650: History of the German Language, 3 cr.
Lec 1, MWF, 12:05, Salmons
Prerequisites: Senior standing or consent of instructor.
This course introduces the field of German historical linguistics, including basic research methodologies. We’ll examine the origins and development of the German language, from prehistory to the present day. We will give attention to both structural aspects (sounds, word forms, and sentence structures), and how they have evolved in changing cultural and social settings. We’ll also discuss the development of standard German and its relationship to non-standard and regional varieties.
Requirements: participation, homework and exercises, midterm, final (mostly take-home), short writing assignments.
Texts:
The core course materials will be on-line at learn@uw: detailed handouts and readings, homework assignments, text samples, additional readings, and so on.
We’ll use this (cheap and easily available) book for some basic background, terminology and its many excellent maps and illustrations:
Werner König, dtv Atlas zur deutschen Sprache. München: dtv.
