Dialect Change in Western Norway

(1)

– a comparative study of the project

Processes of Dialect Change

Lieke Maier

10534245

MA thesis (18 ECTS)

MA Language and Society

University of Amsterdam

August 2019

Supervisor: prof. dr. A.P. (Arjen) Versloot Second reader: prof. dr. P.P.G. (Paul) Boersma Number of words: 19.935

(2)

2

1. Introduction

Dialect change in Norway and especially the question in which direction the change is going has in the last decades been the subject of a number of books and studies, and the interest for this subject is still undiminished. In recent years, several dialects in Western Norway have been studied and analysed within a project called Dialektendringsprosessar, ‘Processes of Dialect Change’ with the aim to get a better insight into the actual changes in the Western Norwegian dialect area. In order to reach this goal, dialect studies have been carried out in places where a similar study was carried out a generation ago. The results from the two studies are compared to see how the dialects have

developed over these 30 years (Sandøy et al. 2007: 4).

The results of the studies within the Processes of Dialect Change-project serve as the source for this paper. In the present study it is not one particular dialect, but rather the complete set of results that are used to answer the following question: what is changing in the language use of speakers of Western Norwegian dialects? Do the same linguistic variables turn up in different dialect studies? Is the change happening at the same pace or are some dialects ahead in the process of change? The structure of the paper is as follows. First, a background is given on the development of

Norwegian dialects and important research that has been carried out, followed by a more extensive description of the project Processes of Dialect Change. Next, the hypotheses and predictions are presented, followed by the method that is used in this paper. As a consequence of using data from studies from the project, some methodological choices have already been made. The method elaborates on these methodological choices and how these issues are tackled. Then, the analysis is given, in which three categories are presented that each represent a different stage in the process of change of a linguistic variable. This chapter also raises the question on the direction of the changes within the dialects and the possible forces behind the changes. Lastly, discussion and conclusion complete the paper.

2. Background

In this chapter a background is given on the Norwegian dialects. Firstly, 2.1 discusses the history of the dialects and the classification of the different dialect areas. 2.2.1 expands on the dialect area that stands in focus for this thesis, namely Western Norwegian dialects. Then, in 2.2 some previous relevant dialect studies are mentioned before turning to the project Processes of Dialect Change in 2.3, followed by hypotheses and predictions in 2.4.

(4)

4

2.1 Dialect areas

It is difficult to put a number on how many dialects there are in Norway. From dialect to dialect there are no clear boundaries as to where one dialect stops and the other one begins. Single linguistic features have clearer isoglosses and are easier to define (Jahr 1990: 10). These isoglosses reflect the linguistic developments that affected the Norwegian language in the Middle Ages.

In the 13th_{century, Old Norwegian was more or less a homogeneous language, but around 1600 the} dialect areas were established as they currently still exist (Berg 2018: 165). Within a few hundred years, a number of far-reaching linguistic changes happened. In Old Norwegian there were already some geographical differences, mostly phonological, that were typical for Western or Eastern Norwegian. For example, consonant compounds were realized as mn, ft and fs in Eastern Norway (namn, eftir, refsing), and as fn, pt, and ps in Western Norway (nafn, eptir, repsing) (Berg 2018: 168). In the Middle Ages more considerable changes happened that affected the language structure at a deeper level. Most of the changes discussed below separate Eastern Norwegian from Western Norwegian.

Phonology

An important change that triggered many other developments is the quantity change. Old Norwegian had four possible stressed syllable combinations: a short vowel with a short consonant, a long vowel with a short consonant, a short vowel with a long consonant and a long vowel with a long consonant (VC, V:C, VC: and V:C:). In the quantity change, short syllables were lengthened and the overlong syllables were shortened, so that the options VC and V:C: disappeared. In general, in Western and Southern Norwegian the vowels were lengthened (V:C - /ve:t/) and in Northern and Eastern

Norwegian, and also in the Western Norwegian city Bergen, the consonants were lengthened (VC: - /vet:/), and in the most northern part of Norway, both options were possible (Berg 2018: 171). One development that is crucial in the division of eastern and western dialects is level stress. In Eastern Norwegian, disyllabic words with a short consonant in the root syllable were under the effect of level stress, with an even stress on both the root syllable and the ending syllable. Because of this, the ending vowel was maintained and could even be lengthened. Disyllabic words with initial stress reduced the ending vowel to -e, or had apocope. In most modern dialects, level stress is no longer effective, but it can be traced back in the endings of infinitive verb endings and weak feminine substantives. In two areas in Norway the ending vowel was reduced to -e, independently of stress patterns. This happened in Northwestern Norway and in Southern Norway, probably around 1400 (Berg 2018: 174). The ending vowel was reduced in Bergen as well, but already a few centuries

(5)

5 earlier. The dialects with a reduced ending vowel are called e-varieties (e-mål), and the dialects that retained the a-ending are called a-varieties (a-mål).

A number of other phonological changes happened during the Middle Ages that affected the quality of consonants. Palatalization of velar consonants before a front vowel affected all dialects (gera > /jera/, kenna > /ҫen:a/). Palatalization of velars could also be found in medial position but was less widespread than in initial position (Berg 2018: 180). Another type of palatalization is palatalization of alveolar consonants that is typical for trøndersk, but it is also found in the surrounding northwestern dialects, most of northern-Norwegian and the counties Hedmark and Oppland. Old Norse long l and n became palatalized in words such as ball > /baʎ:/ and mann > /maɲ:/ (Berg 2018: 180).

A sound that developed from Old Norse short /l/ is the thick l, a retroflex flap that is found in Eastern Norwegian, trøndersk, romsdalsk and most of Northern Norwegian. This is also a feature that divides Western and Eastern Norwegian (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 36).

Assimilation, a process in which two consonants become (more) alike (rl>ll, rn>nn, rs>ss, ld>ll, nd>nn, mb>mm), affected many dialects in the country. The opposite of assimilation, differentiation, in which two consonants become more unalike (rn>dn, rl>dl) is specific for southwestern dialects (Berg 2018: 175). Inside of the region that has differentiation, a smaller area also has segmentation, a process in which two identical consonants become two different consonants (nn>dn, ll>dl) (Berg 2018: 182).

Morphology

Old Norse had a four-case system with nominative, genitive, dative and accusative. Some dialects retained a functional case system with four cases up until the 16th_{century, but in most dialects the} simplification of the case system started in the 14th_{century (Berg 2018: 170). Firstly, in substantives,} the cases nominative and accusative merged. This resulted in another difference between East and West, since, in singular indefinite nouns, western dialects retained the nominative form and Eastern dialects retained the accusative form. Active use of genitive nouns had in the beginning of the 20th century already completely vanished as a productive case (Larsen 1906: 108) and can only be found following certain prepositions. The dative, however, was in the beginning of the 20th_{century still} full-fledged in certain dialects, but its use is currently decreasing (Skjekkeland 2005: 105).

