Levelling Phenomena in the Flemish Dialects: Some Observations on Their Teleology

Abstract

When in today's industrialized Western language communities dialects change, this change usually amounts to loss of variation, because it results in levelling(s) under the influence of and in the direction of the standard language. This is also the general tendency in the dialects of the Flemish part of Belgium. Yet, in my own and other people's research into recent developments in the Flemish-Belgian dialects, there is also prove for other tendencies: processes of change with divergence at its effect, but also cases of consolidation and even reinforcement of a dialect phenomenon. I will report on the following three situations, all of which have become more or less unconventional: (I) dialect levelling towards another variety than the standard language; (2) dialect changes through internal restructuring; (3) some peculiar examples of dialect consolidation

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