Dr Nils Langer
Email: nils.langer@bris.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0117) 92 89841
Room: 1.76, 21 Woodland Road
Office Hours (Semester 2, 2011/12): Wed 11-12, Thur 10-11
Reader in German Linguistics
Fellow of the Humboldt-Foundation
Dr Langer is a Schleswig-Holsteiner born and bred who, in 1991, moved to England after his Zivildienst in Neumünster to study English and German Linguistics at the fine University of Newcastle upon Tyne. Apart from Newcastle where he obtained his B.A. in 1994 and his M.A. in 1995, he studied in Leiden, Heidelberg, Wolfenbüttel and Dublin (UCD). He obtained his PhD from the University of Newcastle in 2000 and has been part of the academic staff at Bristol since 2000. He was promoted to a Readership in 2008 and was a University Research Fellow in 2010/11. Since January 2007, Dr Langer has been the President of the Forum of Germanic Language Studies (FGLS), the subject association of (mostly) British and Irish researchers working on the linguistics of German, Dutch, Flemish and Scandinavian languages. In 2011, he obtained a fellowship from the Alexander-von-Humboldt-Foundation, Bonn.Administration
Dr Langer is Subject Lead for German and is happy to answer queries about the Bristol world of German studies.
Teaching
Dr Langer teaches various aspects of German linguistics, ranging from the technical description of the morphology and syntax of Modern German to historical (History of German, Early New High German) and sociolinguistic (Low German, linguistic prescriptivism, language policy) concerns of the language. He also teaches a general Introduction to Linguistics across the School of Modern Languages.
Research Interests
Dr Langer's specialisms lie in the general area of historical sociolinguistics. His doctoral research, which focussed on the effectiveness of prescriptive grammarians in the seventeenth century was followed by a co-authored study, together with Wini Davies (Aberystwyth University), on the history of German folk linguistic views, with a particular focus on the stigmatisation of morpho-syntactic features from 1500 to the present day. This research, supported by an AHRC major research grant, was published as The Making of Bad Language, a monograph in the VarioLingua series.
This interest in the history of what people think about language and how the actual shape of standard languages was decided, either by grammarians, institutions, individuals or actual language use has sparked a number of scholarly activities in the form of conference, workshops, and summer schools. In 2003 he organised an international conference on Linguistic Purism in the Germanic Languages (proceedings, co-edited with Wini Davies (Aberystwyth) have been published as Linguistic Purism in the Germanic Languages by De Gruyter (Berlin, New York) which was followed in 2005 by a conference on ' Language History from Below - Linguistic Variation in the Germanic Languages from 1700 to 2000' took place in Clifton Hill House (University of Bristol). Its wonderful proceedings - published in 2007 and edited by Stephan Elspaß (Augsburg), Nils Langer (Bristol), Joachim Scharloth (Zurich), and Wim Vandenbussche (VU Brussels) - can be bought from www.degruyter.de.
It was at this 2005 conference where the Historical Sociolinguistics Network (HISON) was founded. This informal but very informed network which boasts some 250 members from across the world is chiefly known for its conferences and annual summer schools. A regular venue for this is the University of Agder's Metochi Study Centre on the Greek island of Lesbos (2007, 2009, 2011) but summer schools have also taken place at Bristol (2008, principal organiser Nils Langer), Bruges (2010, principal organiser Wim Vandenbussche (VU Brussel) and we are looking forward to the next school in a monastery on an island in Lake Chiemsee, Bavaria (2012, principal organiser Stephan Elspass, Augsburg)
Some of the HiSoN activities have been supported by a scientific network grant from Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) on Language and History which funded a summer school, an exploratory workshop with linguists and historians, and an international conference on possibilities for interdisciplinarity between pure history and historical linguistics at Burwalls in Bristol (2008-09). The proceedings from this conference will be published in late 2011 (eds. Langer, Nils, Steffan Davies, Wim Vandenbussche).
Dr Langer has also published on the codification of German, the German diaspora in the USA, and questions regarding the teaching of German as a foreign language. His current research projects focus on two areas. Together with Tim Shortis and Julie Blake (both Bristol), he is directing a set of workshops exploring Bristolian identity with regard to language and region.In the area of historical sociolinguistics, Dr Langer is currently working on a Sociolinguistic Language(s) History of the German-Danish border region, with a particular focus on the language contact and conflict between High German, Low German, Sønderjysk and Danish during the nineteenth century. A website with rare and unpublished materials on Sprachpolitik und Sprachkonflikt in Schleswig-Holstein im 19. Jahrhundert can be found here.
Publications
Monographs
- with Wini Davies. 2006. The Making of Bad Language. Lay Linguistic Stigmatisations in German: Past und Present. (= Variolingua 28). Frankfurt/M etc.: Peter Lang. Reviewed in Zeitschrift für Rezensionen zur germanistischen Sprachwissenschaft
- 2001. Linguistic Purism in Action - How auxiliary tun was stigmatized in Early New High German. (= Studia Linguistica Germanica 60). Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Reviewed in Zeitschrift fuer Dialektologie und Linguistik, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, Henry Sweet Society Bulletin, Modern Languages Review, Germanistik, Journal for Germanic Linguistics
Edited Books and Special Issues
- 2012 (co-edited with Steffan Davies and Wim Vandenbussche). Language and History, Linguistics and Historiography. (= Studies in Historical Linguistics 9). Oxford etc.: Peter Lang.