(6)

6 Dialect areas

On the basis of some of the linguistic features discussed above, the dialects can be divided into several dialect areas. Linguists do not agree on how many dialect areas there are. There is consensus about the clear difference between eastern and western Norwegian dialects, but the difficulty lies in placing the northern dialects, since they have a lot in common with both eastern dialects and western dialects. Ivar Aasen (1864) was the first to make a dialect division. In his view, there was a western, an eastern and a northern dialect area. Aasen used level stress and thick l as criteria for separating west and east. The existence of apocope in the northern dialects was enough reason for Aasen to make a separate group for the northern dialects. At the end of the 18th_{century, a division} between Western and Eastern dialects became dominant among linguists. The first to introduce this two-way-division was Amund B. Larsen (1897), with the northern dialects as part of the western area, although he was careful in placing the northern dialects with either the west or the east, since the northern dialects have as many salient, important features in common with the western dialects as they do with the eastern dialects (Skjekkeland 2005: 150). According to the view of other linguists after him, the northern dialects were in this two-division best seen as part of the western dialect area, a view that stayed dominant until the mid-twentieth century (Skjekkeland 2005: 150). Up until that point, classification of Norwegian dialects remained based merely on the two criteria suggested by Aasen (1864): level stress as the most crucial one, and thick l as a second factor. Hallfrid Christiansen (1954) did not agree with using only two criteria and nor with placing the northern dialects together with the western dialects. Christiansen suggested that it did not make sense, geographically, to group the Northern dialects with the Western dialects. She proposed a division in four areas, made on the basis of a range of linguistic features such as apocope, tone and

palatalization of velar consonants in medial position (Skjekkeland 2005: 151). In the division in four areas, the northern area based on Aasen’s division is split up in two: trønder dialects and northern dialects. In a division in four areas, the borders more or less match the administrative and

geographical borders. An exception is Sørlandet, Southern Norway, which administratively is a separate area, but that is part of the western area in the dialect division.

In this thesis, ‘western Norwegian dialects’ indicates dialects in Western-Norway, using the division in four areas as proposed by Christiansen (1954), following Mæhlum & Røyneland (2012). And although there are key characteristics that group Western dialects together, they still differ on a number of grounds. Therefore, a background is given on the different subareas that exist in the group of western Norwegian dialects and the defining differences between them.

(7)

7

2.1.1 Western Norwegian

The western Norwegian dialect area can be divided in three sub-areas: northwestern dialects,

southwestern dialects and southern dialects. The northwestern region covers the counties Møre og Romsdal and Sogn og Fjordane, the southwestern region covers the counties Hordaland, Rogaland and Vest-Agder, and Aust-Agder belongs to the

southern region. There are several dialectal differences between the three regions, but also within these regions the dialects differ, which is explained in the paragraphs below.

In this thesis, no dialects are discussed that belong to the southern region. Therefore, only the northwestern and southwestern dialect area are discussed below and the southern characteristics are not expanded upon.

Northwestern dialects

Three dialect areas can be distinguished within the northwestern area, to know Romsdalen,

Sunnmøre and Fjordane. What bounds them together as a group is that they are all e-varieties, which means that in both infinitive verb endings and weak feminine substantives the ending is on -e. A second common feature is the palatalization of alveolar consonants in both strong and weak position (maɲɲ, maɲɲeɲ). However, this is a feature that seems to be getting out of use among the youngest generation. The palatalized consonants are being replaced by long alveolars (mann, mannen) (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 95). Other features that formerly helped to differentiate between the three northwestern dialect areas are also in decline. Split feminine inflection could be found in both Sunnmøre and Romsdalen, with an ending on -å in definite form singular for weak feminine nouns and an ending on -a in definite form singular for strong feminine nouns. Especially in Sunnmøre this feature is no longer stable. Palatalization of velar consonants /g/ and /k/ in medial position is another example of a formerly common feature that is disappearing (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 96). Some other features have proven to be more stable across dialects. While in most dialects the consonant compounds nd, ld, mb and ng are assimilated, in Sunnmøre and Fjordane both consonants of the compound are pronounced. Another example, also found in Sunnmøre and Fjordane, is the

Figure 1 - Dialect areas in Norway (adopted from Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 179).

(8)

8 maintenance of the epenthesis in present tense of strong verbs and in adjectives (kje:me (pres.), fi:ne (adj.)). In present tense endings of weak verbs, the -r isremitted (kaste) (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 96).

Some features are spreading outside of their original area of use. Romsdalen borders on the trønder dialect area, which can be traced back in the dialect. Romsdalen has a thick l and retroflexes, which are typical features for the trønder dialect area, with the difference that Romsdalen only has thick l stemming from Old Norse /l/, not from Old Norse /rð/. The occurrence of thick l is limited to

Romsdalen only, but the retroflexion of consonant compounds r + d/l/n/s/t is finding its way into the other northwestern dialects, especially in Sunnmøre (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 95).

In the use of pronouns, there are a lot of differences between the different dialects in the

northwestern area, all variants of the personal pronoun not starting with j-. Romsdalen in the north has i: for first person singular, Fjordane most south has e:(g), and in between these areas, Sunnmøre has e:, ai or æi. In the first person plural the areas also have different forms, with me as the most common form in Romsdalen, vi in Fjordane, and again most variation in Sunnmøre, where both vi, me and oss can be found, although vi is most frequently used (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 96). Southwestern dialects

The southwestern dialect area is made up out of four regions, from north to south Indre Sogn, Nordhordland (with Voss and Indre Hardanger), Sunnhordland and Rogaland (with Vest-Agder). All dialects in this area are a-varieties with endings on -a in infinite verbs and weak feminine

substantives (with the exception of Bergen that has endings on -e). The personal pronoun is the same throughout the region, with eg for singular and me for plural. The exception to this can be found in the cities that also have high-status variants jæi and vi. Another feature that is found in the whole southwestern region is the skarre-r, or uvular r, which has been expansive over the last century, first in the western coastal cities and currently spreading to more rural southwestern dialects (Røyneland 2009: 23).

A difference with the northwestern region is found in the historic development of long alveolar consonants. While they got palatalized in northwestern dialects, in the southwestern dialects long alveolar l and n were segmented in dl and dn (fjell > fjedl, finna > fidna). A feature that is closely linked to segmentation is differentiation, traditionally also a common feature in southwestern dialects. Through differentiation, two different consonants become more distinctive (barn > badn, karl > kadl) (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 93). Both segmentation and differentiation are now used at a lesser extent by the youngest generation (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 97).

(9)

9 Within the southwestern region, certain features are characteristic for specific areas. Split feminine inflection is part of dialects in Indre Sogn, Nordhordland, Voss and Hardanger, although it is used less and less. This feature also exists in some northwestern dialects, but the endings in the southwestern dialects are different, with -i/-ei in Indre Sogn and -æ/-e in Nordhordland, Voss and Hardanger. Dialects in Sunnhordland and Rogaland never had split feminine inflection, and have the same ending for both weak and strong feminine definite singular forms, either -o or -å (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 97). Together with northwestern Sunnmøre and Fjordane, southwestern dialects have

epenthesis in the present tense of strong verbs on -e (kje:me, sø:ve), but dialects in Voss and parts of Hardanger have an epenthesis -u (kje:mu, sø:vu). In present tense of weak verbs, in most of the southwestern dialects the endings-r has disappeared (kasta) with the exception of Hardanger, Bergen and parts of Ryfylke that have maintained the -r (kastar). Dialects in the southern coastal area, from Stavanger southwards, have lenition of p, t, k after a long vowel, softening the consonants to b, d, g. But again, this is a feature that seems to be disappearing, especially in the cities and towns (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 98).

