Everything about The Ausbausprache - Abstandsprache - Dachsprache totally explained
The
Ausbausprache - Abstandsprache - Dachsprache framework is a tool developed by
sociolinguists for analysing and categorising the status of language
varieties along the between
autonomous languages on the one hand and
dialects on the other. The terms were coined by
Heinz Kloss (1967). They are designed to capture the idea that there are two separate and largely independent sets of criteria and arguments for calling a variety an independent "language" rather than a "dialect": the one based on its social functions, and the other based on its objective structural properties.
Terminology
Ausbausprache may be translated literally as 'upgrade language', although
Heinz Kloss describes it as "language by development",
Abstandsprache as 'distance language' and
Dachsprache as 'umbrella language' (literally: 'roof language'). The terms are often rendered with the qualifier untranslated in English, as
ausbau language and
abstand language.
Ausbausprache
A variety is called an
ausbau language if it's used autonomously with respect to other related languages. This typically means that it has its own standardized form independent of neighbouring standard languages. This often involves being taught in schools, and being used as a written language in a wide variety of functions, possibly including that of an official national language. In contrast, varieties that are not
ausbau languages are those that are only spoken and typically only used in private contexts.
Abstandsprache
A variety is called an
abstand language in relation to another language if both are so different from each other that the one can't be considered a dialect of the other. This criterion deals with objective structural properties of the language systems. The framework doesn't in itself specify exactly how "distance" is to be measured objectively. An often used, but debated criterion is
mutual intelligibility. A typical example of an abstand language is
Basque with respect to
Spanish. Abstandsprachen may be deemphasized in languages where the dachsprache has a long written tradition. There is for example, a great deal of abstand between
Standard Arabic and Egyptian Colloquial and between
Mandarin and
Cantonese as well as
Shanghainese.
Interrelation of Ausbausprache and Abstandsprache
A language may be an
abstand language without being an
ausbau language. This is often the case with minority languages used within a larger nation state, where the minority language is used only in private and all official functions are performed in the majority language. On the other hand, a language may be an
ausbau language even when it has relatively little
abstand from its neighbours. Examples are the Scandinavian languages
Danish,
Swedish and
Norwegian, which are mutually intelligible to a large degree but nevertheless constitute three separate languages on criteria of
ausbau. The concept of
ausbau is particularly important in cases where the local spoken varieties across a larger region form a dialect continuum. In such cases, the question of where the one language ends and the other starts is often a question more of
ausbau than of
abstand. For instance, the
Low German dialects of
Dutch and
German on some sides of the Dutch-German border are similar, with both languages merging to some degree; nevertheless, on the level of the
ausbau standard languages Dutch and German clearly constitute two separate languages. In some instances,
ausbau languages have been created out of dialects for purposes of
nation building. This applies for instance to
Luxembourgish vis-a-vis German, or to
Macedonian vis-a-vis Bulgarian. Other examples of
ausbau languages are
Persian of Iran and Afghanistan (
cf. Dari),
Serbian and
Croatian,
Dutch and
Afrikaans,
Malay and
Indonesian and to some extent
Hindi and
Urdu,
Tamil and
Malayalam.
Dachsprache
Dachsprache means a
language form that serves as
standard language for different
dialects, mostly in a
dialect continuum, even though these dialects may be so different that mutual intelligibility isn't possible on the
basilectal level between all dialects, particularly those separated by significant geographical distance. In
1982, "Rumantsch Grischun" was developed by
Heinrich Schmid as such a Dachsprache for a number of quite different
Romansh language forms spoken in parts of
Switzerland. Similarly,
Euskara Batua (Standard Basque) and the
Southern Quechua literary standard were both developed as standard languages for dialect continua that had historically been thought of as discrete languages with many dialects and no "official" dialect.
Standard German and
standard Italian to some extent function in the same way. Perhaps the most widely used Dachsprache is
Modern Standard Arabic, which links together the speakers of many different, often mutually unintelligible
Arabic dialects.
Kloss has also used the term
pseudo-dialectized abstand language for cases where a variety is so different from its
Dachsprache that it ought to be regarded as a separate language on
abstand grounds, but is nevertheless treated more like a dialect in social practice. Examples include
Low German vis-a-vis (High) German,
Sardinian vis-a-vis Italian,
Occitan vis-a-vis French,
Cantonese vis-a-vis Mandarin or
Maithili vis-a-vis Hindi.
Change of roles during history
There are several instances of languages, and language pairs, which have undergone role changes during history.
Low German for instance was both ausbau language and dachsprache of few thousand local dialects in the Netherlands, in North, Central, and former East Germany (today Northern Poland) and in parts of the baltic states and their former German (nowadays Russian) vincinity. With the end of the
Hanse, Low German lost its state as an official language to a large degree. Approximately at the same time Dutch started to replace Low German as a dachsprache of the Low German dialects in the Netherland which form todays
Nedersaksisch group, and most Central German dialects went under the umbrella of the evolving
High German. Only parts of Northern Germany kept Low German, while it mainly dissappeared from the East rim of the Baltic Sea. Today, Low German has become a group of dialects of German under the dachsprache
Standard German to a large degree. Geographically distant Low German varieties, if they survived at all, have often become abstandsprachen of one another. Although widely referred to as dialects by the public, West Central German languages such as Kölsch,
Palatinate German,
Luxemburgish, et al, linguistically are quite distant from Standard German, but with the recent exception of Luxemburgish, are not ausbau languages.
Further Information
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