Identity and first language attrition
A historical approach
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/sols.v5i1.41Keywords:
attrition, attitude, identity, persecution, methodologyAbstract
This paper presents some of the findings of a study on first language attrition of German in an anglophone context. It is based on a corpus of narrative autobiographical interviews with 35 German Jews who emigrated from Germany under the Nazi regime. In recent years, issues of identity theory have figured largely within research on both bilingualism at large and language attrition specifically. Within this context, the situation of German Jews is a unique one: it is very rare that a minority is persecuted by a majority with the same native language. It is to be hypothesized that this situation of forced emigration and brutal persecution led to identity conflicts which, for some of the informants, resulted in a wish to distance themselves from Germany, the Germans and consequently also the German language. The results of this study suggest that for some interviewees the breaks their identity had suffered were too deep to make reconciliation with any part thereof (whether Jewish or German) possible, to the extent that they adopted the language and identity of their country of emigration as their own. In turn, others were able to keep a fairly native-like command of German. This paper will take a closer look at some aspects of persecution, and attempt to link these to individual language attitudes. Qualitative and quantitative aspects of language loss and language preservation will be presented. It will be shown that the breakdown of a language system after sixty years of non-use or restricted use is to a large degree determined by personal attitudes.
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