Within the southwestern dialect area, Bergen forms a big exception. Contrary to the surrounding dialects, Bergen is not an a-variety but an e-variety. Also, while Norwegian dialects in general have three genders, Bergen only differentiates between masculine and neuter, feminine words have morphologically merged into masculine. Other deviations are the ending of weak a-verbs in the past tense and participle on -et, contrary to the ending on -a in the surrounding dialects (kastet / kasta), no umlaut in present tense of strong verbs (kåmmer; så:ver / kje:me; sø:ve) and the lack of

segmentation or differentiation (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 99). These are all features that are also found in East Norwegian dialects.

2.2 Previous dialect studies

Norwegian dialectology has a long tradition of studying its wealth of dialects, starting with Ivar Aasen in the mid-19th_{century. These were diachronic studies, often trying to uncover the ‘real’, traditional} dialect. Language varieties spoken in the cities were mostly neglected in dialectology. Exceptions are the studies in Oslo (Larsen 1907), Bergen (Larsen & Stoltz 1911/1912) and Stavanger (Larsen & Berntsen 1925) in the beginning of the 20th_{century, but until the 1970’s, the focus was mainly on} rural dialects. In the 1970’s there was a turn towards sociolinguistic studies. Variation in language use between speakers of different age, gender, social class and other social factors became a central point of investigation (Skjekkeland 2005: 18). With the advent of sociolinguistics, the interest in urban dialects grew and several quantitative project were set up, such as Talemålsundersøkelsen i Oslo (TAUS 1971-1976) (‘Language study in Oslo’) and Talemål hos ungdom i Bergen (TUB 1983-1984) (‘Language study among adolescents in Bergen’). More recent projects are national projects such as

(10)

10 Talemålsendringar i Noreg (TEIN 1999-2002) (‘Language change in Norway’) and Utviklingsprosesser i urbane språkmiljø (UPUS 2005-2009) (‘Developments in urban language communities’) and also Dialektendringsprosessar (‘Processes of dialect change’), which will be elaborated on in 2.3. While many other European countries show a clear tendency towards a standard spoken variety, in Norway, dialects are widely used and excepted, and there is no official spoken variety. There is an ongoing debate about the assumed existence of an unofficial standard variety. Mæhlum (2009) pleads for the acknowledgement of south-eastern Norwegian as the standard variety, while Akselberg (2009) feels that ‘standard variety’ is not the right term for the Norwegian linguistic situation (Akselberg 2009: 75). Sandøy (2009) recognizes that the south-eastern variety has obtained the mental function of a prestigious variety, but has trouble calling it the standard variety. The south-eastern is the cultural dominant variant but although Mæhlum emphasizes the differences between a source of influence and the outcome of that influence (Mæhlum 2009: 19), Sandøy has never found data that validate south-eastern Norwegian as a possible source of language change other than for lexical items (Sandøy 2009: 42). The debate about the standard variety is tightly linked to the discussion about the development of the dialects and the driving force behind the changes and whether this is a process of regionalization or standardization (Sandøy et al. 2007: 2). Mæhlum means that the source of the dialect changes is the ‘standard’ south-eastern variety and calls the process standardization, but the outcome regionalization, since the outcome of the change is different because of the linguistic differences in dialects (Mæhlum 2009: 20). Linguistic

regionalization is a process of dialect leveling, in which geographical limited features are replaced by regional or standard features (Røyneland 2009: 9). The local dialects are not disappearing, but local features are used less and less, while regional and national features are expanding (Akselberg 2005: 1716). There is still a lot unclear about the driving forces behind dialect change in Norway, and getting more insights in these processes is a hot topic among linguists.

2.3 Processes of Dialect Change-project

The main goal of the Processes of Dialect Change-project is to “develop insights into the modern processes of dialect change and the relation between changes in society and language change” (my translation) (Sandøy et al. 2007: 1). The initial aim was to analyse four dialects, two of which should be Bergen and Stavanger, but the project resulted in fifteen dialect studies between 2010 and 20181_. The innovating aspect about the project is that it analysed dialect changes in ‘real time’ (actual changes of a generation), as opposed to ‘apparent time’ (when changes of a generation are

considered to be equal to changes over time) (Sandøy et al. 2007: 4). Over the last decades, several

(11)

11 individual, solid dialect analyses were carried out, and the project took this source of data as the starting point for the new dialect studies. Every study within the project studied a dialect of which a description of the last decades was available. In the selection of the informants, the aim was to have several participants that also participated in the previous study. Comparing the old data with the new data created the opportunity to study the dialect changes in real time.

There were four different approaches to studying the dialect changes in real time, each analysing a different aspect of language change:

A – Language change and society typology; B – Language change and life stories;

C – Regionalisation, levelling, standardisation, simplification; D – Linguistic consciousness.

A takes a macro-approach to the analysis, studying the relation between dialect societies and language change by making a typology of the society. Its research question was whether certain societies have better conditions for quick changes than others (Sandøy et al. 2007: 4). B adds a more qualitative notion to the overall quantitative project. In this micro-approach the life stories of informants were taken into consideration to explain the language change of individuals over generations (Sandøy et al. 2007: 6). C aims at finding patterns that explain why dialects in different parts of the country have different processes of language change. Finally, D concentrates on the possible role of culture and unconscious assumptions about dialects as an influence on the way people talk and the change of their dialect (Sandøy et al. 2007: 7).

In Method, the way the project is used for this thesis is explained with regard to dialects, informants and linguistic variables.

2.4 Hypotheses and predictions

Based on the findings of earlier studies, there are several expected outcomes. The first two hypotheses are expectations about the linguistic process of language change and the latter two concern external influences on language change.

H1: Geographically limited features are decreasing in use in favour of more regional or national features.

Language contact often leads to simplification and levelling of the language varieties. In the levelling of dialects, linguistic features that are specific to a certain dialect are likely to be replaced by features

(12)

12 that are used in a wider geographical area, either regional or national. The supposition is that the new variant of the linguistic variables is a regional or national variant.

H2: Linguistic variables from deeper linguistic levels are changing at a slower pace than variables from lighter linguistic levels.

The expectation is that there is a difference in the pace in which linguistic items from different linguistic ‘levels’ go through the process of language change. There is an expected hierarchy in which variables from lighter and more salient linguistic levels such as lexical items are more amenable to language change than variables from a deeper, more structural level, such as morphological items. H3: Urban dialects are further ahead in the process of dialect change than rural dialects.

According to Trudgill, the amount of contact impacts the rate of change, “with higher levels of contact leading to faster rates of change” (Trudgill 2011: 6). Since the amount of contact is higher in urban areas than in rural areas, variables in urban dialects are expected to be in a further stage of language change than the same variable in rural dialects.

H4: Cities or towns with a centre function influence the direction of dialect change of the periphery. The fourth hypothesis supposes a hierarchy in the process of language change, in which language change starts in the centre and then spreads to the surrounding areas. A centre offers services such as jobs, school and shopping, and is a central point for communication in a region. H4 hypothesizes that this central role also extends to language and that linguistic changes, starting in the regional centre, are likely to be adopted by the surrounding periphery.

(13)

13

3. Method

3.1 Dialects

This chapter presents a short historical and demographic background of each of the 13 dialect locations. How the dialect studies are distributed over the Western Norwegian region is illustrated in Figure 2.The dialect studies are not evenly distributed over the region. There is a noticeable gap in Sogn og Fjordane, where not one single dialect study was carried out, while in other regions several dialects were studied in close geographically vicinity. This is the case for Molde, Midøya and Brattvåg and Hildre, a bit further south for Øygarden, Bergen and Fana, and thirdly for Randaberg, Stavanger and Hå. Chapter 2.1.1 elaborated on the Western Norwegian dialect area, mentioning different subarea’s within the overarching Western Norwegian dialect area. How the dialects from

the studies from the project are divided over these subareas is listed in table 1.

