The changing Countryside: the Need for Innovation in Dialectology Ad Backus & Jos Swanenberg*



Abstract As globalization has brought about social changes not seen previously, this squib sketches outlines for a renewal of the field of dialectology. The primary concern is how these changes are reflected in young people’s identity construction and expression, expecting an intricate interplay between the attractions of global and local culture. This may be dealt with by mapping out and analyzing communication in the Dutch countryside, with particular attention to language use and stylistic choices made in everyday communication, both in face-to-face settings and on social media.

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1 Introduction Globalization and urbanization have brought about various changes in Northern and Western European societies. The social, ethnic, cultural and linguistic composition has become extremely diverse, in urban areas but also in the countryside. Local dialects are vanishing through processes of dialect leveling. At the same time, informal digital writing has become immensely popular and makes extensive use of dialectal forms. Globalization and urbanization have brought about two recent socio-cultural developments that have far-reaching consequences for dialects: 1) the shift from strictly local to regional identities; and 2) the growing importance of the intertwining of local cultures with global culture (glocalization, cf. Robertson 1995) as the dominant force behind identity formation. Both developments accompany the increasing integration of rural areas into the larger national and international fabric, and reflect that the lives of people in these areas are not as tied to their village or town as they used to be for previous generations. They participate in social and professional networks that extend far beyond their local base, bringing into their communicative repertoires the complex accumulation of partly overlapping contacts, allegiances and skills so typical of our time. What used to be culturally and linguisti-

* Tilburg University. Email: [email protected]

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cally relatively autonomous regions have now become regionally colored parts of a wider national and international network, though still with peripheral status. Dialects used to be stand-alone varieties, tied to a small and self-contained locale. In the past few decades, however, regiolects have emerged that are in use over larger areas and which have shed many of the distinct features of the earlier local dialects, in processes such as dialect leveling and regionalization of language varieties (e.g. Hoppenbrouwers 1990, Vandekerckhove 2000, Hinskens, Auer & Kerswill 2005, De Vogelaer & Heeringa 2011). In addition, urban language varieties, often described as youth language, street language, mixed ethnolect etc., take different forms in different cities, and appear to influence more rural forms of speech as well. If their linguistic features and structures are to be fully investigated we need to describe geographical variation accurately by taking the use of these features into account and compare them to dialectal varieties at earlier stages (as described in dialect atlases and lexica). The research field that traditionally describes geographic (micro)variation of linguistic features, dialectology, is therefore challenged to establish a new footing, if it is to account for the form and function of language variation in the wider environments globalization has thrust it into. This paper aims to launch a renewed approach to dialectology. As part of their socio-cultural impact, regionalization and globalization have given rise to at least three concrete linguistic phenomena: 1) the demise of local dialects and their metamorphosis into regiolects; 2) the increasing linguistic variation in written domains, especially on social media; 3) the influence of new languages brought about by the influx of migrants from abroad into peripheral areas. We propose that guidance for studying these phenomena can come from two recent theoretical developments in linguistics, the usage-based approach and the interactional turn, and their accompanying methodological innovations. The usage-based approach to language knowledge, which holds that a speaker’s linguistic competence is based on his active use of and passive exposure to linguistic forms, provides a principled basis for variation in language, and reconciles sociolinguistics and theoretical linguistics (Bybee 2002; 2010, Geeraerts et al. 2010). The interactional turn in sociolinguistics has demonstrated that variation can be understood better if linguistic and other behavioral choices are analyzed in the context of their interactional production (Eckert 2003, Jaspers 2005). Importing these theoretical and methodological perspectives into dialectological research makes possible improved description and explanation of the three empirical phenomena mentioned above.

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2 Empirical effects of globalization on dialects In the past, dialectology has provided linguistics with detailed information about the differences between geographically contained varieties of a language. A more sociolinguistic perspective was taken in when dialect loss and leveling, dialect contact and mixing, dialect convergence and divergence became central topics (Hinskens, Auer & Kerswill 2005). However, the three developments introduced in Section 1 have changed the empirical situation further, and make a new empirical, theoretical and methodological overhaul of dialectology desirable. 229

