The German spelling reform of 1998 generated an
amazing amount of (mostly negative) reaction from the German public. Starting
with a general overview of the nature of linguistic purism and the history of
German orthography, this article presents a wide range of opinions of the
spelling reform. The data is mostly taken from the Frankfurter Allgemeine
Zeitung, either in the form of newspaper articles or letters to the editor,
showing that the reform is rejected by untrained linguists (folk) for various
political and pseudo-linguistic reasons, which, however, have in common a
fundamenal misconception of the nature and status of both orthography in
general and the 1998 spelling reform in particular. This articles argues,
therefore, that the vast majority of objections to the spelling reform is not
based on linguistic issues but rather based on a broadly politically defined
conservative view of the world.
On 1 August 2000
one of the leading German broadsheets, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
(FAZ), returned to using the old ‘bewährten’ spelling rules after one year of
working with the new rules, arguing that the new rules had not achieved what
they set out to do. The FAZ is on its own in this assessment, no other German
newspaper followed its lead, and only two intellectual societies, the Hochschullehrerverband and the Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung,
returned to the old spelling after the FAZ’s decision. This event made
headlines for some time, showing that after the whole debate about the spelling
reform had quietened down since March 2000 (the constitutional court’s ruling),
the issue is still very contentious. Why, one may ask, “should such a dry,
academic topic become a subject of furious public debates stretching over
decades [...]” (Stevenson 1997: 186)?
Linguistic Purism is one of the most interesting aspects of sociolinguistics
as it clearly unearths the deep feelings that are held by untrained linguists
about (their) language. In examining puristic viewpoints in the field of
linguistics, the heterogeneity of the arguments put forward to justify language
planning or purification is striking. It appears that a language may decline or
come under threat from another for an infinitely diverse range of reasons. In
this article, I will explore to what extent we can actually speak of linguistic purism as a matter pertaining
to language and linguistic issues. Using the recent reactions to the spelling
reform in Germany, I hope to show that puristic views about language have
nothing to do with language in principle, that is there is no common ground on
how people object, what people object to and why people object to a certain
development (or lack thereof) in a language. Rather, I suggest that linguistic
purism is concerned not with language but only with a particular, political view of how to interpret the
world. What distinguishes linguistic purism from other conservative attitudes
is the vehicle for these views: in the case of linguistic purism, language
provides all the arguments, thus telling us about attitudes to society rather
than about language as an isolated feature: “[W]hat can ‘the state of the
language’ tell us about ‘the state of the nation’?” (Stevenson 1997: 186). The
spelling reform in Germany shows clearly that even subjects that are on the
absolute periphery of language (if that) such as spelling can be made into a case
to demonstrate Sprachverfall,
anything will do to get a point across, even is this means that factual
evidence is turned upside down.
1.1 The relevance
of purism
In
sociolinguistics we are concerned with the use and status of language in all
aspects of society. Apart from studies of how certain groups of speakers
‘subconsciously’ use certain types of language or linguistic constructions, an
interesting field of study is to examine what speakers ‘consciously’ think
about language and to what extent these beliefs correspond to actual usage. I
will follow Preston & Niedzielski’s (2000) concept of folk-linguistics as
the sum of reflections on language by folk, whereby folk is defined as untrained linguists, or rather, all people
acting as untrained linguists, that is to say that even a professor of
linguistics will belong to folk when
expressing a view on language that is not based on the rational reflection
facilitated by years of study. Many linguists, for example, will probably have
felt uneasy about the change in the spelling of daß to dass, and we will
probably correct a student’s to who
to make it to whom, despite our
awareness that daß to dass is merely a superficial,
orthographical change which does not actually affect the language, and that the
retention of whom is restricted to
educated written English, and even there a change in the language is slowly
taking hold.
Studying
folk-linguistic belief will help us understand linguistic purism better since
it enables us to compare actual changes in a language with the extent to which
speakers are aware of these. Of particular interest is the degree to which
folk’s views are accurate or simply based on an unverified mix of indoctrination
and half-baked observation, cf. the initial reaction by one interviewee who
claimed before counting that with whom
are you speaking is to be preferred over who are you speaking with since the latter involved more words (and
hence contained redundant words), despite the fact that both sentences contain
exactly the same number of words (Preston & Niedzielski 2000: 276).
A comparatively simple way of collecting puristic attitudes towards language is to scan evidence in the media, in particular letters to the editor (cf. Crystal 1988: 27ff. for English), as these often show very clearly that folk tend to have very serious opinions on correct / incorrect use of language and anything related to language but with an (often contradictory) array of reasoning. For example in German, the prescriptivist idea ‘to speak as you write’, is obeyed in the pronunciation of word-final schwa in habe, laufe etc. but violated in the ending {-ig}, rendering Honig to [ho;:nIC], rather than the expected [ho;:nIk] [2] . Crucially, folk claim to object to a particular construction (say the multiple negation in: I don’t know nothing) not because it is spoken by a group of speakers of lower social prestige (for example working class Cockney, Geordies) but because the construction is wrong, illogical, not rational, inelegant. In the case of the much cited multiple negation this line of argument seems particularly absurd because of its presence in Standard Italian and French as well as in the Middle High German and Middle English, all languages known for their ‘high literatures’.
It
remains to be seen to what extent one should distinguish between folk of lesser
education and folk of higher education, that is politicians, academics and
writers, especially when dealing with language but not linguistics. This
appears particularly sensible in the case of the German spelling reform, for
while people of all social strata objected to its introduction, it was in
particular the latter group of text producing professionals that were most
vocal in their outrage.
In order to show
that linguistic purism has nothing to do with linguistics per se, it seems sensible to examine a case where an aspect is
scrutinised that is considered to be part of language by folk but not, as such,
by expert linguists. To oversimplify slightly: orthography is not part of
language because it is an artificial system, consciously invented and developed
by people. Language, on the other, is naturally acquired in processes that are
even today unclear to us. Crucially, however, to say that orthography is part
of language would be to say that a language without orthography is missing
something. Clearly this is not the case, as evidenced by the hundreds of
(complete) languages in the world that are not written.
