The dissertation deals with the Överkalix dialect in three respects. Överkalix is the northernmost community of the country where Swedish dialect is spoken. It is surrounded on the east and the north by Finnish, and on the west by Finnish and Saami. The first section of the thesis is based on a questionnaire survey among all junior high school students (14-16 years old) in Överkalix and among their parents. It discusses the present-day position of the Överkalix dialect and the attitudes of the people of Överkalix toward the dialect. The results indicate that the people who consider themselves to be speakers of the local dialect have access to two language codes: local dialect and standard Swedish. Personal relationship is the deciding factor in language code choice. None of the parents considers himself/herself to be dialectally monolingual: 11% speak only standard Swedish, 75% keep the varieties apart and are thus bidialectal. 77% of the dialect-speaking students and 69% of those who do not speak dialect have a positive attitude toward the dialect, boys to a greater extent than girls among the dialect-speaking, and girls to a greater extent than boys among non-dialect speakers. The second section examines interference from the surrounding languages, Finnish and Saami, in the Överkalix dialect in general and in the Överkalix dialect of multilingual informantsin particular. These informants speak standard Swedish, dialect, Finnish and/or Saami. The main data of this section originates from recorded interviews performed as informal conversations. The author discusses some characteristic phonetic features in the dialect which seem to be the result of influence from Saami and/or Finnish. The material also shows a number of influences on the syntactic level. The third section describes how the genitive is expressed in the dialect of Överkalix. The author gives several examples of how the -s genitive is paraphrased—most commonly with a prepostion. / <p>Eftertryck av doktorsavhandling framlagd vid Uppsala universitet 1990.</p>

The Germanic initial sound combination wr (e.g. in *wrītan 'write') has not been preserved in any standard language. In the Scandinavian languages the development of this sound combination has resulted in five different initial sounds or sound combinations, namely rw, r, w, br and vr. The aim of this study is to describe the occurrence of these sound combinations, and to explain their age and origin. A limited number of words, mainly from Swedish dialects, has been investigated. The Swedish material has been assembled in a collection that has largely also been mapped, and so has a collection of Norwegian dialect material. The result shows that br is frequent in the Swedish dialects and that it also occurs in Trøndelagen and Østlandet in Norway, and on Jutland. R is widespread in Norway and occurs in Sweden in some words in Norrland, Dalarna, Värmland, Dalsland, Uppland and on the island of Gotland. Rw has been documented in Upper Dalarna, and w in the same area, as well as in the Kalix dialect in northernmost Sweden. The author demonstrates that the Norwegian loss of w might have started already in the 6th century in western Norway. The loss on Gotland is independent and can be demonstrated in Old Gutnish. The metathesis rw is found in Swedish and Norwegian 13-14th century sources from Uppland, Västmanland, Östergötland and southeastern Norway. The developments wr &gt; r and wr &gt; rw probably have their roots in a difference between the west Norwegian wr and the east Norwegian and Swedish war which is documented from PrimScand times. W is a secondary development of rw. The change wr &gt; br can be dated by place-name material to the early 15th century. The change wr &gt; vr appears to have taken place at approximately the same time. The author demonstrates that the result, wr &gt; br or wr &gt; yr, is apparently governed by certain phonetic factors. The failure of the Germanic wr to survive depends on the combination being phonetically complex. The risk that w would be lost was therefore considerable. However, differentiating forces worked for its retention. All developments emanating from wr, apparently disparate, can be seen as features of a larger process where a general linguistic tendency towards a weakening of sounds is confronted by conservative forces, with the above results as a consequence. / <p>Doktorsavhandling vid Uppsala universitet 1991</p>

<p>This study investigates the realisation of phonological quantity in the dialects of Modern Swedish, based on a corpus containing recordings from 86 locations in Sweden and the Swedishspeaking parts of Finland. The corpus was recorded as part of the national SweDia project.</p><p>The study is explorative in character. Quantity structures in Swedish dialects and their geographical distribution, as described in the dialectological literature, are compared to the results of a data-driven categorisation (cluster analysis). The results reveal an overall good correspondence of the data driven and the traditional categorisation, although with some deviations in the detail.</p><p>The study is divided into two parts. The first part lays the foundation for the data-driven categorisation, which is then described in the second part. First, the phonology and phonetics of quantity in Swedish are described in terms of durational distinctions and vocalic quality differences that typically accompany the durational differences. Preaspiration, which appears to be a normative feature in some dialects, is covered as well. An overview of the historical development of the Swedish quantity system is provided, with special emphasis on a phonological interpretation of quantity changes. Thereafter, dialectological evidence is combined with phonological and typological considerations to develop a categorisation of Swedish dialects.</p><p>The second part explains the methodology of cluster analysis and applies this method to vowel and consonant durations from one contrastive word pair, in order to obtain an alternative dialect categorisation. Analyses of vowel quality and preaspiration are performed in addition to the durational analyses. Hypotheses derived from the cluster analysis are then tested on one additional word pair recorded in 75 locations and on three additional word pairs recorded in four locations.</p><p>The general pattern emerging from the cluster analysis is a categorisation of the dialects into three main types, a Finland-Swedish, a Northern and a Southern type. This categorisation shows a good geographical agreement with the categorisation that is derived from the analysis of the dialectological literature. Therefore, the durational patterns of the three types are interpreted as reflections of three different phonological systems: 4-way systems with vocalic and consonantal quantity, 3-way systems with vocalic quantity and with consonantal quantity only after short vowels, and 2-way systems with complementary quantity. From the historical perspective, the 4-way system constitutes the most conservative and the 2-way system the most recently developed system.</p><p>Finally, it is argued that the historical development is one of the factors behind occasional mismatches between the data-driven and the dialectological categorisation. Data from one of the dialects, which has recently abandoned a 4-way system but has obviously retained the durational properties of the older system, is used as an example to illustrate this historical hypothesis.</p>