From north to south, every location will now be introduced with the aim of illustrating the kind of community the dialect is spoken in. On the one hand, there is the kind of community that has a central function and offers certain services, that people travel to. On the other end there are the peripheral communities, that have to travel to a centre for services such as shopping, work and administrative functions (Sandøy 2003: 232-233).

Figure 2 - The distribution of dialects over the Western Norwegian region.

(14)

14

Table 1 - List of dialects.

Dialects from north to south

Dialect region Dialect subregion

Molde Northwestern Romsdalen

Midøya Northwestern Romsdalen /

Sunnmøre Brattvåg and Hildre Northwestern Sunnmøre

Åram Northwestern Sunnmøre

Øygarden Southwestern Nordhordland

Bergen Southwestern Nordhordland

Fana Southwestern Nordhordland

Ullensvang Southwestern Nordhordland (Hardanger) Åkrafjorden Southwestern Sunnhordland

Randaberg Southwestern Rogaland

Stavanger Southwestern Rogaland

Hå Southwestern Rogaland

Lista Southwestern Vest-Agder

Molde

Molde is a city in the county Møre og Romsdal in Northwestern Norway. It is the administrative centre of the municipality Molde with a population of 20.957 (2018)2_{and it is the 23th biggest city in} the country. In the Late Middle Ages there was an active timber trade with the Netherlands and England. In the mid-17th_{century, Molde became the county capital, and in 1742 the city got trading} rights. This led to the settlement of many upper-class families, creating a rich social life. In the 19th century the economic focus was on the fish industry and in addition tourism became an important source of income. During the period of industrialisation, many factories arose, creating a lot of employment and as a consequence, a lot of immigration. At the start of the Second World War in 1940, the whole city was bombed. When the war was over, the city was slowly rebuilt. The period after WWII is characterized by a large growth in population and the development of the city into the administrative and economic centre the city is today (Rød 2014: 6-8). Molde has a hospital, two ‘ungdomsskoler’ (junior high school), two ‘videregående skoler’ (upper secondary school) and a

(15)

15 ‘høyskole’ (college). The city is well connected by bus, ferries and roads, and also has an airport with direct flights to other parts of Norway as well as abroad (Rød 2014: 15).

The dialect of Molde is part of the Romsdal dialect area. The periods with large growth in population also left their traces in the dialect, especially when large groups moved to the city speaking a dialect from another part of the country3_{. As a result, the dialect in Molde stands out from other dialects in} the Romsdal area, characterized by a simplified grammar, with for example simplified inflection in nouns and verbs. Also, the dialect cannot be described as one dialect, but is divided in a high-status variant and a low-status variant. The high-status is characterized by elements from the written standard bokmål (and formerly riksmål), while the low-status variant is closer to other Romsdal dialects (Rød 2014: 20-21).

Midøya

Midøya is a small island in Midsund municipality in the county Møre og Romsdal, about 30 km south of Molde. The island, only 13,9 km² big, has a population of around 410 people (2015)4_{. Over the last} decades, the population of the island has been shrinking (Fossheim 2010: 8).

In table 1, not one but two dialect regions are mentioned for Midøya. This is the result of a former administrative border that, up until 1965, separated the island in two (Fossheim 2010: 1). The north and south side of the island were separated both administratively and ecclesiastically, with their own schools, clubs, national day celebrations (Fossheim 2010: 8). As a consequence, they each had different dialects. On the north side they spoke a romsdalsdialect and on the south side a sunnmørs dialect. In 1965 there was a restructuring of municipalities, resulting in the merger of the two parts of the island into one municipality, Midsund. After 1965 the amount of contact between the two sides of the island increased, and today the island no longer has separate schools and clubs (Fossheim 2010: 11). Also, the ways of transport changed since then, with a bridge to the neighbouring island Otrøya (1969) and ferries and bus routes to Molde and Ålesund. Nowadays, ferries and busses are going more frequently to the east in the direction of Molde than to the southwest in the direction of Brattvåg and Sunnmøre (Fossheim 2010: 4). The majority of the citizens travel to the next island, Otrøya for work. Only a small percentage works on the island itself, either on farms, in construction or as teachers. There is one private primary school on the island, but for high school, pupils have to travel to Otrøya.

3_{Store Norske Leksikon. Norske bymål. [22-05-2019]} 4_{Store Norske Leksikon. Midøya. [22-05-2019]}

(16)

16 Brattvåg and Hildre

Brattvåg and Hildre are a town and a village in Haram municipality in the county Møre og Romsdal. Haram is the most northern municipality of Sunnmøre, right underneath Midsund municipality. Brattvåg and Hildre have a centre-periphery relation. Hildre is an old, small farming and fishing village. Brattvåg was founded in 1911. The earliest immigrants came from Hildre to build mills and hydroelectric power plants, and Brattvåg soon developed into an industry town (Hildremyr 2006: 6). With the municipal merger in 1965, Brattvåg became the municipal centre of Haram. As a result, in the following decades many public services and functions were established in Brattvåg, leading to a growth employment and population. Most immigrants came from other places in Sunnmøre. In 2014, Brattvåg had a population of 24125_{. The population in Hildre is a lot smaller with 535 citizens in 2015,} and decreasing (Hildremyr 2006: 10). Both Hildre and Brattvåg have a primary school, but children from Hildre have to commute to Brattvåg for junior high school and secondary high school (Hildemyr 2006: 13).

The dialect in both Brattvåg and Hildre belongs to the Sunnmørs dialect area. Hildremyr presents only one dialect in her thesis, indicating that the language varieties in Hildre and Brattvåg are very much alike.

Åram

By ‘Åram’, a coastal area is meant that stretches from Hakallestranda, via Åram to Sørbrandal. Fishing and farming have historically been the most important source of income. The population has always been small, with a current size of circa 300 people (Lianes 2013: 11-14). Since 1. January 2002, Åram belongs to Vanylven municipality, in southwestern Møre og Romsdal. Previously, Åram was part of Sande municipality, with Larsnes as the administrative centre. Larsnes is located on the other side of the fjord and for the citizens of Åram only accessible by ferry. In 2002, a referendum was held which led to the reorganization of the municipal borders. Fiskå then became the new administrative centre, only a short drive away (Lianes 2013: 18). Åram offers only a few permanent jobs and most people have to travel for work. Children have to travel too because, in the last decades, both the high school and primary school were closed. The dialect on Åram is part of the sunnmørs dialect area.

(17)

17 Øygarden

Øygarden is a municipality northwest of Bergen, consisting of a string of islands in the North Sea with a population of 48896_{. Øygarden municipality is a result of the 1964 merger of Hjelme municipality} and a part of Herdla municipality. For centuries, Øygarden was depending on the ferry-connection to travel to the mainland, but between 1956 and 1986 twelve bridges were built in a project to improve the connection between Bergen and its surrounding areas. In 1988 another big change happened for Øygarden when the Sture terminal was opened, which is an oil terminal, and in 1996 Kollsnes, a gas processing plant, was opened. This led to an increase in guest workers, but also created jobs for citizens of Øygarden (Villanger 2010: 3-5). Before these big changes, the population had been decreasing, but ever since the coming of the connection to the mainland and the industries, the population has been increasing7_{. Previously, most of the people worked on farms or in the fishing} industry, but nowadays the secondary and tertiary sector are the biggest sectors. More than half of the working people travel outside the municipality for work, of which 25% travels to Bergen for work. The dialect on Øygarden is in the nordhordland dialect area, and together with other dialects around Bergen called strilemål. The dialect is not identical on all islands in the municipality. The variation is a result of the former municipal borders, and because of the fact that before the building of the bridges, the islands used to be isolated from each other (Villanger 2010: 12).