Another
aspect very important to the current discussion about the spelling reform is
the fact that, contrary to belief at least in Germany, spelling is rarely
codified by law. Codification of spelling usually comes after the codification
of a standard language (cf. Trask 1996: 334 for Basque in the 1960s), and in
most cases, the state does not intervene (but cf. the exception of France).
Instead, a certain dictionary tends to gain authoritative status by being
particularly old or large rather than by its formal elevation to guardian of
spelling or language. The situation was rather different in Germany from 1955
to 1998 when the privately-owned Duden
was granted the right by the regional governments (Kultusministerkonferenz) to give a ruling in cases of doubt. Note
in this context that the only aspects of the German language that are formally
codified are orthoepy and orthography / lexis; the grammar of standard German, although written down in the
Duden and respected as set in stone,
has no officially protected form.
Patrick Stevenson
(1997: 186) expressed his bewilderment over “the strange case of the reform of
German orthography.” Given the fact that orthography is not part of language
proper, it is rather surprising that a minor reform of some of the spelling
rules in standard German would cause the puristic reactions that it did: it is
this observation, namely that a virtually non-linguistic issue such as spelling
can cause puristic uproar, which supports most strongly the claim that
linguistic purism is a purely political rather than a linguistic issue.
2. German orthography:
development and history
2.1 The beginnings until 1850
It is useful at
this point to sketch very briefly how German spelling developed over the
centuries. Principally, German spelling is a graphic, alphabetic representation
of linguistic sounds as perceived by
the hearer. The first texts written in German date back to the eighth century,
but the problem of variation in spelling was found right from the beginning of
written German owing to different perceptions of sounds and the adherence to
different writing traditions (that is ‘write as you were taught to, not as you
pronounce the language’). Examples of the former include cases (a) where a
sound did not exist in Latin or (b) where different sounds (allophones) where
perceived as one sound (phoneme):
a) sounds that did not exist in Latin: [ð, q] =>
<th> (e.g. <thaz>, /ða:s/, {DAS})
b) sounds that were not perceived as different:
[x, ç] => <ch> (e.g. <lacht> vs <licht>)
In Early New High
German (1350-1730), tendencies towards supraregional language varieties and,
from the seventeenth century, a national German standard language did not
automatically entail the fixation of a unified orthography, showing again that
language and spelling are not mutually dependent on each other. In fact, it was
not until the late nineteenth century that official, binding norms were set by
the authorities. This does not mean, however, that prior to this, ‘free’
spelling resulted in anarchical writing. On the contrary, anyone reading even
seventeenth-century texts in the original today will be able to verify that
although the language may be different, the spelling proves no obstacle to
comprehension. This is not to say that the many spelling reformers since the
sixteenth century have been unsuccessful, but no individual orthographarian has
been followed and no legal authority has officially endorsed a particular way
of spelling.
However, because
of the adherence to spelling traditions, changes in the languages were not
always reflected in a modified spelling, causing an even greater rift between
spelling and pronunciation. Thus, while <ei> to the pronunication of
[aI], and the monophongisation of <ie> to [I@] are not reflected in the
spelling (we still write <klein> despite [klaIn] and <liebe> for
[li;b@]), the monophongisation of [uO] to [u;] has resulted in a modified
spelling, thus Middle High German guot
is spelled gut today.
Until the
mid-nineteenth century, spelling was neither anarchical nor formally codified
but consisted of “nach allmählicher Entwicklung traditionell gewachsener
Normen” (von Polenz 1999: 236). In 1862, the Prussian ministry of education
decreed that at least all teachers of the same school should agree to use only
one spelling (Wells 1990: 371ff.). In 1876, a first conference on spelling took
place in Berlin, resulting in at least a partial codification of orthography.
The degree to which irregularities were still very frequent is exemplified in
the marking of long vowels: while the homophones /vi;d6/ (<wider>, “again, against”), /fi;b6/
(<Fiber> (“fever, fibre”) and /mi;n@/ (<Mine> “facial expression,
mine”) were spelled identically, /li;t/ was not (<Lid> “eye-lid” vs
<Lied> “song”). Furthermore, there was some considerable regional
variation, such as the spelling of geminate consonants:
Prussia vs. Bavaria
Betttuch
– Bettuch
Kammmacher
– Kammacher
Litteratur
– Literatur
It was not until
1901/02 that a second, national conference took place in Berlin, this time
agreeing on further changes such as the deletion of <h> after <t>
in words of German origin:
<th> => <t> in Tal, Tat, Taler, tun, Tor, Ton, Rath,
and the
germanisation of the foreign graphemes <c> and <cc>:
<c>, <cc> => <k>,
<z> in foreign words, e.g. Kanzler,
Akzent, Publikum.
The 1901/02 conference covered substantial ground and
also received backing from Austria and Switzerland: “Einheit und
Einheitlichkeit, wenn auch nicht völlig konsequente Durchführung, waren
erreicht” (Wells 1990: 376). However, the delegates of the conference always
considered the results as work in progress and suggested that the rules should
be reviewed again. Importantly, the dictionary published by Konrad Duden
(1829-1911) since 1880 never had official status. Crucially, the 1901
conference published a set of rules, not a dictionary – and Duden ‘merely’
applied the rules to create a list of words and, for lack of competition and
presumably because of the quality of his work, the Duden dictionary was considered to be an authority. However, its
legal status as being the ultimate authority on questions of orthography (if it’s in the Duden, it’s correct, if it’s
not in the Duden, it’s wrong) dates back no further than 1955 when the
education secretaries of the regions passed a decree to that effect. It has
frequently been pointed out in the light of the current debate about the
spelling reform that the 1955 decree was illegal (as it created a monopoly for
a private company) and that, if one was to return to the old spelling, it could
technically only be the 1901/02 one - which unsurprisingly is hopelessly out of
date.
