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In:Processes of Change: Studies in Late Modern and Present-Day English
Edited by Sandra Jansen and Lucia Siebers
[Studies in Language Variation 21] 2019
► pp. 115–138

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Chapter 7
Early immigrant English

Midwestern English before the dust settled

Published online: 13 August 2019
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/silv.21.07lit
We explore the development of final obstruent neutralization (German Bad ‘bath’: /ba:d/ = [ba:t]) and other features of an emerging Wisconsin English variety that has been shaped by contact, while considering multiple factors such as input, contact, and influence from other varieties. We draw our data from immigrant letters and supplement these with what is known about education and language guides available to early immigrants, as well as contact with other language varieties and dialects. Through time and over remarkably heterogeneous varieties of English and German, we trace the presence of this feature in German and English, where it has been transformed.
Article outline
  • 0.Introduction
  • 1.Context
  • 2.The twisted path of one innovation and the possible role of education
  • 3.The broader picture: English dialect features in immigrant letters
    • 3.1The Asbach letters
    • 3.2Sophia Goth’s English letter: Excerpts
    • 3.3Fred Volkmann English letter: Excerpts
  • 4.Feature analysis
    • 4.1Transitional nonnative features
    • 4.2Enduring but less directly structural features
    • 4.3Ambiguous features
    • 4.4Possible dialectal American English-origin patterns
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgments
  • Notes
  • References
References (50)
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Cited by (3)

Cited by three other publications

Purnell, Thomas
2025. US English, Midwestern Varieties. In The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of World Englishes, ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Litty, Samantha M.
2024. Language dominance across the lifespan in Wisconsin German and English varieties. In Lifespan Acquisition and Language Change [Advances in Historical Sociolinguistics, 14], ► pp. 234 ff. DOI logo
Salmons, Joseph & Miranda E. Wilkerson
2019. English in German-Speaking Wisconsin and the Aftermath. In English in the German-Speaking World, ► pp. 361 ff. DOI logo

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