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First, the primary development in European dialects is a move towards regional rather than strictly local varieties. Local dialects are in decline and they develop into regional varieties all over Northern and Western Europe (Røyneland 2009: 18). Globalization and urbanization have led to increased physical and psychological mobility, the effect of which has been to break down the strict locality of social networks. Few people’s lives are still limited to the dialect heartland. Many people move from one village to another, or to a local city, and both socio-economically and culturally, they participate in national and international communities. In addition, immigration of speakers of other dialects and languages, as well as in general widespread exposure to the standard language, have resulted in more intense language contact than ever before. This has produced a leveling of the differences between local varieties, and gradual convergence to the national standard. Regionalization results in a reduction of intersystemic variation, but intrasystemically the degree of variation may in fact increase because people choose their linguistic variants from a larger repertoire. Variation is now found at a somewhat higher level of granularity. As a result, strictly local forms of speech are fading (described as the loss of the so-called ‘primary’ features that are specific to only a small part of the region, cf. Hinskens 1986). Linguistic convergence to the various standard varieties progresses at different rates, depending on geographic, socio-cultural and socio-economic factors (cf. Auer 2005). Furthermore, dialect loss does not always imply replacing dialect forms by standard forms. Other, more prestigious, dialects, as well as urban vernaculars and ethnic varieties also influence dialect change (Britain 2009: 137-149). Second, the increased use of social media, particularly Internet forums, mobile phones, text messaging and social networking sites, has given dialects new modes of expression (Warschauer et al. 2002). The modern means of communication witness freer use of the dialects in writing, and therefore assist in breaking down the diglossic dichotomy between a written national standard and a spoken local dialect. Writing is by its very nature more sensitive to normativity than speaking, so that the domain enlargement, while positive for the status of dialect, might also subject it to some degree of grassroots standardization. While language use on social media and in other online environments has been the subject of investigation in various domains of linguistics and communication studies, its role in dialect revitalization needs more attention (Vandekerckhove 2009). Finally, migration from abroad has turned the countryside into a much more heterogeneous social landscape. People’s social networks contain contacts in a wider range of places than just one’s hometown, or even the wider dialect-speaking region. High mobility and easy long-distance communication combine to produce a situation of superdiversity (e.g. Vertovec 2007), so far associated almost exclusively with urban areas. Cities in Western Europe and elsewhere have seen an influx of long-term and temporary migrants from all over the world. As a result, many sociolinguists abandon the rather rigid toolkit of speech communities, ethnolects and mother tongues in favor of notions of (truncated) linguistic repertoires and resources that better capture the plurality of styles, registers and genres. These are simultaneously picked up and used in superdiverse environments and life trajectories (Blommaert & Rampton 2011), and lead to linguistic varieties that are hybrid and difficult to categorize. The concept of the fixed language system is rendered increasingly problematic (Blommaert & Backus 2011, Eckert 2008, Jaspers 2008), as language varieties are increasingly viewed as flexible and fluid systems. Language choice patterns 230

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consist of sets of linguistic features that may be ascribed to different ‘languages’ (polylingual languaging, Møller & Jørgensen 2009). People use linguistic features to portray themselves as belonging to particular groups in society, relying on the fact that linguistic variation indexes wider social and cultural structures (Silverstein 2004). The most commonly discussed linguistic consequence of superdiversity is the emergence, also in The Netherlands, of urban linguistic varieties used by young people of various ethnic backgrounds (Tertilt 1996, Keim 2007, Quist 2008, Cornips & De Rooij 2013 etc.). These varieties generally go by the name multi-ethnolects; in the Dutch context it has also been dubbed straattaal (‘street talk’). Such varieties generally contain elements from different immigrant languages, but by and large function as a young urban vernacular variety of the majority language. So far, superdiversity and multi-ethnolects have been studied exclusively, as far as we know, in urban areas. Superdiversity affects the countryside too, however, though it remains to be seen how it affects it, whether there are qualitative differences with the effects it has in urban settings. The heterogeneity of the rural population will probably play a reinforcing role in the drive towards regiolects, as newcomers participate in the globalization of the countryside, yet at the same time also join the original locals in stemming the drive towards full assimilation to the national identity, and therefore assist in the development of a new regional identity. Preliminary reports indicate that migrants influence the local linguistic situation in, e.g., Noord-Brabant (Mutsaers & Swanenberg 2012). Some of the peripheral areas have seen diglossia give way to diaglossia (in between the two poles of local dialects versus Standard Dutch a continuum of intermediate varieties has evolved), whereas in other areas maintenance of local dialects seems more successful (Auer 2005). Concurrently reconsideration of regional values is on its way in The Netherlands, which also reflects inquisitiveness for cultural expressions that reside in the regional language varieties. In this process of revaluation, language use with dialect features becomes more visible in modern society. This should not be approached as an isolated linguistic process in terms of dialect renaissance, but rather as a cultural process (Cornips et al. 2012). The countryside is integrated more in the national culture and partakes in the same globalization-induced developments as urban centers. Its peripheral nature causes some unique features as well, though, as in addition to its unifying tendencies globalization also evokes the counter-reaction known as glocalization. Focus on the importance of locality may seem paradoxical in times of globalization. The local aspect of glocalization, however, not only refers to spatially restricted localities but also to the people that are part of that locality, their way of living, values and attitudes. Therefore the paradox is only apparent. Globalization, the spatial compression of our world, implies the linking of localities. Global culture is composed of an intertwining of many different local cultures (Robertson 1995, Hinskens, Auer & Kerswill 2005: 36). The presence of different cultures in a locality gives rise to a renewed interest in the original culture of that locality.