Bergen

Bergen is the second biggest city of Norway with a population of 255 464 in 20188_{and likes to call} itself Vestlandets capital. Bergen has an important import- and export harbour, an airport, many ferry- and boat connections to both Norway and abroad, plus a direct train connection to Oslo by Bergensbanen9_.

Bergen was founded by Olav Kyrre and got city status in 1070. Trade was important from the start, with an active trade in fish with the areas northwards and in goods such as wine, clothing and corn with cities abroad10_{. In 1350, a group of German merchants from the Hanseatic League settled in} Bergen, and Bryggen was established as a Hanseatic office. The Hanseatic League dominated life in Bergen especially in the 14th_{and 15}th_{century. The merchants lived in Bryggen, and although there}

6_{Øygarden commune. Folketalsutvikling.}

https://www.oygarden.kommune.no/om-oygarden/folketalsutvikling/ [22-05-2019]

7_{Store Norske Leksikon. Øygarden. [22-05-2019]}

8_{Store Norske Leksikon. De største tettstedene I Norge. [22-05-2019]} 9_{Store Norske Leksikon. Bergen – samferdsel. [23-05-2019]}

(18)

18 was intensive contact between the merchants and Bergen citizens, they lived in two separated societies. As a result, Bergen was influenced by Low-German, but the languages did not mix11_. Bergen’s population kept on growing and Bergen was Norway’s biggest city up until the 1830s. Through the centuries, Bergen has always had a lot of immigration, both from abroad as from other parts of Norway, especially from Vestlandet. Nowadays, many of the people who move to the centre of Bergen move within the municipality or are from other parts of the Bergen region (Nornes 2012: 10).

The dialect study in Processes of Dialect Change focusses on informants from the city centre,

Bergenhus. Bergenhus has been the administrative centre of Bergen municipality since the merger of the districts Sentrum and Sandviken in 2000. Bergenhus is not only an administrative centre, within Bergenhus, many important institutions are located, such as Haukeland university hospital, many media headquarters, the University of Bergen, a campus of the Western Norway University of Applied Sciences and the Norwegian School of Economics. Many cultural significant organisations are found in Bergenhus as well, for example art museum KODE, concert hall Grieghallen and the National Theatre. Around 51000 people are employed within Bergenhus, of which circa 90% works in the tertiary sector. Many people travel to work every day, mainly within the borders of Bergen municipality (Nornes 2012: 15).

The dialect of Bergen stands out from other dialects from the same nordhordlands dialect area. Cities tend to develop differently than small dialects and this is no different for bergensk. The high amount of language contact to other languages or dialect varieties led to simplifications. The biggest

differences between bergensk and the surrounding dialects is that bergensk is an e-variety, and that it has a simplified grammatical system with only two genders. The surrounding dialects have

masculine, feminine and neuter, but bergensk does not differentiate between masculine and feminine and only has masculine and neuter (Nornes 2012: 17).

And, as is common in cities, there is a high-status variety and a low-status variety. But contrary to many other cities, the two varieties are linguistically not very different and not clearly separated. For example, both the high-status and low-status variety have two genders and both varieties have an ending on -et in past tense of weak a-verbs (kastet) (Mæhlum & Røyneland 2012: 100). The varieties serve an identity marker, and forms from both varieties are used by all informants (Nornes 2012: 19).

(19)

19 Fana

Fana is one of the eight urban districts of Bergen with a population of 38.317 (2011)12_{. Fana was a} separate municipality until it merged into Bergen municipality in 1972. In the 1870’s, a railway was built from Bergen to Voss, going straight through Fana. There was a station build in Hop and the railway started to function as public transport between Fana and Bergen (Doublet 2012: 19). Many privileged citizens from Bergen then decided to move to Fana, while working in Bergen. At first it was mainly the upper class who moved to Fana, but after a while also the middle class followed. This led to an enormous growth in population at the beginning of the 20th_{century, increasing from 4000} citizens in 1875 to 11600 in 1920 (Doublet 2012: 19). Moving to Fana had its advantages, since houses were cheaper than in the city centre and taxes were lower. Fana’s population kept increasing, especially right after the Second World War, when there was a housing shortage in Bergen which was resolved by building more houses in Fana.

The dialect study from Processes of Dialect Change focusses on informants from Nesttun, which is the centre of Fana and the former municipal centre of Fana. In Nesttun, the same dialect is spoken as in Bergen, also with the variation of high-status forms and low-status forms, but with one difference. High-status forms are much more frequent and common in Fana than they are in Bergen (Doublet 2012: 11).

Ullensvang

Ullensvang is a municipality in Hordaland county and includes both sides of Sørfjorden, as well as a bigger area east of Sørfjorden, with a population of 3363 people. Most people live on the coastlines of the fjord, with 36% on the west side and 62% on the east side. There are two towns on the east coastline, the municipal center Kinsarvik with a population of 551, and Lofthus with a population of 521 in 201613_{. The population in the municipality was stable up until the 1990s, but in the last decade} the population is going down by annually 0,1%.

Unlike the closest towns of Odda and Tyssedal, Ullensvang has no hydroelectric power industry. Ullensvang has the biggest fruit cultivation in the country and produces both apples, pears, plums, cherries and berries. The orchards draw many tourists to Ullensvang, which in the last decades has given in impulse to the tourist industry (Lid 2015: 18). Around 39%14_{travels outside of the}

municipality for work, of which more than half works in Odda.

12_{Store Norske Leksikon. Fana – bydel i Bergen. [23-05-2019]} 13_{Store Norske Leksikon. Ullensvang. [23-05-2019]}

(20)

20 In 1860, the first permanent schoolroom was opened, which substituted the omgangsskole, which was a school that traveled from place to place. More schools followed, and, up until the 1980’s, there were three school districts on the west side of the fjord and three on the east side (Lid 2015: 11). Up until this day, there is a separation between the two sides of the fjord. Students from different sides of the fjord do not often meet until they start attending high school in Odda. There are strong feelings of identity connected to the fjord side (Lid 2015: 13).

Åkrafjorden

By ‘Åkrafjorden’, the villages are meant that lie on the northern and southern shore of Åkrafjorden in Hordaland county. On the northside the informants are from Baugstranda and Åkra and on the southside from Kyrping, Rafdal, Markus and Teigland. Until 1965, both sides of the fjord belonged to the municipality Skånevik, with the town Skånevik on the south side as the administrative centre. People on both sides of the fjord belonged to one community. Although children went to different schools, there was one church in Åkra were people from all along the fjord gathered, and there were daily ferry connections. Nowadays, the ferries are no longer going, and there is almost no

communication anymore between the fjord sides.

In 1965 the fjord sides got separated as a result of a municipal reorganization. The north side is part of Kvinnherad municipality, with Rosendal and Husnes as the important centres. The south side belongs to Etne municipality, with Etne as the administrative centre. Both sides of the fjord are outskirts of the municipality they belong to, and both sides struggle with depopulation. In 1910, the northside had a total population of 488 people. In 2016, the number had decreased to 199. On the southside there were 270 inhabitants in 1910, which had decreased to 169 in 2016 (Tjelmeland 2016: 11). On the north side, many farmsteads are already completely abandoned.