In 1996,
representatives of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland but also Liechtenstein,
Luxemburg, Hungary, Romania and Belgium signed an agreement which technically
is not so much a Neuregelung (despite
its name) but a Festsetzung of the
spelling rules. In contrast to what was accepted spelling before, the Neuregelung included a number of
changes, albeit comparatively minor ones. The reform was activated on 1 August
1998, and is supervised by an international commission (with representatives
from Germany (6), Austria (3) and Switzerland (3) to ensure the correct
implementation but also to review the reform in 2005 if it was felt that some
changes should be reversed or extended.
To conclude,
codification of German spelling has been a long process ever since the first
time German was written down. However, codification by legal authority has
taken place only for the last 140 years so. To list but a few, before 1998 the
standard German orthography included at least these inconsistencies:
i. orthographic differences with a purpose
a) semantic differentiation
Ehre – Ähre, Rad – Rat, Lerche – Lärche, sitzenbleiben – sitzen bleiben,
dass – das
b) etymological differentiation
/f/ =>
<ph>, <f>, v> (Philosophie, viel, fühl)
/r/ =>
<rh>, <r> (Rhabarber, Rahm)
ii. orthographic differences without a purpose
Auto fahren – radfahren Delphin – Elefant
Balletttruppe – Ballettänzer mit Bezug auf – in bezug auf
iii. semantic difference with no orthographic repercussion
hängenbleiben – hängenbleiben das
– das (relative pronoun vs definite
article)
iv. more than 50 rules on punctuation
It was felt that
a reform of the spelling of German was needed because the 1901/02 norms
· were
often decided on political, rather than orthographical grounds (e.g. ss/ß)
· were
always seen to be provisional
· were
simply too complicated and irregular, leaving speakers to struggle with the
orthography of their native language, even after thirteen years of schooling
As mentioned
above, a change of spelling is slower than change of language since the latter
is not always noticed by the speakers. However, there is general agreement that
spelling should correspond as much as possible to the actual pronunciation of a
language. In pre-standardised days, spelling would automatically adapt to
changes in languages as some experimentation of a given author would catch on
more readily than the suggestion of another. However, since 1901/02 we live in
standardized times and thus a ‘natürliche’ adjustment is not possible anymore.
It therefore seems quite legitimate to reform the spelling from ‘above’, that
is by state intervention to keep everyone happy – learner and user. Given the
degree of literacy and the number of the users, it would be foolish to reform
spelling radically every 20 years or
so. Rather, a ‘behutsame’ adjustment needs to counterbalance tradition and
innovation. Having said all this, the present reform is even less radical as it
merely simplifies and reduces irregularities within the spelling system. It
does not introduce innovations to reflect a change in the German language, it
merely repairs and streamlines the existing spelling.
The basic
principles underlying all changes to the old spelling are those of Vereinheitlichung (standardisation) and Vereinfachung (simplification):
Kuß – Kusses – Küsse
{KISS} => Kuss – Kusses - Küsse
Nummer – numerieren
{NUMBER} => Nummer – nummerieren
Platz – plazieren
{PLACE} => Platz – platzieren
also:
Stange – Stengel => Stange – Stängel
aufwendig –
aufwenden, Aufwand => aufwendig / aufwändig
Quantum – Quentchen => Quantum – Quäntchen
Schiffahrt => Schifffahrt / Schiff-Fahrt
Balletttruppe /
Ballettänzer => Balletttruppe / Balletttänzer
Zoo-Orchester => Zooorchester / Zoo-Orchester
Delphin but Elefant, Tele(ph/f)on => Del(ph/f)in,
Elefant, Telefon (but: Elephantiasis)
Ketchup but Scheck => Ket(s)chup, Scheck
radfahren but Auto fahren => Rad
fahren, Auto fahren
irgend jemand but irgendwer => irgendjemand,
irgendwer
in bezug auf but mit Bezug auf => in Bezug auf, mit
Bezug auf
schuld geben => Schuld geben
der, die, das letzte => der, die, das Letzte
Most commas are
now optional and should be used by the writer to structure a sentence / text
(cf. the use of commas in English!). The old rules are all still valid, as an
option.
We-ste but Wes-pe => We-ste,
Wes-pe
Zucker but Zuk-ker => Zu-cker
Heliko-pter => Helikop-ter / Heliko-pter
This is obviously
a somewhat over-simplified version, but it captures the spirit of the reform
(cf. Heller 1996 for a more detailed, downloadable overview). This is not to
deny that there are inconsistencies or problems with some of the changes – the
folk linguists, however, did not pick up on these but condemned the spelling
reform in general. It therefore seems justified to leave out a discussion of
the more contentious changes.
Language changes
all the time. In the case of standard languages change is considerably slower,
in particular as regards written standard languages for here Normverfasser, Normvermittler and Normüberwacher (von Polenz 1999: 230f.)
are actively looking after the preservation of the status quo[3].
In general, the Duden-dictionary is comparatively open to language change
relating to lexical innovation (for example anglicisms include Upgrade, Voucher, Midlife-Crisis, downloaden
as a well as pseudoanglicisms: Handy,
Twen, Smoking, Oldtimer[4])
while a similar degree of acceptance of change does not take place with regard
to grammar:
i. Ich glaube schon, weil ich habe das
gestern schon gesehen. [weil
+ VSecond]
ii. Vielleicht hatte ich es aber auch schon gestern gesehen gehabt. [double perfect]
iii. In
1848 [gab es eine schöne, bürgerliche Revolution]. [in
+ year]
The examples in
(i-iii) are fairly well-established features in spoken standard grammar but not
at all accepted in written discourse. For example the use of in + year was criticized as ‘bad’ German
as early as 1923 (Andresen 1923: 331), suggesting that it not a recent feature
of non-standard syntax. It is, however, important to note that the spelling
reform is not attempting to accept grammatical or lexical innovation. It does
not set out to allow new syntactic structures nor does it promote the use or
introduction of new (foreign or otherwise) words – it merely attempts to repair
system-internal irregularities.