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3 New methods in dialectology Guidance comes mainly from two recent theoretical developments in linguistics, with accompanying methodological innovations. The first theoretical anchor is the usagebased approach to language knowledge. Contrary to generative approaches, usage-based 231

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approaches hypothesize that all linguistic knowledge is stored in the brain on the basis of language use, both in the sense of active use and of passive exposure. Innate cognitive mechanisms help organize this knowledge, but the inventory of linguistic elements that get stored is completely dependent on usage. This means that people whose lives are different will store different linguistic elements. While much of linguistics has been focusing on universals, this approach puts emphasis on differences. In turn, this makes it well suited to theorizing about what the similarities and differences between the linguistic knowledge of individual people in the superdiverse contexts in which polylingual varieties are used. The growing availability of corpus technology makes it imperative to go beyond the traditional means of dialectological data collection, and build large-scale databases of spoken everyday conversation (speech as well as digital writing), and analyze these using corpus-linguistic tools (cf. Jacobi 2009). Data collection in dialectology needs to go beyond traditional methods, such as written questionnaires that elicit the local translations of a standard set of stimulus sentences. The interactional turn in sociolinguistics, the second theoretical anchor, is important for the growing realization in sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology that a true understanding of language variation requires the analysis of linguistic variation in the light of wider cultural variation, as choices in language use are seen to go together with choices in other aspects of behavior. Ethnography is the method of choice in this tradition, as it allows for better understanding of the choices people make in the communicative settings they engage in. Ethnographic studies in interactional sociolinguistics have shown that language variation does not just reflect geographic patterns of distribution, nor broad social categories such as social class, gender and age. Speakers are sensitive to all manner of socio-cultural categorization, and use aspects of cultural behavior, including language, to express identities and claim (or reject) membership in particular groups. Identity issues are shown to be the engine of change, as they are implicated in many of the communicative choices that people make on a day-to-day basis. However, it has become increasingly clear that a purely linguistic focus would limit the descriptive adequacy of sociolinguistic research, as the identity-marking function that linguistic choices fulfil is also served by other stylistic markers, such as media use, dress, leisure activities, religion, folklore, music preferences, opinions, etc; all these contribute to the structure of groups and networks (Eckert 2003, Mendoza-Denton 2008). Linguistic and cultural choices combine to index the many different sub-identities people assume at any given moment, a situation caused by the fact that we belong to many different sub-communities, defined by important aspects of our lives such as family, work, friendship and hobbies. Our sociolinguistic life is divided up into various communities of practice. For urban settings, it has been demonstrated that globalised neighbourhoods appear chaotic, and common assumptions about the national, regional, ethnic, cultural or linguistic status of the inhabitants often prove to hide the complexity (Blommaert and Dong 2007: 8). As the urban-rural opposition is replaced by a continuum between city and countryside, it is natural to expect that the linguistic repertoires of residents in the formerly rural communities take on features typically associated with the fragmented urban lifestyles. Quist (2008) emphasizes that it is necessary for sociolinguists to adopt both a language variety perspective and a stylistic practice perspective on any kind of language variety. The variety perspective asks for a formal description of a set of linguistic features. This is needed 232

