Language Islands Worldwide – Theoretical and Methodological Issues: What Can We Learn from Language Island Research?

Abstract

What can we learn from language island research? Answers drawn from German language island research refer to linguistics, ethnology and language politics. German language islands in Russia and Brazil are on the way to language shift. The varieties of these communities display varying degrees of decomposition and simplification in terms of morphology. Regular and irregular morphology are developing differently. How could these differences be explained? What is the impact of language contact? To what extent does variation within language change depend on the distinctiveness of this linguistic community? The contribution is about comparative language island research, relating linguistic results to the ethnographic background and the conditions of language politics.