Linguistic
purism, on the other hand, is actively concerned with the rejection or
acceptance of certain linguistic constructions.
“[A] purist is a person who attempts to purify a language of certain
undesirable features – be they unwanted foreign elements, vulgar
colloquialisms, or some new-fangled popular jargon.” (Thomas 1991:1). Neither
Thomas (1991) nor Rash (1998) include the field of orthography as a potential
part of linguistic purism:
[The aims
of purism are:]
a. the maintenance of what is generally accepted
as correct grammar and good style, and
b. the protection of a language from the
encroachment of perceived impurities, such as foreign influences,
provincialisms, coarse expressions and slang. (Rash 1998:89)
Some of the most
prominent modern examples of purism include
· loanwords:
against Anglicisms (downloaden (Duden
2000: 303) but in favour of Graecisms and Latinisms (Zirkus, Mauer, but esp. words such as Philosophie, Logik)[5]
· purity
of origin and meaning: Handy is not a
word because it is not a word in English
· con'troversy (as opposed to 'controversy) is wrong because it is
American
· medieval should be spelled mediæval or at least mediaeval
· “Deutsch
ist eine würdelose Sprache”,
that is do not ever use the periphrastic subjunctive with würde in ‘good’ German
Even more
pointedly, both Rash and Thomas agree that purism is pro-home and anti-foreign:
but one the most problematic cases in the recent spelling reform was the
Germanisation of foreign loanwords, that is the (optional) spelling of Spagetti, Delfin and Fassette (alongside
Spaghetti, Delphin, Facette), that
is an antipathy towards making words more German! The spelling reform, however,
does not serve to show Thomas’ and Rash’s assessment to be wrong. Rather, while
both are quite in their right to ignore orthography[6]
since it is not part of language proper, the folk-linguistic reactions to the
spelling reform nonetheless show to what extremes linguistic purism can go,
namely to attack issues that are not linguistic in the first place, thus
handing support to the claim suggested in this article that linguistic purism
has nothing to do with language as such but is merely a representation of a
particular set of political ideas.
So far we have
established that while Language changes and there is nothing to stop that,
spelling in standardised written languages often does not reflect a particular
(accepted) language change (such as the diphthongisation of /i:/ in English to
/ai/ (/wain/ = <wine>). Therefore it would seem both legitimate and
desirable to modernise the spelling at regular intervals.
The advantage of
such a modernisation would be a closer match between spelling and pronunciation
and hence greater ease for reader and writer to learn and remember the rules of
orthography. However, as we saw above, the 1998 spelling reform (in contrast to
1989, NdR 1989) does not even go so far as to propose any changes in the
matching of pronunciation and spelling, with some minor exceptions of
optionally extending the Germanised (that is closer to German pronunciation)
spelling of some foreign loan words[7].
As mentioned above, the only substantial thing the spelling reform is
successfully changing is the removal of spelling-internal inconsistencies. To
argue against the reform is to argue in favour of irregularities –
irregularities that are hard to learn but serve the very useful purpose of
distinguishing between speakers with an advanced education and those without,
given the importance of knowing how to spell properly for example when writing
a job application. To hear from leading intellectuals that one should maintain
the status quo which makes life difficult for a vast majority of the
German-speaking people can only be described as disappointing. But let us look
at the reactions in more detail.
5.1.1 The
spelling reform is unconstitutional
In 1996, a
professor of Law at the university of Jena took his case to the federal
constitutional court (BVG), arguing for the withdrawal of the spelling reform
as it violated his rights of personal dignity, personal freedom, freedom of
action, right as a parent, freedom of speech and freedom of teaching (Johnson
2000: 116f.). Several further court cases were heard (roughly 50% decided in
favour of the reform), mostly from parents claiming that the state cannot force
their children to be taught a new spelling, until in July 1998 the BVG rejected
the complaints, arguing that it was quite in a state’s right to change the
spelling norm for its employees (civil servants, including teachers)
(25.3.1999, FAZ). Despite the BVG’s ruling, a feeling remained that a
democratic government should not be allowed to impose a certain way of spelling
(“Verrat demokratischer Grundsätze (Artikel 20GG)”, Dr Karl-Theodor Lieser,
Berlin, 5./6.8.2000, BZ, S.9), in spite of the fact that this is what the state
had been doing since Wilhelmine days (1903).
The claim that
the implementation of the spelling reform followed undemocratic procedures is
equally absurd, given the length of the consultation process, the involvement
of independent expertise and the signing of the agreement by several foreign
countries as well as all regional secretaries for education (Kultusminister), following the normal
procedures for changes in the curriculum. However, the reactions were quite
different, arguing that the procedures had ‘raped’ the parliaments, and are
reminiscent of the ‘dictatorial GDR-practices’. The East German writer Günther
Kunert warned that one should act now, otherwise we will find ourselves in a
‘Halb-DDR’:
Sie ist undemokratisch durchgesetzt worden. (WIR gegen
die Rechtschreibreform (Schleswig-Holstein, 1997/8)
Hier sind die Parlamente von den Kultusministern
vergewaltigt worden. (Horst
Milde, President of Lower Saxony-Parliament, 1.11.1996)
Nicht nur, was die neuen Regeln vorschrieben, sondern
auch und vor allem, wie sie “von oben herab durchgedrückt” worden seien, empöre
alle freiheitlich denkenden Bürger, sagte der Schriftsteller Günther Kunert auf
derselben Veranstaltung. Jemand, der einen großen Teil seines Lebens in der DDR
verbracht habe, fühle sich an diktatorische Praktiken erinnert: Die Einführung
der neuen Regeln wirke auf ihn wie ein Staatsstreich. Wer damit einmal Erfolg
habe, sei in Versuchung, dergleichen zu wiederholen. Der Coup der
Kultusminister könnte auch andere dazu verleiten, ähnlich zu verfahren. Daher
gehe es nicht nur um die Regeln der Rechtschreibung, sondern auch und vor allem
um die Regeln der Demokratie. Er rufe allen Bürgern zu “wehret den Anfängen”,
sonst fänden sie sich unversehens in einer Halb-DDR wieder. (FAZ, 31.7.2000)
Finally, it was
argued that freedom of expression presupposes the conscious decision to spell a
word in a certain way, something which, as is claimed below, is not possible
anymore with the new spelling.
