Ghyselen Anne-Sophie, De Vogelaer Gunther
Research Centre for Multilingual Practices and Language Learning in Society, Department of Linguistics, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
Institut für Niederländische Philologie, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Münster, Germany.
Front Psychol. 2018 Mar 26;9:385. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00385. eCollection 2018.
One centennial discussion in linguistics concerns whether languages, or linguistic systems, are, essentially, homogeneous or rather show "structured heterogeneity." In this contribution, the question is addressed whether and how sociolinguistically defined systems (or 'varieties') are to be distinguished in a heterogeneous linguistic landscape: to what extent can structure be found in the myriads of language variants heard in everyday language use? We first elaborate on the theoretical importance of this 'variety question' by relating it to current approaches from, among others, generative linguistics (competing grammars), sociolinguistics (style-shifting, polylanguaging), and cognitive linguistics (prototype theory). Possible criteria for defining and detecting varieties are introduced, which are subsequently tested empirically, using a self-compiled corpus of spoken Dutch in West Flanders (Belgium). This empirical study demonstrates that the speech repertoire of the studied West Flemish speakers consists of four varieties, viz. a fairly stable dialect variety, a more or less virtual standard Dutch variety, and two intermediate varieties, which we will label 'cleaned-up dialect' and 'substandard.' On the methodological level, this case-study underscores the importance of speech corpora comprising both inter- and intra-speaker variation on the one hand, and the merits of triangulating qualitative and quantitative approaches on the other.
语言学界的一场百年讨论聚焦于语言或语言系统本质上是同质的，还是呈现出“结构化异质性”。在本文中，探讨的问题是，在异质的语言格局中，社会语言学定义的系统（或“变体”）能否以及如何被区分：在日常语言使用中听到的无数语言变体中，能在多大程度上发现结构？我们首先通过将其与生成语言学（竞争语法）、社会语言学（风格转换、多语使用）和认知语言学（原型理论）等当前方法相关联，阐述这个“变体问题”的理论重要性。介绍了定义和检测变体的可能标准，随后使用自行编纂的比利时西佛兰德省荷兰语口语语料库对这些标准进行实证检验。这项实证研究表明，所研究的西佛兰德语使用者的言语库由四种变体组成，即一种相当稳定的方言变体、一种或多或少虚拟的标准荷兰语变体，以及两种中间变体，我们将其标记为“净化方言”和“非标准语”。在方法论层面，这个案例研究一方面强调了包含说话者之间和说话者内部变异的言语语料库的重要性，另一方面强调了将定性和定量方法相结合的优点。