On the north side it takes about 45 to 60 minutes by car to get to the towns Husnes or Rosendal, what many people do on a daily basis to get to work. At the time of the dialect study, there was still a junior high school, so pupils did not travel on a daily basis to go to school. But for many

extracurricular activities such as sports, children go to Husnes or Rosendal several times a week. Also, there is no senior high school. When children finish junior high, they have to move out to go to senior high, since there is no daily buss connection to senior high in Husnes (Tjelmeland 2016: 17).

Life in the villages on the south side is closely connected to Etne. Most people drive 20/30 minutes several times a day to go to work, school, kindergarten or to do grocery shopping (Tjelmeland 2016: 10). The three schools that once existed on the south side are all shut down.

(21)

21 Formerly, both sides of the fjord spoke the same dialect and was linguistically homogeneous.

Nowadays, there is still a strong feeling of identity connected to the fjord, but only to one side of the fjord, which also has its consequences for the dialect (Tjelmeland 2016: 20).

Randaberg

Randaberg is a small municipality of 24 km² at the northern end of Jæren in Rogaland county. It is surrounded by water and in the south it has one border to Stavanger. Traces of inhabitation are found dating back to 6000 b.C. After the Middle-Ages, Randaberg developed as a farming

municipality, with Stavanger as the most important trade market (Doublet 2015: 12). Still, 65% of the land in Randaberg is farming land.

After 1965, Randaberg changed a lot. In that year, an oil base was opened in Dusavika, creating new jobs and leading to a growth in population. This growth has been constant ever since, growing from a small town with 2000 inhabitants to a city with over 10000 inhabitants (Doublet 2015: 13). The largest part of the population, 71%, works outside of the municipality, with 43% traveling to

Stavanger on a daily basis15_{. Many pupils also travel to Stavanger every day. There are three schools} in Randaberg and since 1984 also a high school, but despite this, many children choose a high school in Stavanger over the one in Randaberg (Doublet 2012: 12).

Stavanger

Stavanger is the third biggest city in Norway with a population of 133.140 inhabitants16_{. It was} founded in 1125 and stayed a small village throughout the Middle Ages, serving as a local trading centre for the farmers in Jæren. After the Middle Ages, there was a growth in population with people coming from both Norway and abroad. More than half of the newcomers was from Rogaland and Stavanger became a melting pot of all kind of Rogaland-dialects. In the 19th_{century, Stavanger} flourished both economically, politically and culturally (Aasen 2011: 8) before it shifted to becoming a typical industry town in the beginning of the 20th_{century. The next big turning point came after the} Second World War. In 1972, Parliament declared Stavanger as the city were the oil industry would be located. This was the start of another period of welfare for “oil city” Stavanger. Within ten years, Stavanger had a higher net profit per tax payer than the capital Oslo (Aasen 2011: 9). The growth in population that followed was, again, mostly people moving in from the area around Stavanger. Over the last decades, Stavanger has developed as a central city. More public buildings were built, as well as the University of Stavanger, which opened in 2005 (Aasen 2011: 13).

15_{Store Norske Leksikon. Randaberg. [28-05-2019]} 16_{Store Norske Leksikon. Stavanger. [28-05-2019]}

(22)

22 The dialect of Stavanger has a high-status variety and a low-status variety. The high-status variety, that probably originates from the welfare period in the 19th_{century, has its roots in the written} standard, conservative bokmål. The low-status variety developed from the local dialects that were spoken by immigrants that moved to Stavanger from other parts of Rogaland (Aasen 2011: 15). In Stavanger, the high-status and low-status variety are more separated than in Bergen, where the varieties historically served as a kind of social tools. In Stavanger, the varieties did indicate class and status.

Hå

Hå is a municipality at the southern end of Jæren. In the dialect study of Bøe (2013), the focus is on three towns in the southern corner of the municipality, Ogna, Brusand and Sirevåg. Hå has a population of 18762 inhabitants17_{, of which approximately 2400 people live in Ogna, Brusand and} Sirevåg (Bøe 2013: 12). The municipality is one of the most important farming lands of the country, yet, the southern part where the dialect study was carried out is the exception to the rest of the municipality. Hå is a rural, very stable municipality. Over the last decades, there has been a steady, natural population growth without much migration. Also, more than half of the people work within the municipality (Bøe 2013: 18).

Lista

Lista is a peninsula in Farsund municipality in Vest-Agder county. Up until 1965, Lista was a municipality of its own. Of the 9758 inhabitants of Farsund, 54 percent lives on Lista (Heradstveit 2018: 12). The population has been slowly decreasing since the 1980’s.

Lista is a flat area of land were signs of inhabitation have been found dating back many thousands of years. With its for Norway unusual long stretched white beaches, Lista is often compared to

Denmark. In the time when transport happened mainly by boat, the peninsula was on the route of everyone passing the southern Norwegian coast, but now that the means of transportation have changed to the road, Lista is in the periphery, with a 40 minutes’ drive to the closest main road (Heradstveit 2018: 13).

Historically, most people in Lista had small farms that could never cover all expanses. Incomes were always complemented by fishing and timber. When times were low in the middle of the 19th_century, many people from Lista, both men and women, went to America to work and send the money home. Most of them returned back to Lista after a few years. Up until the 1960’s, there was a constant flow of people moving to and from America. This affected cultural life in Lista, as well as the language.

(23)

23 There is an American inspired restaurant, a shop, American street names and a yearly America Festival (Heradstveit 2018: 17). Because of the incomes from their work in America, the farms were not modernized as elsewhere in Norway. After the Second World War, the farms were bought by people moving to Lista from different parts of Jæren. This also left its traces in the dialect

(Heradstveit 2018: 18).

Lista is still a very rural community, with most jobs in the primary and secondary sector. The senior high school in Lista only offers practical tracks and for general studies, pupils have to travel to the senior high school in Farsund. Compared to the national average, there are less people in Lista with a higher education.

3.2 Classification of informants

In the studies of the project Processes of Dialect Change, informants are categorized in two ways. The informants are either classified on the basis of ‘livsfaser’, stages of life, or on the basis of ‘årsklasser’, age groups.

The age groups are static. The year of birth of the informant determines the age group and that does not change over time. Stages of life are not static and change as the informant gets older. Not the year of birth, but the age at the moment of the recording determines the stage of life.

Table 2 - Classification of informants in age groups.

Age groups Year of birth Age group 0 1860-1889 Age group I 1890-1919 Age group II 1920-1949 Age group III 1950-1979 Age group IV 1980-2009

In stages of life, the informants are categorized in three groups: the elderly, the middle-aged and the youth. In the group elderly informants the age ranks from 65 to 80, if necessary from 60 to 80. In the group middle-aged informants the age ranks from 35 to 50, and 30 to 59 if necessary. The group of young informants is in a lot of studies the 9th_{or 10}th_{grade of a secondary school, called}

(24)

24

Table 3 - Stages of life

Every stage-of-life group fits into a certain age group. Youth fits in age group IV, Middle-aged fits in age group III, Elderly fits in age group II. The two different ways are useful when recordings are made at two periods in time. An informant born in 1960, for

example, will fall into age group III, both in the older study and in the recent study from Processes of Dialect Change. But in terms of stages of life, the informant born in 1960 will fall in the group of young informants in the older study, while in the more recent study the same informant will be categorized as an middle-age informant.

