Geolinguistic structures of dialect phonology in the German-speaking Alpine region: A dialectometric approach using crowdsourcing data

Abstract

The Alpine region stands out in the German-speaking world for its well-preserved traditional dialects, which continue to play a significant role in daily life. However, the vast geographical range of the Alpine region and the limitations imposed by national and regional borders have hindered comprehensive investigations of the entire Alpine area. To overcome these obstacles, this study utilizes crowdsourcing data from the VerbaAlpina project to investigate phonological and morpho-phonological variation in the German-speaking Alpine region. Although the data were collected in a written form and with a focus on lexical variation, it is shown that the data contain detailed phonological information. By using multivariate dialectometric measurements (i.e. factor analysis [FA]) based on 19 (morpho-)phonological variables (comprising 8,582 tokens), the study explores the geolinguistic structures of the German dialects in the Alpine region. The results confirm, on a general level, the validity of the traditionally established dialect classification. However, the findings also reveal previously underrated border effects, in particular for Bavarian dialects along the German-Austrian border, which are argued to be the outcome of divergence processes. Hence, the study highlights the importance of cross-dialectal and cross-national perspectives in understanding dialect variation and emphasizes the value of crowdsourcing data for dialectological research.