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Tapping into German Adjective Variation: A Variationist Sociolinguistic Approach

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 February 2022

James M. Stratton
James M. Stratton*
Affiliation:
Purdue University
*
Department of Linguistics, Purdue University, 640 Oval Drive, West Lafayette, West Lafayette, IN, 47906, USA [[email protected]]
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Abstract

Following the Labovian paradigm, the present study uses variationist quantitative methods to examine the linguistic and social factors influencing adjective choices in German. By focusing on adjectives of positive evaluation (such as cool ‘cool’, toll/geil ‘great’), an analysis of over 3,000 tokens reveals that the choice of using one adjective over a competing counterpart is structured systematically. This choice is heavily constrained by the social factor age, with gender also influencing variation to varying degrees. The syntactic position of the adjective also conditions use, with some adjectives favoring predicative position and others favoring attributive or stand-alone position. Comparisons across apparent time, as well as with previous research, indicate that the semantic field of positive evaluation is a perpetually changing locus of variation. By applying variationist methods to German data, the present study illustrates how German lexis can index social meaning, paving the way for future research on German lexical variation. More broadly speaking, this study also contributes to ongoing variationist sociolinguistic research on German language variation and change.*

Keywords

variationist sociolinguisticsGerman languageadjectivespositive evaluationsocial correlateslexical variation
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Germanic Linguistics , Volume 34 , Issue 1 , March 2022 , pp. 63 - 102
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Copyright
© Society for Germanic Linguistics 2022

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Footnotes

*

The author would like to thank several people for their comments on this paper. First, he would like to thank Katharina Pabst, Sali Tagliamonte, and Jochen Matthies. Second, he would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers of the Journal of Germanic Linguistics. Third, he would like to thank Thomas Schmidt for his consultation regarding the FOLK design.

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