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From: EURMXK@MVS.sas.com
Subject: Re: Dialect or Language?difference=???
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Message-ID: <19941130085729EURMXK@MVS.sas.com>
Date: Wed, 30 Nov 1994 13:57:00 GMT
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In article <kjp1003-281194103748@pc1004.sidg.pwf.cam.ac.uk>,
kjp1003@hermes.cam.ac.uk () writes:
 
>In article <Cztq12.H64@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>, iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A
>Derzhanski) wrote:
>
>> In article <kjp1003-251194105334@pc1003.sidg.pwf.cam.ac.uk> kjp1003@hermes.cam.ac.uk () writes:
>
>> >'Dialects' and 'languages' are so called for geographical/political
>> >reasons, e.g. Holland and Germany want to regard themselves as
>> >diferent countries.
>>
>> That doesn't always work.  Austria and Germany are different
>> countries, too, yet there is no separate Austrian language.
>>
>That's exactly my point - the definition is difficult because each case is
>different - the reasons are arbitrary. As for Austria and Germany then,
>they want to be viewed as different countries (unsurprising given recent
>history), whether or not the language they speak is ARBITRARILY designated
>one language. Interestingly Austrians pride themselves on using dialectal
>features that set them apart from German nationals.
>
>Kimberley Parsons,
>Dept of Linguistics, University of Cambridge
 
But this is true for any German dialect. Each of those has features
that set them apart from neighbouring ones. Austrian dialects are
close to Bavarian, except for the variety spoken in Vorarlberg which
is closer to the neighbouring Swiss dialects than to the Austrian
ones.
Austrian German as used in newspapers, TV, literature is just a variety
of German; the lexical differences (Austrizisms) are minimal (about 2%
of the overall German vocabulary).
 
A definition is still difficult.
I wonder whether the terms "Abstandsprache" (abstand language) and
"Ausbausprache" (ausbau language) introduced by H. Kloss might
be helpful here. (Cf. Kloss, "Abstand Languages" and "Ausbau
LAnguages", in: Anthropological Linguistics 9 (1967), pp. 29-41.).
Abstand languages are different in their grammatical structure, etc.;
ausbau languages are languages used as official means of communication.
English and German are both abstand and ausbau languages. German and
Luxemburgian ("Letzeburgisch") aren't abstand languages, but
both are (Letzeburgisch to some extent at least) ausbau languages.
H. Haarmann calls Luxemburgian a "Kulturdialekt", i.e., a dialect
which has been developed into an official means of communication.
The same relationship as between German and Luxemburgian applies
to Portuguese and Galician, Romanian and Moldavian, Spanish and
Ladino, for instance.
 
Regards, 
M. Kiefer