- 2011 (co-edited with Melani Schröter). 'Alltagssprache und Deutsch als Fremdsprache'. Special issue of Gfl-journal.de
- 2009 (co-edited with Geraldine Horan and Sheila Watts). Landmarks in the History of German. (= Britische und Irische Studien zur deutschen Sprache und Literatur 52). Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
- 2007 (co-edited with Stephan Elspaß, Joachim Scharloth, and Wim Vandenbussche). Germanic Language Histories from Below. (Studia Linguistica Germanica 87). Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Click for review in Linguistlist
- 2005. (co-edited with Winifred Davies). Linguistic Purism in the Germanic Languages. (= Studia Linguistica Germanica 75). Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Reviewed in Historical Sociolinguistics - Sociohistorical Linguistics and LinguistList
Chapters in Books and Journal Articles
Forthc (2012) Finding Non-Dominant Languages in the Nineteenth Century - Problems and Potentials from Historical Sociolinguistics, in Muhr, Rudolf (Ed.), Non-dominating Varietes of Pluricentric Languages, Peter Lang. [25 pages]
Forthc (2012) with Stephan Elspaß. A Sociolinguistic Reassessment of the History of German Negation, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, [15 pages]
Forthc (2012) Die Lesebuchfrage in Schleswig-Holstein (1864-1870), in Bär Jochen and Markus Müller (eds.). [= FS Reichmann] Heidelberg: Carl Winter. 15-33.
Forthc (2012) with Agnete Nesse. Linguistic Purism. In: Hernandez-Campoy, Juan (ed.). The Blackwell Handbook to Historical Sociolinguistics. 25 pages.
2011. 'Historical Sociolinguistics in 19th-century Schleswig-Holstein.' In German Life and Letters 64, 169-187.
2010. Sprechereinstellungen zur Zielsprache im britischen und irischen DaF-Unterricht. In Christina Anders et al. (eds.). perceptual dialectology – Neue Wege der Dialektologie. Berlin, New York: De Gruyter. 409-431.
2009b. 'Sprachverfall in the New Germany.' In: Germanistik in Ireland 4. 117-132.
2009a 'Landmark Process - the case of Low German.' In: Horan, Geraldine, Langer, Nils & Sheila Watts (eds.). 2009. Landmarks in the History of German. Berne: Lang. 211-232.
2008. German Language and German Identity in America – Evidence from school grammars 1860-1918. In: German Life and Letters. 497-513.
2007 'Finding Standard German - Thoughts on Linguistic Codification.' In: Fandrych, Christian / Salverda, Reinier (eds.). Standard, Variation und Sprachwandel in germanischen Sprachen. Tuebingen: Narr. 217-241.
2006 with Winifred Davies. “Gutes Deutsch” - “schlechtes Deutsch” von 1600 bis 2005. In: Sprachreport 3/2006. pp.2-9.
2005 with Martin Durrell. Sprachvariation und Sprachvarietät im britischen DaF-Unterricht. In: Roggausch, Werner (ed.). Germanistentreffen Tagungsbeiträge Deutschland Großbritannien Irland. Bonn: DAAD. pp. 297-314.
2004. 'Frühe Fremdsprachengrammatiken als Vermittlerinnen deutscher Standardsprache' In: Mattheier, Klaus & Haruo Nitta (eds.). Sprachwandel und Gesellschaftswandel - Wurzeln des heutigen Deutsch. Muenchen: Iudicium. pp. 223-243.
2003 'Low German.' In: Deumert, Ana & Wim Vandenbussche (eds.). Germanic Standardizations. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. pp. 282-302.
2002 'On the Importance of Foreign Language Grammars for a History of Standard German.' In: Linn, Andrew & Nicola McLelland (eds.). Standard Germanic. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. pp. 67-82.
2001. 'The Distribution of Non-Lexical DO in Early New High German.' In: Watts, Sheila, Solms, Hans-Joachim & Jonathan West (eds.): The Germanic Verb. (Linguistische Arbeiten 446). Tuebingen: Max Niemeyer. pp. 155-173;
2001. 'The Rechtschreibreform: A Lesson in Linguistic Purism.' In: German as a Foreign Language.
2000. 'Wornach die Bürger sonst die Finger lecken thun - Zur Verteilung der tun-Periphrase im Frühneuhochdeutschen.' In: Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik. 67, 3. pp. 287-316.
2000. 'On the Polyfunctionality of Auxiliary tun.' In: Hall, Christopher & David Rock. German Studies in the New Millenium. Bern, Frankfurt: Peter Lang. pp. 261-282.
1997 . Light Verbs in Early New High German. in Papers in Linguistics from the University of Manchester. Vol. II.197-213.
1996 . Scrambling Is Not Optional. in Newcastle and Durham Working Papers in Linguistics Vol. III. 125-145.