In the analysis (chapter 4), two groups of informants are repeatedly mentioned. The first group is the total group of informants that was part of the most recent dialect study. The generations in total are made up out of either the three stages of life, Elderly, Middle-aged and Younger, or the three age groups II, III, and IV. The second group that is mentioned in the analysis is the group of Younger informants, or age group IV. The language use of the youngest group of informants is compared to the language use of the generations in total.

3.3 Linguistic variables

The thirteen dialect studies from the Processes of Dialect Change-project that serve as the source for this paper each analyse a number of linguistic features. The study with the least number of variables analyses five items, the study with the largest number of variables analysed thirteen items, but on average eight linguistic items are studied per dialect study. All studies together generate a total of 108 linguistic items. Of this total amount, only the variables that have overlap in two or more dialect studies are analysed in this thesis. This resulted in a set of 17 linguistic variables, with a total amount of 76 tokens. These are the variables presented in 3.4.

Every token holds information about a linguistic variable in a specific dialect. Each token consists of two, sometimes more variants. Most tokens vary between a traditional and a new variant. By a traditional variant, the variant is meant that one would expect to find in the dialect on the basis of dialect descriptions in literature. A new variant is a variant that earlier was not part of the dialect where it is now observed and used. This can either be a derivative of the traditional variant, or a form that comes from another dialect. In the analysis, the traditional form is called variant 1 and the new form is called variant 2.

Another form of variation is found in urban dialects. These dialects have a high-status variety and a low-status variety. Besides variation between a traditional and a new variant, these urban dialects

Stages of life Age

Elderly 65-80 years old (60-80) Middle-aged 35-50 years old (30-59) Youth 14-16 years old

(25)

25 can have variation between the high-status variant and the low-status variant. Marking the variants as variant 1 or variant 2 turned out to be more complicated for this variation than it was for the traditional and new variant.

Marking the high-status variant as variant 1 and the low-status variety as variant 2 would bring order, but a complication arises when the same linguistic variable occurs both in an urban dialect and in a rural dialect, which is illustrated in table 4.

Table 4 - Complication in structuring high-status and low-status variables.

Dialect Variation Variant 1 Variant 2

Stavanger High- vs. Low-status Infinite verb ending on -e Infinite verb ending on -a Øygarden Traditional vs. New Infinite verb ending on -a Infinite verb ending on -e Randaberg Traditional vs. New Infinite verb ending on -a Infinite verb ending on -e

The linguistic variable has three tokens, one token in an urban dialect and two in rural dialects. The variation that occurs is the same for all three tokens, with a variant on -e and a variant on -a, but with the high-status variant as variant 1, the tokens are not in the same column. The same issue arises – but in other variables - when structuring the variants the other way around, with the low-status variant as variant 1. To solve this problem, not all high- and low-low-status variants are structured in the same way. There is a cluster with the high-status variant as variant 1 and the low-status variant as variant 2, and there is a cluster with the low-status variant as variant 1 and the high-status variant as variant 2. The goal is to have the same variants of a variable in the same column for all tokens. The way the traditional and new variants were marked are leading. In case of types with only variation between a high- and low-status variant the decision is made on the basis of the data from the dialect studies. The form that was most dominant in the dialect study from a generation ago is then marked as variant 1, the ‘traditional’ or formerly most frequent form.

3.4 Presentation of linguistic variables

Lexical variables

V01 Determiner /mye/ Number of tokens: 2 Dialects: Fana, Lista

For the quantifier mye, ‘a lot’, there is a token in the dialect of Fana and one in the dialect of Lista. Although the variable is the same, some differences can be found in the variation in the two dialects.

(26)

26 In Fana, the variable varies between a high-status variant and a low-status variant, while in Lista the variation is between a traditional variant and a new variant. Also, the variants do not fully overlap. The form [myә] is a variant for both dialects, but the competing variants differ.

Fana

High-status variant: [myə] Low-status variant: [myçә, myʃә] Lista

Traditional variant: møje, mø:e New variant: my:e

V02 Determiner /noen/, /noe/ Number of tokens: 4

Dialects: Bergen, Fana, Lista, Lista

V02 consist of tokens from, again, Fana and Lista, with in addition a token from Bergen. Lista has two tokens in V02, since in the Lista-study the determiner was analysed separately for noen, ‘someone’ and noe, ‘something’. In the studies in Bergen and Fana, they were analysed as one variable, with noen as the masculine and feminine form, and noe as the neuter form of the paradigm. Again, in Fana the variation is between a high-status variant and a low-status variant, and in Lista between a traditional and a new variant. For Bergen, both forms of variation apply, but in the dialect study, the variable was analysed as variation between a high and a low form, so that will be the case in this study as well.

Bergen

High-status variant: någen/någet, noen/noe Low-status variant: nåkken/nåkke

Fana

High-status variant: [nʊːən] / [nʊːə] Low-status variant: [nɔkən] / [nɔkə] Lista

(27)

27 Traditional variant: nɔ:en, nɔ:ne / nɔ:ge, nɔ:e

New variant: nu:en/nu:e

V03 Determiner /det/ Number of tokens: 3

Dialects: Åkrafjorden North, Åkrafjorden South, Ullensvang

V03 has tokens in Åkrafjorden and Ullensvang, which are dialects in two neighbouring regions, Sunnhordland and Hardanger. In both dialects, variation is found between the form /de:/ and /da:/, but which variant can be called the traditional form is not quite clear. In the Ullensvang-study, no information is given about which variant is the traditional variant, but from the data in the study it can be derived that a generation ago /da:/ was the dominating variant (Lid 2015: 80), and therefore variant /da:/ will be called the traditional variant and /de:/ the new variant for Ullensvang. In

Åkrafjorden, the situation is the other way around. Variant /de:/ is mentioned as the traditional form here, although Tjelmeland remarks that there may be variation between the towns on both sides of the fjord (Tjelmeland 2016: 32).

Åkrafjorden (North and South) Traditional variant: /de:/ New variant: /da:/ Ullensvang

Traditional variant: /da:/ New variant: /de:/

V04 Differentiation of /rn/ Number of tokens: 3

Dialects: Åkrafjorden North, Åkrafjorden South, Øygarden

With differentiation, two different phonemes become more distinctive. Old Norse /rl/, /rn/ and /fn/ differentiated to /dl/, /dn/ and /bn/. This is a common feature in southwestern dialects. In the dialects of Åkrafjorden and Øygarden it was analysed whether the original, differentiated phoneme is

(28)

28 still in use. Both studies were limited to the compound /dn/ > /rn/, since this is the most frequent combination. For V04, the variants align for both dialects:

Traditional variant: /dn/ Intermediate form: /n/ New variant: /rn/

V05 Segmentation of long /l/ Number of tokens: 3

Dialects: Randaberg, Åkrafjorden North, Åkrafjorden South

With segmentation, a long phoneme is split up in two different phonemes, creating a new phoneme compound. Old Norse long /n:/ became /dn/ and long /l:/ became /dl/. Segmentation is often found in dialects that also have differentiation. V05 has tokens in Randaberg and Åkrafjorden, that both limited the analysis to the segmentation of long /l/, in the case of Åkrafjorden because of the lack of relevant occurrences of long /n/ (Tjelmeland 2016: 34). Both studies analysed to what extent the traditional, segmented form is still in use.