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to describe and analyse linguistic variation and change in a speech community, and paves the way for the systematic analysis of social structures and dynamics that we focus on via the stylistic practice perspective. The stylistic practice perspective aims at studying language varieties “in more holistic terms as part of a broad range of stylistic repertoires in a local community of practice” (Quist 2008: 43). Its goal is to understand linguistic practices and their social meaning. Speech is analyzed within a local system of semiotic contrasts in a local community of practice. Style in this context is a cluster of social and cultural, including linguistic, features. Style clusters are dynamic feature sets that give an impression of one’s identity, adapted to a specific situation and context (features may even be adapted during a conversation). Consider the following example of two clusters, based on research data from secondary education students in ‘s-Hertogenbosch and Mill (Noord-Brabant). (1) two clusters of social and cultural (incl. linguistic) features (from Swanenberg 2011) location: ‘urban’ ‘rural’ origin: Turkish Dutch religion: muslim catholic (no practice) lect: regio-/multiethno- regio-, Dutch slang music: R&B, hiphop (‘farmer music’) rock sports: kickboxing fishing, motocross leisure: running pc, tinkering The variety perspective implies examining language use and variation with the objective of describing new emerging varieties. The following conversational sample contains lexical insertion and phonological features from Morrocan Arabic and Moroccan flavoured Dutch (Nortier & Dorleijn 2008), although the speaker is of Turkish decent. (2) Conversation at a high school in ‘s Hertogenbosch (Male student NES is born in ‘s-Hertogenbosch from Turkish parents; he calls his friend anonymously; TEL stands for the person at the other end of the line) (from Mutsaers & Swanenberg 2012) *NES: ewa koelie hey carrier1 *NES: ewa dreri hoe izzie? hey boy(s) how is he? ‘hey boy, how are you? *TEL: xxx *NES: oh God jongûh oh God boy *NES: eeh gabbûh hoe izzie jongûh dreri? eeh lad how is he boy boy(s)? ‘hey lad, how are you, boy?’ 1  Koelie is a term that was used to address wage slaves in the former Dutch East Indies and is still current as a pejorative term used by Surinam Creoles to ridicule Surinam Hindustanis (www.etymologiebank.nl)

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*TEL: xxx *NES: ikke? me? *NES: ik ben je maat jongûh I am your mate boy *TEL: xxx *NES: radûh raad raad wie ik ben guessing guess guess who I am ‘guess my name’ Adolescent speech in ‘s-Hertogenbosch shows the influences of globalization and cultural diversity, mixing regiolects, the traditional city dialect and a street language with a Moroccan accent, and lexical items from Arabic, Spanish, Malay and Sranan Tongo. It represents that the traditional local varieties and regiolects still have a role to play, but as part of a larger style cluster. The ‘s-Hertogenbosch students experiment with various modes and degrees of polylingual languaging, since “a feature pool available in linguistically diverse contexts can support something like a feature pond: a rich ecology of connected and interacting elements that form a system in its own standing” (Wiese 2013).

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4 Concluding remarks Overall, the paper aims at giving new content and context to theoretical frameworks for language variation and identity construction. Approaching languages and communities of practice as fluid rather than fixed, applying recent theoretical perspectives on linguistic and identity repertoires (Blommaert et al. 2005, Møller & Jørgensen 2009), the considerations we have sketched are designed to help dialectology enter the era of globalization and superdiversity. Detailed description of the geographic variation of linguistic features (the traditional remit of dialectology) remains necessary, as the heterogeneity of language concerns not only social and cultural variation but also geographic variation. Dialectological research is also needed to investigate the origins of regional features: which characteristics come from which local dialects? A usage-based approach that takes differentiation between social styles and communicative settings into consideration requires new efforts to build corpora of non-elicited conversations in regional speech, both real-life and digital, to see what features are common and which ones are not. At the same time, since language behavior is interactional, it also needs to be described and analyzed as an element of social and cultural behavior, which calls for a holistic ethnographic methodology (cf. Eckert 2003), preferably one that takes local language attitudes and ideologies into account. Through linguistic behavior, speakers convey their language ideology. Ideologies thus construct the link between linguistic forms and social phenomena. This is markedly different from how media, teachers, and linguists view language use (Androutsopoulos 2010). Implementing our ideas would make possible the connection between Cognitive Linguistics and Interactional Sociolinguistics that Geeraerts & Kristiansen (forthcoming) consider an urgent task.

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