(l) as a sociolinguistic variable in Francoprovençal

Abstract

This article argues for (l) as a sociolinguistic variable in Francoprovençal: (l) refers to variable palatalisation of /l/ in obstruent+lateral onset clusters (/kl, ɡl, pl, bl, fl/), a feature that has long been the subject of metalinguistic commentary, but no systematic analysis. Our data, which come from a larger study of Francoprovençal (FP), show significant intraspeaker variation. Sociolinguistic interviews were carried out in the Lyonnais region of France among 21 FP speakers with different acquisition routes. /l/-palatalisation is far from categorical in our sample, with increased rates of the French variant [l] over the traditional [j] variant. We interpret these data as contact-induced change: phonological leveling is underway, with convergence towards French. These findings are consistent with the language death literature, and are now widely reported in the context of other minority varieties spoken in the Hexagon. Conversely, some

New speakers: Challenges and opportunities for variationist sociolinguistics

“…Analogous observations have been made most recently by Kasstan and Müller (), who examine production data among new speakers of Francoprovençal – a severely endangered language spoke in parts of France, Switzerland, and Italy. While native speakers broadly evidenced phonological levelling of palatalised lateral approximants in obstruent + lateral onset clusters (a feature of Francoprovençal, but not of Standard French), the data revealed that new speakers can style‐shift between highly localised dialectal variants and pan‐regional variants in sociolinguistic interviews, with very limited linguistic competency.…”

“…That said, a social network analysis can still be operationalised to fit the relevant research questions for new‐speaker studies. In particular, the absence of an overtly prestigious norm presents at least one important research question: if – as has been proposed above – new speakers are agents of change, then are they responsible for the diffusion of new vernacular forms in their communities, as suggested by Jaffe () and Kasstan and Müller ()? Do these new forms then penetrate native‐speaker networks?…”

“…Indeed, in recent years, an increasing number of papers in typologically dissimilar contexts have revealed many common themes and findings. New‐speaker studies are now available on Baseldytsch (Del Percio, ), Belarusian (Woolhiser, ), Catalan (Frekko, ; Pujolar & Puigdevall, ), Cornish (Sayers, ; Sayers & Renkó‐Michelsén, ), Corsican (Jaffe, ), Francoprovençal (Bichurina, ; Kasstan, ; Kasstan & Müller, ), Galician (O'Rourke & Ramallo, ; Tomé Lourido and Evans, ; ), Giernesiei and Jèrriais (Sallabank & Marquis, ; Wilson, Johnson, & Sallabank, ), Irish (Walsh, , O'Rourke & Walsh, ), Lemko (Hornsby, ), Louisiana Creole (Mayeux, ), Manx (Ó hIfearnáin, ), Occitan (Costa, ), Scottish Gaelic (McLeod & O'Rourke, ; Nance, ; Nance et al, ), Welsh (Morris, ; Robert, ), Western Armenian (Manoukian, ), and Yiddish (Hornsby, ). Owing to the observations set out above that new speakers are frequently characterised as employing linguistic variants that differ from traditional norms, it is surprising that so few studies have made use of quantitative variationist methods to better understand the social significance of this variation, or to connect variation in production with broader questions of linguistic diffusion and change.…”

“…Studies such as these clearly illustrate the potential of bridging research on new speakers with variationist sociolinguistic theory, in order to illustrate the social significance of linguistic variation in (severely) endangered‐language communities, and the parallels that can be drawn with the broader variationist work on English and other dominant languages. New speaker studies also have much to offer the variationist literature on stylisation of speech, and, on the basis of the observations made by Tomé Lourido and Evans (; ), Nance et al, , and Kasstan and Müller (), it seems possible to conceive of new speakers as agents of sociolinguistic change in variationist terms. It will next be argued that a social network analysis can offer a fruitful case study for understanding the social mechanisms that underpin this variation.…”

The role of linguistic ideologies in language contact situations

“…A pointed investigation into how the “negotiation, debate, contestation and appropriation” of these ideologies (Costa et al, , p. 12) are linked to the emergence of new forms of linguistic variation (including those that are contact induced) has powerful potential to help us better understand how hegemonic discourses are “re‐signified, reindexicalized [and] re‐imagined” (Gal, , p. 238), as well as how they lead to various forms of language contact. Though a few advancements on the study of new speaker contact outcomes have been made (Kasstan, ; Kasstan & Müller, ; Kennard, ; Lantto, , ; Nance, ; Rodríguez‐Ordóñez, , in press), future work on new speakers' linguistic practices is essential as we continue to theorize about how multilinguals linguistically mediate among their socio‐political structures and in‐the‐moment interactional contexts as they navigate sociolinguistics reality and continually construct their individualized notions of “speakerhood.”…”