Traditional variant: /dl/ New variant: /l/

V06 Loss of lenition Number of tokens: 3

Dialects: Lista, Randaberg, Stavanger

The short, non-voiced consonants p, t, k get softened and become a voiced b, d, g after a vowel. This feature called lenition is found in the southern and southwestern coastal area of Norway. V06 has tokens in Lista, Randaberg and Stavanger. In all these dialects, the voiced consonants b, d, g are restored to p, t, k. Lenition is a lexical feature, and the process of change happens mostly in individual words. Therefore, it is said that this process of change can take quite some time (Sandøy 2018: 199).

Traditional variant: /b, d, g/ New variant: /p, t, k/

(29)

29 V07 Monophtongization of /ɛi/

Number of tokens: 3

Dialects: Brattvåg, Hildre, Åram

Brattvåg and Hildre belong to the northern sunnmørsk dialect area, Åram to the southern sunnmørsk dialect area. Originally, sunnmørsk is a dialect area with a lot of diphthongs, but, as in other parts of the country, many diphthongs are changing into monophtongs. V07 analyses the monophtongization of /ɛi/ to /e/. The Åram-study is specific in what exactly has been analysed, limiting itself to a small number of words that traditionally has a diphthong /ɛi/, originating from Old Norse long é: tre, ser, vêr, meter, brev and fele (‘tree, to see, weather, meter, letter and violin’) (Lianes 2013: 34). In the Brattvåg and Hildre-study no specifics are given about the variable, merely that in individual words the traditional pronunciation is with a diphthong, for example the word kne (‘knee’) (Hildremyr 2006: 26).

Brattvåg and Hildre Traditional variant: /ɛi/ New variant: /e/ Åram

Traditional variant: /ɛi/ Intermediate form: /æ/ New variant: /e/

V08a + b Personal pronoun – 1. Person singular – stressed and unstressed Number of tokens: 14

Dialects: Bergen, Fana, Midøya North, Midøya South, Molde, Stavanger, Åram

The personal pronoun first person singular is probably the word with the widest range of possible pronunciations in Norway, originating from the time when in a sentence, different forms were used in stressed and unstressed position. Over time, one or the other became generalised, resulting in the range of variants there are today (Sandøy 2018: 201). The different variants can be divided in two groups, either with or without a j- in onset position (eg / jeg). These are two different forms with a

(30)

30 different origin. The forms with a j- developed from Proto-Norse eka, whereas the forms without a j- developed from Proto-Norse ek (Skjekkeland 2005: 107).

V08 has 7 tokens for V08a – in stressed position, and 7 tokens for V08b – in unstressed position. Since all variants are the same in stressed and unstressed position, they are presented here simultaneously. In city-dialects of Stavanger, Bergen, Fana and Molde, V08 varies between a high-status variety and a low-high-status variant, with some intermediate forms. Even though all cities vary between a jeg-form and an eg-form, there is a difference between the southwestern cities and Molde. Belonging to the north-western dialect area, Molde, along with Midøya and Åram, have different eg-forms than the southwestern dialects.

Bergen and Stavanger

High-status variants: /jɛi/ /je:/ Low-status variants: /e:g/ /e:/ /ei/ Fana

High-status variant: /jɛi/ Intermediate form: /ɛi/ Low-status variant: /eg/ Intermediate form: /e/ Molde

High-status variant: /jei/ Low-status variant: /i:/ Nordmøre og Ålesund: /eː/ Midøya

Romsdalsk variant: /i/ Sunnmørsk variant: /ɛi:/ Intermediate form: /e:/ Åram

(31)

31 New variant: /ɛi:/

Intermediate form: /e:/

V09 Negation “ikke” Number of tokens: 5

Dialects: Bergen, Fana, Hå, Molde, Stavanger

The personal pronoun first person singular and the negation adverb ikke are strong solidarity and identity markers (Sandøy 1985: 139). These two words are very high-frequent and salient, and a change in the way you pronounce these words is very marked, since they express the belonging to a certain group. The (South-)Eastern Norwegian variant is /ikə/, the Western Norwegian variant is /iҫə/. In West-Norwegian towns that have a and a low-status variant, ikke is used as the high-status variant and ikkje (/iҫə/) is the low-high-status variant. V09 has five tokens, four of which are found in urban dialects, varying between ikke and ikkje. The fifth token in Hå does not have an opposition between ikke and ikkje, but between different ways of pronouncing ikkje.

Bergen and Stavanger High-status variant: /ikə/ Low-status variant: /iҫə/ Fana

High-status variant: /ikə/ Low variety form: /iҫə/, /iʃə/ Molde

High-status variant: /ikə/ Low-status variant: /içə/

New youth variant/urban form: /iʃə/ Hå

Traditional variant: /ic͡ҫə/ Intermediate form: /iҫə/

(32)

32 New variant: /iʃə/

Phonological variables V10a The sj-sound Number of tokens: 3

Dialects: Bergen, Hå, Stavanger

The development that is analysed in V10a is the change from /sҫ/ or /sj/ to /ʃ/. The /ʃ/-sound, originally a south-eastern Norwegian sound, started spreading among younger people in Western and Southern Norway, mostly in urban areas, while the older generation still distinguished /sj/. The three dialects with a token for V10a all have multiple variants, the traditional variant, the new variant and one or more intermediate forms. In the data it became soon very clear that the traditional variant /sj/ or /sҫ/ is hardly ever used any more, and that the variation is found between the intermediate form /ʃj/ and the new variant /ʃ/. The variant in the analysis that is called ‘traditional variant’ for V10a is actually the intermediate variant.

Bergen

Traditional variant: /sj/ Intermediate variant: /ʃj/ New variant: /ʃ/

Other forms: /ҫ/ and ҫ+ Stavanger Traditional variant: /ʃj/ Intermediate variant: /ʃj/ New variant: /ʃ/ Hå Traditional variant: /sҫ/ Intermediate variant: /ʃj/ New variant: /ʃ/

(33)

33 V10b The kj-sound / Merging of the kj-sound and sj-sound

Number of tokens: 5

Dialects: Bergen, Hå, Lista, Molde, Randaberg, Stavanger

In V10b two synonym processes are put together in one variable. The variable analysis the change of the pronunciation of the kj-sound, that is changing from the original pronunciation with /ҫ/ into the phoneme /ʃ/. What follows from this development is a merge of the kj- and sj-sound. This merge is only possible after a change in the pronunciation of sj-, as described for V10a.

The merge of the kj- and sj-sound was first observed in the bigger cities among the younger generations in most towns and cities as far north as Trondheim, skipping the rural dialects in between (Skjekkeland 2005: 79). The occurrence of tokens in Hå and Lista in this study might be a sign that, after the city hopping, the phenomenon is now spreading around these cities like a wave. V10b only analyses the pronunciation of kj- in onset position. In a number of words, kj- occurs in medial position, for example in the negation ikke, but this was in most studies made into an own variable (see V09). Bergen Traditional variant: /ҫ/ New variant: /ʃ/ Intermediate/other variants: /ʃj/, /c͡ҫ/, ҫ+ Hå Traditional variant: /c͡ҫ/ Intermediate form: /ҫ/ New variant: /ʃ/ Lista Traditional variant: /ҫ/ New variant: /ʃ/ Molde

Dialect Change in Western Norway – a comparative study of the project Processes of Dialect Change