Der frühere Feuilletonchef der ‘Bayerischen
Staatszeitung’, Krieger, appellierte an seine [journalistischen] Kollegen, sich
die Freiheit des Schreibens zu nehmen. Freiheit setze voraus, daß man sich für
eine bestimmte Schreibweise bewußt entscheide
und daß der Leser beabsichtigte Abweichungen, Nuancen, erkenne. (FAZ 1. Aug. 2000)
Astonishingly, it
seems to escape Krieger that he himself never consciously chose to spell a word
in a certain way but that he simply followed the rules as he learned them at
school!
Another argument
to show the reform to be a piece of undemocratic action relates to its
designers, leading experts in orthography from Germany, Switzerland and Austria
who had been working on reforming German spelling over decades but who
nonetheless are described as ‘anonymous’, ‘dilettantes’ whose expertise on
matters of spelling is claimed to be inferior to those of writers and
journalists (who, surely, are experts in producing texts, not in preferring a
certain spelling over another):
von einer kleinen, weitgehend anonymen Expertengruppe
(DENK-Aufruf, Oct.1996)
Die zahlreichen Schriftsteller und Professoren, deren
Kompetenz die der Schreibreformer bei weitem übersteigen dürfte,
[...].(Friedrich Denk, FAZ, 21.10.1996)
Es ist höchste Zeit, diesen Dilettantenverein aufzulösen
und den missglückten Großversuch an den Schulen zu stoppen.(Prof. Dr. H.
Jochems, Kreuztal, Spiegel 16/2000)
bornierte [...] Vorgaben inkompetenter “Fachleute” mit
ihrem prätentiösen Dilettantismus [...] (Dr Karl-Theodor Lieser, Berlin,
5./6.8.2000, BZ, p.9)
It has also been
claimed that the spelling reform was successful only because of the German
inclination towards obedience, which is described as part of the German
personality, something that has been around for some time and one cannot get
rid of since in Germany one always preferred to talk about rules rather than
content. As J. von Westphalen put it: The Germans want to obey. They always
want to get everything just right:
Ich finde es als ein gutes Zeichen der Demokratie, wenn
Leute waehlen koennen wie sie sich entsprechend ausdruecken wollen. Ich moechte
hierzu noch bemerken, dass man es hier in England als ein amuesantes Deutsches
Karaktermerkmal [sic!, NL] findet, dass immer alles bis ins letzte Detail als
klar definiert und gesetzlich geregelt erscheinen muss. In dieser Beziehung
sind finde ich die Englaender als eher laid back. (Brian Muller, Shoreham 7. Aug. 2000, FAZ)
[Die Reform] konnte nicht überzeugen, trotz allen von
oben ausgeübten Drucks, trotz aller Bereitschaft zu vorauseilendem Gehorsam,
die in Deutschland offenbar so leicht nicht auszurotten ist. (Christian Meier,
31.7.2000, FAZ)
Man ist versucht zu resignieren: In Deutschland hat man
sich halt schon immer mehr über Regeln als über Inhalte aufgeregt. (Dr. Axel
Stommel, Teltow, BZ, 5./6.2000, p.9)
Die Deutschen. Sie wollen gehorchen. Dem Diktat der
Orthographie. Sie wollen alles richtig machen. (Joseph von Westphalen,
19.2.1997, p. XIII, Süddeutsche Zeitung)
Whereas the above
comments principally linked the spelling reform with political issues such as
democracy and civil obedience, the following will shed some light on the
connection between the reform and language.
It is argued that
the old spelling was highly phonetic[8],
and thus there was no need for a reform. This was seen as confusing even for an
experienced reader and unsuccessful on the evidence of the first Klassenarbeiten at school especially at
a time (Oct. 1996) when the new spelling was restricted to the classroom. But
no reformer had ever claimed that the benefits of the reform (easier learning
of spelling) would be quantifiable within a few years. Instead, it was always
anticipated that one will have to wait until the new spelling has become
visible in everyday life, thus probably not before the end of the transition
period in 2005:
Unter den Sprachen Europas nimmt die deutsche
Schriftsprache [die alte Rechtschreibung] insofern eine Sonderstellung ein, als
sie keineswegs besonders kompliziert, sondern im Gegenteil besonders einfach
ist. Die [...] phonetisch höchst getreue [sic!] Schreibweise [...]. (Dankwart
Guratzsch, 17.10.1996, Die Welt)
Als Lehrerin habe ich ziemlich schnell gemerkt, daß die
Rechtschreibreform von weltfremden Theoretikern ausgeheckt worden ist. Die Fehlerzahl
sinkt nämlich nur minimal. Nach Auswertung der ersten Deutscharbeiten meiner
Schüler habe ich festgestellt, daß sich der Fehlerquotient um maximal 0,5
Prozent verbessert. (Marion von der Kammer, Berlin, Spiegel 44/1996)
Als begeisterte Vielleserin habe ich mir bislang drei
Romane in der neuen Rechtschreibung gekauft. Immer wieder bin ich dort an
Sätzen hängengeblieben, die durch die neuen Regeln so unübersichtlich waren,
daß ich sie mehrmals lesen mußte, um überhaupt ihren Sinn zu erfassen. [...]
