Download or read book Germanic Language Histories 'from Below' (1700-2000) written by Stephan Elspaß and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2011-07-26 with total page 532 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Focusing on the sociolinguistic history of Germanic languages, the current volume challenges the traditional teleological approach of language historiography. The 30 contributions present alternative histories of ten ‘big’ as well as ‘small’ Germanic languages and varieties in the last 300 years. Topics covered in this book include language variation and change and the politics of language contact and choice, seen against the background of standardization processes of written and oral text genres and from the viewpoint of larger sections of the population.