Koine Formation and Society: A Sociolinguistic Study of Migration, Dialects, and Norms in Norwegian Industrial Towns

(Hardback)

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Massive in-migration to a new town leads to socio-cultural and linguistic contact andinevitably--change. Which linguistic features are preferred in the new dialect Why do these features prevail And how does language use in the wider society influence the local process Randi Neteland explores local and national conditions of koine formation in Koine Formation and Society, using three Norwegian industrial town dialects as main examples. The koine formation is characterized by a complex interplay between social and linguistic factors, such as in-migration rate, migrants social characteristics, housing conditions, social class distinctions, in-migrants dialect background, and linguistic distinctions among the varieties in contact. However, Neteland contextualizes the industrial towns within the larger society from which the in-migrants originate, and these case studies reveal to what extent the language use and norms for language use operating in the wider speech community can also influence the outcome of the koine formation. In Koine Formation and Society, Neteland explores how the social and linguistic factors work together and discusses determining factors and constraints on the local and national level.

Reviews

This is a comprehensive investigation of linguistic processes in industrial towns in Norway and indeed one of few sociolinguistic studies of Norwegian dialects written in English. Neteland provides a very detailed account of migration and language in three industrial towns using historical and contemporary data, and she offers new insight into the processes behind new dialect formation. I strongly recommend this book to researchers working on dialect contact. -- Eivind Torgersen, Norwegian University of Science and Technology
Randi Netelands highly original book is the first to tackle the theory of new-dialect formation by examining three new communities from a comparative perspective. Neteland has had access to linguistic materials dating back almost 100 years, and has even been able to re-record some people 30 years after they were originally interviewed. Neteland demonstrates that predicting what a new dialect will look like is much more than noting which dialects, and which dialect features, are in the `melting pot. We must also pay careful attention to the prior migration patterns of the people who eventually settled in these communities. -- Paul Kerswill, University of York

Author Bio

Randi Neteland is a postdoctoral researcher in Nordic Languages at the University of Bergen.