Alle drei Bücher habe ich nach halber Lektüre entnervt beiseite gelegt. (Heike
Blumenberg, Berlin, 5./6.8.2000, BZ, S.9)
On the other
hand, a simplified spelling is misunderstood as a simplification of the content
of German lessons, a procedure that one would surely not wish to extend to
subjects like maths and physics, lowering their content value also:
Die Rechtschreibreform sei gut für die Grundschüler, weil
sie nun weniger Fehler machen, sagt Bundesministerin Bulmahn. Und was ist mit
der Mathematik, der Physik und den vielen anderen Fächern? Sollten die nicht
vielleicht auch auf Grundschul-Niveau herunterreformiert werden? (Gerd Segatz,
Norderstedt 10. Aug.
2000, FAZ)
5.2.2.1 The spelling reform simplifies the German language
One of the most
astonishing comments relates to the equation not only of spelling and language
but also the direct relation between spelling (= language) and cultural values.
It is argued that the spelling reform damages the linguistic culture, is a
cultural disaster, messes up literary quotations, and its retraction would be a
benefit to culture in general:
Gleichzeitig fordert der [Hochschulv]erband die
Kultusministerkonferenz auf, “mit den erforderlichen Korrekturen an der
Rechtschreibreform die deutsche Sprachkultur vor Schaden zu bewahren”. (FAZ,
2.08.2000, p. 1)
kulturpolitisches Desaster (dtv-Chef Wolfgang Balk) (Spiegel, 42/1996)
Gezeigt wird, dass [die neuen] Wörterbücher literarische
Zitate verhunzen, dass Schüler nicht weniger, sondern mehr Fehler machen als
früher. (Prof. Peter Eisenberg, FAZ, 31.7.2000)
[Wie ich sagte:] Da Sprache wichtigster Teil der Kultur
sei, dürfe die Rücknahme eines Eingriffs in sie der Kultur zugutekommen.
(Hermann Kant, Prälank, 5./6.8.2000/ BZ, p. 9)
Furthermore, the
spelling reform is claimed to result in the trivialisation of the language,
confusion, linguistic impoverishment, and that it reduces the number of
expressions of the language or even eliminates words[9],
and leads to an intellectual split in German society because Panther and Thunfisch now have optional spelling variants without a <h>:
führt zur Verflachung der deutschen Sprache (Siegfried
Lenz) (Spiegel, 42/1996)
[D]ie sichtbarsten Folgen [der Reform sind] Verwirrung,
sprachliche Verarmung und die Beschneidung der sprachlichen
Ausdrucksmöglichkeiten. (Helmut Krüger, Potsdam, BZ, 5./6.8.2000)
[Sie] eliminiert Wörter aus dem deutschen Wortschatz und
vermindert so die Ausdrucksmöglichkeiten unserer Sprache. (WIR gegen die
Rechtschreibreform (Schleswig-Holstein), 1997/8)
Wenn Panter und
Tunfisch möglich werden, aber Panther und Thunfisch Hauptformen bleiben, entsteht eine mentale
Zwei-Klassen-Gesellschaft. (Spiegel
42/1996, p. 264)
The famous
liberal writer Siegfried Lenz claims that he signed the Frankfurt declaration
(urging ministers to stop the reform) against the spelling reform to halt the decline of the language! It is somewhat disheartening when even leading
intellectuals do not realise the difference between spelling and language,
especially if this lack of subject knowledge does not prevent them from
publicly declaring their strong resistance. That this is not restricted to
Siegfried Lenz is clearly shown by the astonishing number of famous
intellectuals that signed the Frankfurt declaration and who joined with Günter
Grass in congratulating the FAZ on their return to the old spelling:
[Ich unterschrieb die Frankfurter Erklärung] als Bürger
und Schriftsteller, den der wahrnehmbare Sprachverfall
nicht unbesorgt sein läßt. (Siegfried Lenz, Spiegel 42/1996, 268)
Having considered
criticisms that relate to politically or culturally based lines of
argumentation, there are also a number of statements that simply reject the
spelling reform for reasons that are much more openly emotional. The Spiegel title page from 14 October 1996
opened with the claim that the German language was endangered because of the nonsensical (new) spelling, while the
authors of the Schleswig-Holstein petition stated that the reform was an attack on both language and literature!
Schwachsinn Rechtschreibung - Rettet die deutsche
Sprache! (Spiegel title page,
42/1996)
Die Rechtschreibreform ist ein Angriff auf die deutsche
Sprache und Literatur. (WIR gegen die Rechtschreibreform, Schleswig-Holstein,
1997/8)
The novelist
Walter Kempowski feels that the new (optional) way of separating the ‘good old
German’ word Abend as A-bend at the end of a line is simply
barbaric. Even more absurdly, it is argued by Lieber and Meyer in the Berliner
Zeitung that the new rule of never dropping a consonant in the writing of
compounds is ‘simply ludicrous’ or ‘mad’; both writers clearly show their
complete ignorance of the old spelling in this context, since triple letters
were the norm even before 1998 (no letter was dropped when three vowels
co-occurred or three consonants co-occurred with another consonant following).
