Dialect perception, linguistic regionalization and the influence of mundane mobility

Presentation of the published thesis "Sprachliche Regionalisierung. Dialektwahrnehmung und Dialektwandel im Kontext von institutioneller Raumplanung und individueller Mobilität" (https://doi.org/10.25162/9783515139175), held at the 13th International Conference on Language Variation in Europe (ICLaVE | 13) on "language, im/mobilities, and belonging" in Lausanne on 2 July 2026. Abstract: The present study examines language, mobility, and belonging in a rural region in Switzerland that has been constructed in the 1960s due to economic and political developments across cantonal borders. As Britain (2010, 2013) states, however, regions are above all shaped by the daily routines of the residents, i.e. by social and societal influences. Furthermore, inhabitants do not only form a region through their social practices, but also by linking linguistic forms with regions (cf. Auer 2013; Christen 2015). The study combines dialectological and sociolinguistic questions and methods to examine dialect perception and dialect change. Sociolinguistic interviews (cf. Labov 1984) were conducted to collect spontaneous speech data and mental maps (cf. Preston 1989) from 69 informants from three generations. The results show that, contrary to previous research (cf. Christen 2010; Stoeckle and Schwarz 2019), the cantons and their borders do not necessarily represent the primary classification category for lay people in Switzerland. Furthermore, a real-time comparison of six variables with the language atlas of German-speaking Switzerland (SDS I, SDS II) provides evidence that mobility does not necessarily lead to convergence with urban dialects. Although the inhabitants of the rural region have had increasing contact with the nearby city over the past decades, their language shows no clear convergence; on the contrary, levelling has taken place within the rural region. However, it is shown that commuting, in contrast to leisure mobility, has a statistically significant influence on the basic dialectal realisations of the salient and socially evaluated velarisation of Middle High German nd to ŋ. It can be concluded that this linguistic feature is not used as an identity marker by commuters, but rather abandoned due to the attributions associated with it. The presentation will outline the methodology and key findings of the dissertation project and place them in the context of current research.