Stefan Dollinger, Full Professor of English Linguistics at UBC Vancouver, specialising in sociolinguistics, historical linguistics, and dialectology. Stefan Dollinger is also the recipient of one of the first ASciNA Awards in 2008.
25 August 2021, 10 AM PT, 1 PM ET, 19:00 MESZ
Sprechen wir Österreichisches Deutsch oder Deutsch in Österreich? Die Antwort ist eigentlich ganz klar, nur nicht in der Germanistik. Die Sachlage rollt nun neuerdings Dollingers Sachbuch auf nach dem Motto, wenn die Wissenschaft versagt, muss die Bevölkerung informiert werden. Und es funktionert: dieses sachliche, witzige und auch goscherte Buch zeigt nicht nur, wie man Steuermilliionen vergeuden kann, und zwar über Jahrzehnte, sondern vor allem warum man endlich, in der Germanistik, in der Lehrer:innenausbildung und in der Schule zum österreichischen Hochdeutsch stehen sollte, ohne Wenn und Aber und ganz ohne Minderwertigkeitskomplex. Der Erfolg des Buches, das bisher jeden Monat eine neue Auflage erfahren hat, gibt einem manchmal doch recht, sogar der Herr Bundespräsident gratulierte zum Buch. Nur die Germanistik sagt, in Review und Rezension, es hätte nicht publiziert werden dürfen.
Österreichisches Standarddeutsch — das, was Ascinat:innen sprechen bei Vorträgen, sofern ihr sie auf Deutsch hält — erlaubt eine Fallstudie, die zeigt, dass man ohne Theorie, auch in der Geisteswissenschaft, auf dem falschen Dampfer unterwegs ist und, auch ganz unvermittelt weil historisch verhaftet, man ohne Theorie auch unversehens deutsch-nationale Standpunkte vertritt, die so keine:r formulieren würde. Der Vortrag zeigt eingängig, warum nicht alles was Empirie sich auf die Fahnen schreibt, auch fortschrittlich sein muss, sondern, wie in unserem Fall, das neueste Aufwaschen von großdeutschen Ideen, die sich eben noch immer in der Sprache manifestieren.
Buch zum Thema:
Dollinger, Stefan. 2021. Österreichisches Deutsch oder Deutsch in Österreich? Identitäten im 21. Jahrhundert. Wien: new academic press. Inhalt und 1. Kapitel hier:
https://www.academia.edu/42767781/
Do we speak Austrian German or German in Austria? Though the answer is quite clear, German Studies would beg to differ. The case of “German” is synthesized in Dollingers new general-interest book [in German], which follows the logic if academia fails to produce results, the speakers of the varieties must be informed. The idea seems to be working, as this fact-based, funny, even cheeky book not only shows how *not* to use millions of public research funding these past few decades, but above all why the concept of a Standard Austrian German would finally need to be implemented in German Studies, teacher education and in Austrian schools without ands, ifs and but and free from linguistic inferiority complexes. The book’s success, going through three editions in as many months months, suggests that public success may be of relevance in the social sciences, underscored by a congratulatory note from the Austrian president Alexander van der Bellen.
The case of Austrian Standard German – which is what Ascinat-ians speak when they give lectures in German – shows that the Humanities and Social Sciences cannot work without theory and that, without social theory, one may drift off into historical and German-nationalist discourse, which otherwise would have little influence today. The lecture also shows how empirical approaches do not necessarily turn out to be “modern” or cutting-edge and that, on the contrary, grossdeutsch (German nationalist) ideas may manifest themselves in indirect ways today via the way how we conceptualize the German language.
Books on the topics:
Dollinger, Stefan. 2021. Österreichisches Deutsch oder Deutsch in Österreich? Identitäten im 21. Jahrhundert. Wien: new academic press. TOC and first chapter: https://www.academia.edu/42767781/
Dollinger, Stefan. 2019. The Pluricentricity Debate: On Austrian German and Other Germanic Standard Varieties. London: Routledge. TOC and first chapter: https://www.academia.edu/37714477/
Dollinger, Stefan. 2019. Debunking „pluri-areality“: on the pluricentric perspective of national varieties. Journal of Linguistic Geography 7:98-112. Online: https://www.academia.edu/38389481/
Stefan Dollinger is Full Professor of English Linguistics at UBC Vancouver, specializing in sociolinguistics, historical linguistics, and dialectology. The graduate of Vienna University’s Anglistik and Germanistik has held, before his Vancouver time, a Research Chair in Gothenburg, Sweden, and has researched in Kiel, Germany, Toronto, Canada, and is affiliate at UVic Linguistics in Victoria, BC. The author of more than 70 articles and field-specific contributions, has written a number of books, including The Written Questionnaire in Social Dialectology (Benjamins, 2016), Creating Canadian English (Cambridge UP, 2019), The Pluricentricity Debate: On Austrian German and Other Germanic Standard Varieties (Routledge, 2019) and, for the first time in German, Austrian German or German in Austria: Identities in the 21st Century (new academic press, 2021, in German). He is editor-in-chief of the second edition of A Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles (UBC, 2017; www.dchp.ca/dchp2). In 2008, we received the first Ascina-Award and he is most happy to return to Ascina with a talk today.
ASciNA Pacific Northwest Chapter
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