Again, their criticism is contributes to the overall impression that the
negative reactions to the spelling reform were based on general puristic
feelings rather than a critical analysis of the proposed changes:
Jetzt gipfelt diese Änderungsschneiderei sogar darin, daß
man ein schönes, altes, deutsches Wort barbarisch trennt. A-bend. (Walter
Kempowski, in Die Woche, 18.10.1996)
Die Verwendung von drei aufeinander folgenden Buchstaben
[...] ist schlicht affig, und die Ersetzung von ‘ß’ durch ‘ss’ ist eher
peinlich. (Dr. Karl-Theodor Lieser, Berlin, BZ, 5./6.8.2000)
‘Missstand’, ‘Schlussstrich’, ‘Litfasssäule’ – keine
Sprache der Erde erlaubt drei gleiche Buchstaben in Folge. Wer sich so etwas
ausdenkt, gehört in die Klapsmühle! (Ingo Meyer, Berlin, BZ, 5./6.8.2000)[10]
Let us finish
this section on the reaction to the spelling reform with an extreme though not
unrepresentative line of argumentation. In response to the FAZ’s return to the
old rule, the following letter sees the change in the spelling rules as an
attack on the intellectual and cultural heritage of the German people as well
as on everyone’s right to think freely. How it can be seriously claimed that
having to spell dass rather than daß restricts one’s freedom of thought,
as the following letter claims, really is difficult to comprehend.
Es ist nicht nur, daß völlig widersinnige Orthographie verordnet
wurde, die Rechtschreibreform war/ist ein vorsätzlicher Angriff auf die
deutsche Sprache. [...] Der Eingriff des Staates auf die Sprache [d.h. die
Rechtschreibreform] muß als Angriff auf das geistig kulturelle Erbe eines
Volkes und auf das individuelle Recht auf freies Denken, das nur aus der
Sprache wachsen kann, gedeutet werden. (Roman Wengerter, Frankfurt am Main,
3.8.2000, FAZ).[11]
The spelling
reform probably caused as much emotional debate in Germany as the discussion
over changing the postcodes in the early 1990s and the introduction of the
Euro. The reactions exemplified in the quotations in section 5 show very
clearly that the spelling reform was rejected by a diverse range of people and
for a vast array of reasons. However, careful consideration of what spelling,
and for that matter the spelling reform, actually is, has shown that the
general criticism by the public is ill-founded and based on ignorance and gut
reaction[12]. The reform
was designed to erase some of the worst irregularities of the spelling rules,
with an aim to facilitate the learning and application of these rules, esp. for
school children. It was never its target to advance the progress of Germany, as
indirectly presupposed by Theo Waigel:
Das Gras [des Protestes] wächst mittlerweile so laut,
dass ein Politiker wie Theo Waigel es hört und in der Passauer Nibelungenhalle
verkünden kann, es bringe Deutschland nicht vorwärts, wenn man statt Schiffahrt nun plötzlich Schifffahrt schreibe. Wo er recht (alt) hat, hat er Recht (neu). Indessen verfolgte das
Reformwerk nie den Zweck, Deutschland voranzubringen. (Hartmut Unterstöger,
19.2.1997, p. XI, Süddeutsche Zeitung)
That the poets
and writers as representative of German intelligentsia and professional ‘text
producers’ reject the reform out of hand is equally surprising since it is
poets who often ‘disobey’ certain rules of spelling or punctuation in order to
achieve a particular effect. Their complaints over the reform hint at a certain
degree of intellectual arrogance, according to the principle: I learnt the old
rules, why should others have an easier time?:
Nicht für die Dichter wurde die Reform gemacht, sondern
für das Millionenheer der Lernenden. (Dr Hans-Peter Nolting, Göttingen, Spiegel
44/1996)
Dichter, bleib bei deinen Leisten! Sicherlich hätte die
Kommission auch die Schriftsteller hören sollen. Aber diese sind nicht die
Obergutachter über die Sprache. (Michael Kussmann, Neuss, Spiegel 44/1996)
And
finally, it is striking that spelling is more or less consistently equated with
language, and language with cultural heritage and thought. But as shown above,
changing the spelling of a certain word neither changes its syntax, phonology,
nor semantics:
Wenn im Deutschen
(wie in vielen anderen Sprachen) “Filosofie” geschrieben werden sollte, würde
es mich emeritierten Philosophieprofessor auch nicht stören, solange das
denkerische Werk unverfälscht bleibt. Die Denker verwechseln hier denken mit
buchstabieren. (Prof. W. Hirsch, Altenholz, Spiegel 44/1996)
So, “what can
‘the state of the language’ tell us about ‘the state of the nation’?”
(Stevenson 1997: 186). Leaving aside the fact that the spelling reform does not
concern language per se, the
reactions nonetheless show us very clearly how language is viewed in Germany
today. It appears as something holy, untouchable, something that is both part
of the people, but also represents intellectual thought and cultural heritage.
It is like a home to everyone, and nobody must change it, or else we lose our sense
of belonging:
Die Muttersprache ist wie die Landschaft, in die man
hineingeboren wird, etwas Angestammtes, eine Heimat, aus der niemand vertrieben
werden darf. Wir haben sie ererbt, wir müssen sie heil weitergeben. (Günter Gillesen, FAZ,
12.8.1988, cited in Stevenson 1997: 186)
On a more
political level, it appears that the reasons for the ferocity of the reactions
have to do with at least two points that are not restricted to linguistic
issues:
· Media-hype
à la Gore/Bush: news is made by the media; if enough journalists decide that
something is newsworthy, they generally succeed in arousing the interest of the
public. It is no surprise that the spelling reform became an issue only once
the media took an interest, despite the fact that press releases and general
information had been issued well in advance of the final decision over the
spelling reform in 1996.
· Reformstau: German politics
has been plagued over the last few years with the inability of government and
opposition to agree on major political reforms such as modernising the health
system, taxes and the state pension scheme. Judging from the reaction to the
spelling reform, one easily gains the impression that the public was defying
the attempt by the ‘politicians up there’ to impose another unworkable reform
on ‘us down here’.
The outcry over
the spelling reform is very similar to objections to an increasing use of
English loan words, but in the case of the spelling reform the language is
not actually affected. The reactions to the reform often refer to linguistic
issues but in all cases are misguided and often based on a misinterpretation
or ignorance of the facts. But the facts, it seems, are unimportant. What
appears to be important is that the language is in danger and thus we need
to protect it. This is, of course, the foundation of linguistic purism: an
endangered language and therefore an urge or even necessity to protect it.
