Ein Vorschlag des dialektbasierten Hochdeutschunterrichts für die Wolgadeutschen in Argentinien

Abstract

Just like many other German communities in the Americas the Volga Germans in Argentina have been able to maintain their initial dialectal variety of German until today. It has been passed on mostly orally, has only covert prestige and functions as an ethnic identity marker for the speakers. As opposed to that the language of the majority population (Spanish in the case of the Volga Germans in Argentina) has overt prestige and objective value for everyday life. Also the standard variety of German is perceived as objectively useful, e.g. for the future career. At the same time, the variety of German spoken by the community is perceived as incompatible with standard German: The speakers of the dialect often think that their knowledge of the dialect is more an obstacle for learning standard German than a help. Nevertheless, there have already been initiatives in Argentina of developing and implementing dialect-based standard German classes, e.g. by Arndt Schmidt in his program for training teachers in the Volga German village in Santa Maria in the province of Buenos Aires. The present article will discuss the question of German classes for dialect learners, give a short overview of the sociolinguistic situation of Volga Germans in Argentina and make a proposal of a heritage-dialect based standard German teaching program. Keywords