Variaatio ja sen selittäminen kaakkoishämäläisen murreaineiston valossa

• Hanna Lappalainen

Avainsanat: hämäläismurteet, murteen muuttuminen, murteentutkimus, sosiolingvistiikka, variaatio, yleinen kielitiede

Abstrakti

Variation and its explanation, with respect to dialect material from South-east Häme (englanti)

1996 (100)

Hanna Lappalainen (University of Helsinki; fi)

Variation and its explanation, with respect to dialect material from Southeast Hme

In sociolinguistics, variation is regarded as the self-evident starting point, and the objective is then to explain it in terms of correlations between linguistic and social variables. This article examines how variation can be interpreted, and what kinds of problems may arise in the explanation of variation. It is based on data from the Artjrvi dialect in Southern Finland: interviews (n = 20) with representatives of four different age-groups, carried out in 1993, plus comparative material collected earlier.

The writer examines the preservation and decline of various dialectal features from different sources. It seems that the most marked features have given way to more widely spread variants from the standard spoken language (see Figure 1, Tables 1 and 2). This development appears to have occurred more quickly in Southern Finland than elsewhere in the country. The rapid levelling of the dialect can be explained by the loose social networks of the speakers: the migration movement began earlier in Southern Finland than in the rest of the country, and it resulted in the spread of new variants to Artjrvi. Contacts with the main towns in Southern Finland have been lively for several decades.

The variation correlates to some extent with social factors, sex, age and social background. However, explanations at the individual level cannot be proposed with traditional methods, since the groups are very heterogeneous in their internal variation (see Figure 4). The article ends with a discussion of how social networks can be relevant to the interpretation of idiolectal differences.