In this way, the spelling reform is an excellent example on which to base
an investigation of linguistic purism, as it shows us that puristic feelings
can be activated even when no reason actually exists. The reaction to the
spelling reform is not about language – it is an attitude towards change and
about a political conviction that change is bad in principle and must be defied.
By showing us how little puristic attitudes are connected to actual threats
to a language, the spelling reform provides us with a lesson in linguistic
purism par excellence!
Andresen, Karl
Gustaf (1923) Sprachgebrauch und
Sprachrichtigkeit im Deutschen. 11th edition. Darmstadt:
Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. (Reprinted 1967)
Crystal,
David (1988) The English Language. Harmondsworth:
Penguin.
DR = Institut für
deutsche Sprache. 1996. Deutsche
Rechtschreibung: Regeln und Wörterverzeichnis - Text der amtlichen Regelung.
Tübingen: Gunter Narr.
Duden. Die deutsche
Rechtschreibung (222000) Mannheim: Bibliographisches Institut &
F.A. Brockhaus.
Eisenberg,
Peter (2000) Zur Morphologie von Fremdwörtern im Deutschen. Paper
given at the Forum for Germanic Language
Studies. Manchester University. Forthcoming in Jahrbuch
des IDS Mannheim für das Jahr 2000.
Heller, Klaus
(1996/1998) Rechtschreibreform - Eine Zusammenfassung. In: Sprachreport Extraausgabe. Mannheim: Institut für deutsche Sprache
[http://www.ids-mannheim.de/].
Johnson,
Sally (2000) The Cultural Politics of the 1998 Reform of German Orthography.
In: German Life and Letters 53,
106-125.
NdR = Kommission für
Rechtschreibfragen des Institut für deutsche Sprache, Mannheim. 1989. Zur Neuregelung der deutschen
Rechtschreibung. Düsseldorf: Schwann-Bagel.
Polenz, Peter von
(1999) Deutsche Sprachgeschichte. Vol
III. Das 19. und 20.Jahrhundert. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Preston,
Dennis R.; Niedzielski, Nancy (2000) Folk
Linguistics. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Rash,
Felicity (1998) The German Language in
Switzerland. Bern, Frankfurt/M: Peter Lang.
Russ,
Charles V.J. (1994) The German Language
Today. London: Routledge.
Stevenson,
Patrick (1997) The German-Speaking World.
London: Routledge.
Thomas,
George (1991) Linguistic purism.
London: Longmans.
Trask,
R.L. (1996) Historical Linguistics. London: Arnold.
Wells, Christopher
J. (1990) Deutsch – Eine Sprachgeschichte
bis 1945. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer.
The
Schleswig-Holsteiner Nils Langer studied at Newcastle upon Tyne, Leiden,
Heidelberg and Wolfenbüttel and completed his PhD thesis on the effectiveness
of seventeenth century grammarians for the standardisation of German in 2000.
Having worked briefly at University College Dublin, he is now a Lecturer in
German at the University of Bristol.
[1] Thanks to Lesley Sharpe and Frank Shaw for
their very helpful comments. As always, all faults remain my own.
[2] There is of course an obvious reason for
that. When Theodor Siebs’s orthoepy (Bühnenaussprache,
1898) was agreed, most of the delegates were Northern German (von Polenz 1999:
257ff.). The Northern pronunciation for /ho:nig/ is [ho:nIC] whereas the
‘expected’ [ho:nIk] is realised in Southern German varieties (Russ 1994: 63).
[3] However, the Duden did not define itself as mere a preserver in recent years.
Rather, the editors observed contemporary usage of German and included new
words in their dictionary provided they had appeared sufficiently frequently in
print over a certain period of time.
[4] Note that in the Duden Rechtschreibwörterbuch (2000) of these examples only Handy and Twen are actually identified as pseudo-anglicisms (“anglisierend”),
while Smoking and Oldtimer are listed as English originals
(“engl.”) despite the fact that their use in German does not at all correspond
to that in English .
[5] In this context, cf. the difference between Fremdwörter and fremde Wörter (Eisenberg 2000).
[6] Thomas (1991: 66) mentions one case of puristic
outcry over orthography when in 1818, the Latin letter <j> was introduced
to written Czech. Trask (1996: 334) briefly refers to problems related to the
spelling of Basque up to its standardisation in the 1960s.
[7] This lack of radicality obviously opens the
question posed by “reformophiles”: to what extent the considerable intellectual
and logistic effort of a formal implementation of a spelling reform can be
justified if the changes are only minor. While I fully accept the argument –
and there are reasons why a more radical reform has not been postulated (again)
–, this article deals with puristic reactions from people to whom even a minor
change is already far too much – hence I feel justified in not discussing the
advantages of more extensive changes over the present Neuregelung.
[8] Although this is true when compared to
French and English, but certainly not for Italian or Dutch. Also, the claim is
clearly not accurate when seen on its own: if the relation between spelling and pronunciation of German
was indeed phonetic (or rather: phonemic) in a highly regular fashion, nobody
would have suggested reforming it.
[9] The argument refers to the claim that
because former sitzenbleiben and sitzen bleiben are now spelled in the
same way, one of the words is lost. That this cannot be upheld is clear to
anyone who realises that a word consists of meaning, syntax (morphology) and
phonology. Notice that even the old spelling made no orthographic difference
between the two meanings of hängenbleiben
(“to get stuck” vs. “to repeat a year in school”).
[10] As Frank Shaw points out, at least Romanian
allows for the triple letters (copiii lui Kennedy; “Kennedy’s Children”).
[11] I am indebted to Michael Gratzke (Cambridge)
for providing this example.
[12] There are other critics, who, equipped with an
understanding of the subject matter, reject the spelling reform because of
internal inconsistencies. These critics were not discussed in this article
because they are not puristic as such and because they are part of a tiny
minority.