 |
WWW.MARQUETTE.EDU CAMPUS CONTACTS SITE INDEX 
|
       |
|
The relatively isolated, rural society of the Amish has helped Pennsylvania German survive.
“Can you speak Pennsylvania German?” Those who can provide fertile field study for Dr. Steven Hartman Keiser, one of the few linguists studying the unique language of the Amish and Old Order Mennonite.
An assistant professor of English, he first heard the language from his Mennonite grandmother. Now he’s working on a dialectology of Pennsylvania German, studying the vocabulary, pronunciation and structural differences across regions. He is particularly interested in studying how language changes spread over large, discontinuous space, such as the isolated Amish communities of the Midwest.
A product of colonial Pennsylvania, the language is a “New World” blend that most closely resembles the dialect of the Palatinate region near Frankfurt, Germany, with a bit of Swiss influence mixed in. In the beginning, the Amish and Mennonites were a minority among Pennsylvania
German speakers.
“There were once hundreds of thousands of Pennsylvania German speakers in Pennsylvania — Lutherans and Reformed and all sorts of faith traditions — but now the language is all but dead in those groups. The only place where it’s still alive, where children are still learning it, is among Old Order Mennonites and the Amish,” Hartman Keiser says.
Pennsylvania German speakers are fluid bilinguals, he notes. Although Amish and Old Order Mennonite children speak the native language at home, all of their schooling (which ends in eighth grade) is in English.
Hartman Keiser estimates that there might be 300,000 Pennsylvania German speakers today, down from a peak of nearly a million in the late-1800s. And despite its Pennsylvania roots, the language is now most concentrated in the American Midwest.
Pennsylvania German speakers have defied the pattern of other immigrant populations, who usually drift farther from the native language with every generation. In contrast, the relatively isolated, rural society of the Amish has helped Pennsylvania German survive, he says.
Even more surprising is that the language is on the rise. The Amish population in North America doubles every 20 years, and by 2020, it’s likely to reach 400,000. “In all of the Amish communities, you have children learning Pennsylvania German,” he says. “So as long as the kids are learning it, it’s alive, and it’s growing.”
BLAZING TRAILS
Armed with a new federal grant, Dr. Charles Wilkie heats up the field of fire retardancy.
ECO ENIGMA
NAZI CHIC
Dr. Irene Guenther unravels the sinister relationship between fashion and fascism.
MECHANICAL WONDER
LISTENING TO THE ANIMALS
IDENTITY CRISIS
What does it mean to be an individual? Dr. John Davis examines the human side of economics.
RESEARCH IN BRIEF
- Trial by TV: pop culture meets law
- Craving answers about appetite
- Oh favorite soda, how do I love thee?
- Text messaging: deciphering an electronic Babel
- Getting to the root of the problem
- Kannscht du Deitsch schwetze
- Innovations in family planning
- Healing pain
- Revving up rehab through robotics
- The other side of the therapy couch
- Marquette bookshelf
- Research at Marquette
Quick Facts About Marquette
| Identity: | Catholic, Jesuit, private |
| Established: | 1881 |
| Location: | Milwaukee, Wisconsin |
| Undergraduate: | 8,048 |
| Postgraduate: | 3,500 |
| Campus: | Urban, 80 acres |
| Athletics: | 14 NCAA Division I teams (Big East Conference) |
| Colors: | Blue and Gold |