Invited Lectures and Conference Papers
2011f Soziolinguistik in der frühen Neuzeit. Kulturtransfer und Identität in der vormodernen Gesellschaft.Kungeliga Bibliotek Stockholm
2011e Die Lehre von der Variation. Zum Umgang mit sprachlicher Variation in der DaF-Didaktik. DAAD-LektorInnentreffen, Windsor
2011d Finding Non-Dominant Languages in the Nineteenth Century. Non-dominating Varieties of Pluricentric Languages. Universität Graz.
2011c mit Robert Langhanke. Language Apocalypse – Worries about Dialect Survival in the 19th-century. XIII. International Conference on Minority Languages. Sønderborg-Flensburg
2011b Danish and German in Historical Sociolinguistics, University of Sheffield
2011a Problems and Opportunities in Historical Sociolinguistics: the Case of the Duchy of Schleswig University of Flensburg, Germany
2010c Linguistic Purism and the Role of Academic Linguistics, University of Bergen, Norway
2010b Language Policy and Language Suppression in the 19th-century, University of Newcastle on Tyne
2010a Language Policies in German Schools Linguistics Circles, University of the West of England
2009e Why I like Old High German Lecture Series on Old Languages, University of Bristol
2009c, d Multilingualism in 19th-century Schleswig-Holstein Research Group on Language and History – University of Oxford and Joint Meeting of Forum for Germanic Language Studies and Society for Germanic Linguistics, Banff, Canada
2009a, b On the Sociolinguistics of School Inspection Reports in 19th-century GermanyDept of German - King’s College London, Dept of Linguistics and English Language - University of Edinburgh
2008 The German diaspora in the American Upper Midwest Dept of German, University of Wales Swansea
2007e Sprachverfall in the New Germany. Plenary Lecture at the Association of Third-Level Teachers of German in Ireland, Tallaght.
2007c,d German-American Identity in Early School GrammarsMax-Kade Institute, Madison, Wisconsin (USA) and Aberystwyth Linguistics Forum, UW Aberystwyth.
2007a, b Viewing the new Heimatin American School Grammars 1860-1918 School of Modern Languages, University of Exeter, and Conference of University Teachers of German¸University of Bristol.
2006c Writing the new Middle High German grammar. How the Germans do historical grammatography. Unlocking the Potential of Texts: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Medieval Greek,University of Cambridge.
2006a, b Bad German from 1600-2005 The Philological Society, at the University of Oxford and Forschungskolloquium Linguistik, Universität Zürich.
2005i with Anja Voeste. Dual Standards Revisited – Orthographic Variation in Early Modern German 5th Conference on Language Variation and Change, University of Aberdeen.
2005g, h with Winifred Davies. Prescriptive Views on bad German since 1700.Language History from Below. University of Bristol and XVIIth International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Madison, WI .
2005f Making Bad German: Morpho-syntactic stigmatisations from 1700 - 2000. Dept of English Language and Linguistics, University of Sheffield.
2005e Zur Verortung der Standardsprache 1600-2005. Dept of German Linguistics, Universität Kassel.
2005c,d Schlechtes Deutsch in vier Jahrhunderten. Deutscher Sprachatlas, Universität Marburg and Institute of German Linguistics, Humboldt-Universität Berlin.
2005b Bristolian – Linguistic Features and Folk Linguistic Feelings. Forschungskolloquium at the Department of English, Universität Potsdam.
2005a with Martin Durrell. DaF in British and Irish Universities: Variation and Varieties of L2 German. Forum for Germanic Language Studies. University of Cambridge.
2003b Finding Bad German: An Investigation of Baroque Foreign Language Grammars. XVIth International Conference on Historical Linguistics, University of Copenhagen.
2003a with Winifred Davies. Who Made Bad German? - studying the origins, development and current status of stigmatized morpho-syntax. Dept of Linguistics, University of Manchester
2002c Innovation in Language – the representation and status of the newly-born standard German in foreign language grammars. British Baroque Symposium. University of Bristol
2002b Standarddeutsch im Fremdsprachenunterricht: Belege aus dem Barock Dept of General Linguistics, Universität Bremen
2002a Landmark Process: Low German. Death of a (Written) Dialect. Invited Lecture as part of the Landmarks in German Linguistics Series, University of Cambridge
2000c Tracing Standard German in Early Foreign Language Grammars Conference of University Teachers of German, University of Southampton.
2000a, b The Rechtschreibreform - A Lesson in Linguistic Purism.University College Dublin and the University of Newcastle upon Tyne.
1999 Auf der Suche nach dem verschwundenen Thun - Zur Bestimmung des Wirkungsgrades frühneuhochdeutscher Grammatiker. Stipendiaten-Colloquium der Herzog August-Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel.
1998 The syntax of periphrastic DO in ENHG. Trinity College Dublin
1997 Lexical and Periphrastic DO in Early New High German The Postgraduate Conference of the Centre for Research in Linguistics, University of Newcastle.
1996 Optionality in Syntax and the Case of German ScramblingThe Postgraduate Conference of the Faculty of Arts, University of Newcastle.