Kerkrade dialect phonology

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This article covers the phonology of the Kerkrade dialect, a West Ripuarian language variety spoken in parts of the Kerkrade municipality in the Netherlands (including the town of Kerkrade itself) and Herzogenrath in Germany.

Contents

Just like Colognian, the Kerkrade dialect is not uniform and there are some geographical differences. This article focuses on the variety spoken in the Dutch town of Kerkrade.

Consonants

In contrast to Limburgish and Standard Dutch, but like other varieties of Ripuarian, the Kerkrade dialect was partially affected by the High German consonant shift. For instance, the former /t/ became an affricate /ts/ in word-initial and word-final positions, after historical /l/ and /r/ as well as when doubled. Thus, the word for "two" is twee/ˈtʋeː/ in Standard Dutch, but tswai/ˈtsβaɪ/[ tone? ] in the Kerkrade dialect, almost identical to Standard German zwei/ˈtsvaɪ/. [1]

Labial Alveolar Postalveolar Dorsal Glottal
Nasal m n ŋ
Plosive voiceless p t k
voiced b d ( ɡ )
Affricate voiceless ts
voiced ( dz )( )
Fricative voiceless f s ʃ x
voiced v z ʒ ɣ ɦ
Liquid l r
Approximant β j

Vowels

Vowel phonemes [7]
Front Central Back
unrounded rounded
shortlongshortlongshortshortlong
Close i y u
Close-mid e ø øː ə o
Open-mid ɛ ɛː œ œː ɔ ɔː
Open a
Diphthongs closingɛɪ œʏ ɔɪ ɔʊ  
centering    œə 

Phonetic realization

Pitch accent

As most other Ripuarian and Limburgish dialects, the Kerkrade dialect features a distinction between the thrusting tone (Dutch : stoottoon, German : Schärfung or Stoßton), which has a shortening effect on the syllable (not shown in transcriptions in this article) and the slurring tone (Dutch : sleeptoon, German : Schleifton). This distinctive pitch accent appears on long vowels as well as short vowels followed by a sonorant. In this article, the slurring tone is transcribed as a high tone, whereas the thrusting tone is left unmarked. This is nothing more than a convention, as the phonetics of the Kerkrade pitch accent are severely under-researched. There are minimal pairs, for example moer/ˈmuːr/ 'wall' - moer/ˈmúːr/ 'carrot'. [12] [13]

The pitch accent can be the only difference: [13]

See also

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References

  1. Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), p. 36.
  2. Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), pp. 17, 19, 21, 126.
  3. Russ (1989), p. 230.
  4. 1 2 Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), p. 18.
  5. 1 2 Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), p. 17.
  6. Russ (1989), pp. 228–229.
  7. Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), pp. 15–17.
  8. 1 2 3 4 Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), p. 16.
  9. Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), pp. 16, 18.
  10. Verhoeven (2007), pp. 221, 223.
  11. Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), pp. 15, 18.
  12. Fournier, Rachel; Gussenhoven, Carlos; Peters, Jörg; Swerts, Marc; Verhoeven, Jo. "The tones of Limburg". Archived from the original on 26 February 2012. Retrieved 26 February 2012.
  13. 1 2 Stichting Kirchröadsjer Dieksiejoneer (1997), p. 19.

Bibliography