guido. 2004. On three types of dialect variation, and their implications for linguistic theory. Evidence from verb clusters in Swiss German dialects. In Dialectology meets typology. Dialect grammar from a Cross-linguistic perspective, 367–399. Ed. Bernd Kortmann. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter.Search in Google Scholar
Sibler, Pius, Robert Weibel, Elvira Glaser & Gabriela Bart. 2012. Cartographic visualization in Support of Dialectology. In Proceedings Auto Carto 2012, Columbus, OH (USA), 17‒18 September 2012 (accessed 4 March 2016): http://www.cartogis.org/docs/proceedings/2012/Sibler_etal_AutoCarto2012.pdfSearch in Google Scholar
Spruit, Marco René, Wilbert Heeringa & John Nerbonne. 2009. Associations among linguistic levels. Lingua 119: 1624–1642.10.1016/j.lingua.2009.02.001Search in Google Scholar
Stoeckle, Philipp. 2016. Horizontal and vertical variation in Swiss German morphosyntax. In The future of dialects. Selected papers from methods in dialectology XV (Language variation 1), 195–215. Eds. Marie-Hélène Côté, Remco Knooihuizen & John Nerbonne. Berlin: Language Science Press.Search in Google Scholar
Trüb, Rudolf. 1951. Die Sprachlandschaft Walensee-Seeztal (Beiträge zur schweizerdeutschen Mundartfortschung 3). Frauenfeld: Huber.Search in Google Scholar
Ward, Joe H. 1963. Hierarchical grouping to optimize an objective function. Journal of the American statistical association 58: 236–244.10.1080/01621459.1963.10500845Search in Google Scholar
Weiss, Richard. 1947. Die Brünig-Napf-Reuss-Linie als Kulturgrenze zwischen Ost- und Westschweiz auf volkskundlichen Karten. Geographica Helvetica 2: 153–175.10.5194/gh-2-153-1947Search in Google Scholar
Wieling, Martijn & John Nerbonne. 2015. Advances in dialectometry. Annual review of linguistics 2015: 243–264.10.1146/annurev-linguist-030514-124930Search in Google Scholar
© 2016 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston