Posted on 08/26/2007 2:04:22 PM PDT by Dysart
AUSTIN --Although stories of der Cowboy and die Stinkkatze mayno longer get told in Texas, Germanic linguistics professor Hans Boas wants to make sure nobody forgets them.
Boas, an assistant professor at the University of Texas, is the founder and manager of the Texas German Preservation Project. Every month or so Boas ventures forth from his campus office in Austin to small towns like Boerne, Fredericksburg and Crawford to conduct interviews with the dwindling number of old-timers who speak the odd mixture of English and 19th-century German.
It's a dialect unique to the Lone Star State, and most of the 8,000 or so remaining speakers are in their 60s, 70s or 80s. Their numbers are expected to dwindle precipitously over the next few years, and Boas says that by 2040, the dialect will probably be gone.
And so die Stinkkatze -- the Texas German word for skunk -- and der Cowboy will become just a memory.
"The Texas German Dialect Project I started right after I got [to the University of Texas] in September 2001," Boas said. "The main reason was because no one else has been interested in Texas German from an academic point of view. But there are fewer and fewer speakers, and in 30 years it will be gone. I thought it would be a good idea to record the remaining speakers who are left."
Boas says he has interviewed more than 200 Texas German speakers and recorded more than 350 hours of the conversations. Interviewers are typically UT students who ask about childhood memories, games, social interactions -- anything, really, that will get Texas German speakers to provide a window into their lives.
'The culture's legacy'
Boas has preserved audio recordings of these interviews on an Internet database, which also includes video recordings and written text. Besides helping to preserve the dialect, the archive will allow further study of the linguistic features and grammar of Texas German. "It also is important to create a popular account of Texas German to share with local schools, preservation societies and museums -- the dialect is part of the culture's legacy, but it is rapidly eroding," Boas said.
Der Cowboy is Texas German for "cowboy" -- it's basically the English word spoken with a German accent. "Die Stinkkatz" literally means "stinky cat"; that is, it's the Texas German word for "skunk." Boas explains that because there were no skunks in their native country, German immigrants invented their own word.
The word "Luftschiff" is also unique to Texas German -- or at least, it's unique the way Texas German speakers use the term. During a vacation some years back in Germany, New Braunfels resident Bill Moltz used "Luftschiff" to describe his long flight across the Atlantic. For speakers of Texas German, "Luftschiff" means airplane.
But in modern German, "Luftschiff" means "airship." Texas Germans have been using the word since before the invention of the airplane and never updated it to reflect a post-Wright Brothers world.
"I remember people looked at us in Germany like we were nuts -- they said you flew here in a dirigible?" recalls Moltz, 68, still laughing about the incident. "But that's what happened. We use those terms."
Although fewer than 10,000 speakers remain, at one time as much as 20 percent of the Texas population may have spoken the language. Moltz said that many German settlers arrived in Galveston and spread out during the mid-1800s, and now a swath of German communities can be found running north and south down the middle of the state.
The immigrants settled in dozens of towns like Fredericksburg, New Braunfels and Boerne. At one time there were more than 150 German-language newspapers in Texas, and in many towns German was spoken almost exclusively.
Wars brought decline
But the dialect began to fade during World War I, Boas said.
"A little before World War I, there was a big nativist movement in the U.S. and [the idea] was that if you're in the United States, then you better speak English -- there just wasn't a lot of tolerance for people who speak differently," Boas explained.
He said there was another steep decline during World War II and that the last of the monolingual Texas German speakers are pretty much gone. Those who are left -- fifth-generation Texans like Moltz -- spoke the dialect as kids, but also speak English.
The Texas German Dialect Project has been funded through grants, although that funding expired at the end of last year, Boas said. He said it costs about $35,000 a year to maintain the program.
It also accepts contributions though a University of Texas endowment.
"Every time we lose a language, we lose a data set -- if researchers have more data, we can create and test theories about how language works more accurately," Boas said.
Texas German Dialect Project: www.tgdp.org
A different dialect
A sampling of unique Texas German words and their translations in European German and English:
Airplane
das Luftschiff -- Texas German
das Flugzeug -- European German
Blouse
die Taille -- Texas German
die Bluse -- European German
Car
die Car (pronounced Kaa) -- Texas German
das Auto (pronounced otto) -- European German
Little town
die kleine Stadt -- Texas German
das Dorf -- European German
Piano
das Piano -- Texas German
das Klavier -- European German
Truck (semi)
der grosse Truck -- Texas German
der Lastwagen -- European German
Skunk
die Stinkkatze -- Texas German
das Stinktier --European German
Squirrel
die Eichkatze --Texas German
das Eichhörnchen -- European German
Socks
die Strumpf --Texas German
die Sökchen -- European German
Source: Texas German Preservation Project
LOL, sehr gut. Aber,
I think that’s “Ich bin Texikaner, j’alle!”
Yep. Probably FReepers. :)
Interesting history.
The Alsatian settlements in Medina County (Castroville, D’Hanis, Quihi and Vandenberg)
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/CC/uec1.html
Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels’ colony (New Braunfels and the surrounding area)
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/SS/fso3.html
John O. Meusebach’s settlements around present-day Fredericksburg (the treaty he signed with the Comanche was the only one never broken by either side in US history)
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/MM/fme33.html
Although they’re Slavic rather than Germanic, the Wends of modern-day eastern Germany came to Texas in the 1850s - and beerlovers should be grateful (one of them founded Spoetzel Brewery in 1909 - the makers of Shiner Beer)
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/WW/plw1.html
I was just tweaking the fans of historical revision around here. No offense meant or taken I hope.
Das Scheisse-Kopf ... Texas German .....:o)
He probably won’t be, but others will be - Jimmy Jones does a spot-on Willie (puts a clothespin on his nose).
Go by most any weekend - here’s their website:
http://www.luckenbachtexas.com/
The town is named for Albert Luckenbach - and Albert is a few miles east of there (also worth a visit):
None was taken by me, at your comments. Your post was a convenient place to get mine in, without it being a complete Non-Sequiter.
I only threw in the last paragraph to perhaps, enlighten some earlier, speak English, or leave the country, posters.
Put course some of them have a point. When living in NYC, I met a man, who claimed he was dispatched by the “Secret Service?” to New Braunfels. He was sent to close down the Neu Braunfelser Zeitung during WWII. Claimed they had some very curious German Language ads being run.
Put course = But of course
LOL Genius!!
Tanks for the intriguing links. Luckenbach is in play again...
Like ..Ihr-all come back now?
Well, until 1803, it was “Reich” In English, The Empire. In 1871, after the Franco-Prussian War, the king of Prussia assumed the title Kaiser and it is the Empire of the Germans. So we have a second Reich. There was another Reich, of course, that of the Austrians. Hitler aimed at unification of the German lands. a restoration of the First Reich, a Third Reich. One reason why the Western Powers were so willing to let Hitler have the Sudetenland was that it, like Austria, was German.
“I’ve read that during WW1 and again in WW2 many Germans named Mueller changed their names to Miller due to harassment of Germans.”
—
There is a major league baseball pitcher (retired now) who was born Sanford Braun. He went into the BB Hall of Fame after a brilliant career with the Dodgers.
You know him as Sandy Koufax.
“Smelly cat, smelly cat,
What are they feeding you?
Smelly cat, smelly cat,
It’s not your fault.”
One of the few funny moments from that idiotic show...
Then of course there are the “British” royals. Saxe-Coburg-Hesse or whatever it was, became Windsor. Battenberg became Mountbatten. Victoria and her precious “Bertie” Prince Albert I have been told, spoke German when at home.
Many such changes were made Because of WWI.
Man, I love spätzle cooked with bacon. With a Warsteiner Dunkels.... mmmmmmmmmmmm....
Windsor = Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
Hi
Texas born Freeper living in Ozarks of Missouri here. I am a seventh generation Texan on my English side, fourth generation on the German side. My ancestor,Fredrich Wilhelm Keng, came from Westphalia in Germany(Prussia) in 1848. They came into Galveston and traveled to Giddings, TX. They owned a mill in Germany and Friedrich’s father fought against Napoleon. I’m glad to hear there is someone interested in preserving the language.
We went from von Bauer to Bowers in my family.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.