Language death in the Isle of Man : an investigation into the decline and extinction of Manx Gaelic as a community language in the Isle of Man / George Broderick.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Broderick, George.

Contributor:

Broderick, George.

Series:

Linguistische Arbeiten (Max Niemeyer Verlag) ; 395.

Linguistische Arbeiten, 0344-6727 ; 395

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Manx language--History.

Manx language.

Manx language--Social aspects.

Language obsolescence--Isle of Man.

Language obsolescence.

Community life--Isle of Man.

Community life.

Isle of Man--Languages.

Isle of Man.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (316 pages) : maps

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Tubingen : Niemeyer, 1999.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Language death is an aspect of language contact which has occupied the interest of linguists from the past twenty-five years or so. Although the phenomenon of language death is occuring all over the world very few instances of it have been dealt with both from a sociolinguistic and formal linguistic standpoint. Those that spring to mind are the works of Nancy Dorian on East Sutherland Gaelic and Hans-Jürgen Sasse on the Albanian dialect of Arvanítika in Greece. In both instances it is dialects of languages that are treated and not complete languages themselves. The study of language death in the Isle of Man deals with the decline and extinction of Manx Gaelic as a community language, and as a language in its own right. After setting the scenario of language death this study then looks into the sociolinguistic reasons which led to the decline and death of Manx in Man. There then follows a detailed look into the study of language and language use in Man, from early observations to the present day. This section includes a detailed description of phonetic and sound recordings made of Manx over the period. This leads to an in-depth study into the formal linguistic situation of Manx, tracing the development in its phonology, morphophonology, morphology, morphosyntax and syntax, idiom and lexicon, which ultimately led to its demise. As language revival is in itself a facet of language death, the study concludes with a short excursus into the various efforts at language revival and maintenance in Man, from the latter part of the 19th century to the present day. The appendices include Professor Carl Marstrander's diary of his visits to Man (1929-33) published for the first time. The diary contains percipient observations of the state of Manx in its final phase. In short, this study looks in some detail into the mechanics of language death on a once thriving and vibrant community language.

Contents:

Front matter

1. Language death

2. The sociolinguistic situation of Manx

3. Studies on language and language use in Man

4. The formal linguistic development of Manx

5. Excursus: Language revival and language maintenance in the Isle of Man

Bibliography

Appendix A: Dagbok. Carl J. S. Marstrander's Diary of his visits to the Isle of Man 1929, 1930, and 1933 (translation and text)

Appendix B: Letters (1-5) for and against the use of Manx

Appendix C: Census figures for the towns and parishes 1726-1891

Appendix D: Maps

Appendix E: Texts

Index

Notes:

"This work is a continuation of A handbook of late spoken Manx, a work in three volumes"--P. x.

Includes "Dagbok" of C.J.S. Marstrander in Norwegian with a translation into English (p. 203-252).

The author's Habilitationsschrift--Universitat Mannheim, 1998.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [189]-201) and index.

Related Work:

Broderick, George. Handbook of late spoken Manx.

Contains:

Marstrander, Carl J. S. (Carl Johan Sverdrup), 1883-1965. Man dagbok. English & Norwegian

ISBN:

9783110911411

3110911418

OCLC:

843205762