This study investigates the realisation of phonological quantity in the dialects of Modern Swedish, based on a corpus containing recordings from 86 locations in Sweden and the Swedishspeaking parts of Finland. The corpus was recorded as part of the national SweDia project. The study is explorative in character. Quantity structures in Swedish dialects and their geographical distribution, as described in the dialectological literature, are compared to the results of a data-driven categorisation (cluster analysis). The results reveal an overall good correspondence of the data driven and the traditional categorisation, although with some deviations in the detail. The study is divided into two parts. The first part lays the foundation for the data-driven categorisation, which is then described in the second part. First, the phonology and phonetics of quantity in Swedish are described in terms of durational distinctions and vocalic quality differences that typically accompany the durational differences. Preaspiration, which appears to be a normative feature in some dialects, is covered as well. An overview of the historical development of the Swedish quantity system is provided, with special emphasis on a phonological interpretation of quantity changes. Thereafter, dialectological evidence is combined with phonological and typological considerations to develop a categorisation of Swedish dialects. The second part explains the methodology of cluster analysis and applies this method to vowel and consonant durations from one contrastive word pair, in order to obtain an alternative dialect categorisation. Analyses of vowel quality and preaspiration are performed in addition to the durational analyses. Hypotheses derived from the cluster analysis are then tested on one additional word pair recorded in 75 locations and on three additional word pairs recorded in four locations. The general pattern emerging from the cluster analysis is a categorisation of the dialects into three main types, a Finland-Swedish, a Northern and a Southern type. This categorisation shows a good geographical agreement with the categorisation that is derived from the analysis of the dialectological literature. Therefore, the durational patterns of the three types are interpreted as reflections of three different phonological systems: 4-way systems with vocalic and consonantal quantity, 3-way systems with vocalic quantity and with consonantal quantity only after short vowels, and 2-way systems with complementary quantity. From the historical perspective, the 4-way system constitutes the most conservative and the 2-way system the most recently developed system. Finally, it is argued that the historical development is one of the factors behind occasional mismatches between the data-driven and the dialectological categorisation. Data from one of the dialects, which has recently abandoned a 4-way system but has obviously retained the durational properties of the older system, is used as an example to illustrate this historical hypothesis.

In the North Scandinavian area of investigation, which is in focus in this dissertation, seal-hunting has been an important means of livelihood from prehistoric times up to the present. The Swedish-speaking seal-hunters' conceptual system for seal during the 20th century is analysed here. The analysis is mainly based on oral recorded interviews with hunters from the coastal areas around the Gulf of Bothnia – from Norrbotten and Västerbotten in Sweden, and Österbotten in Finland. A cognitive perspective is applied in the analysis, in which focus is on the hunters' knowledge of the seal with the purpose of investigating the construction of the hunters' conceptual system for seal. The dissertation's theoretical starting-point is taken in cognitive linguistics and cognitive anthropology. The investigated vocabulary contains 150 different words for seal. The analysis also includes the cultural and ecological context of the hunt. The hunters' conceptual system for seal is characterised by breadth and variation. There is regional variation in the construction of the conceptual system in the investigated area. In addition to that there is also variation with regard to different hunting seasons, something which is apparent both in the vocabulary and in the structure of the conceptual system. The summer and autumn hunt was not particularly complicated and there was consequently no need for categorising the seal. During this season a limited conceptual system with more general terms was used, which included all seals that were hunted at that time. The late winter and early summer hunt, on the other hand, required an immense amount of knowledge, for example with regard to ecology. In that connection the hunters used an extended conceptual system for seal. The analysis of the conceptual system of the late winter and early summer hunt is based on three different scenarios in which the categories for seal direct the actions of the hunters – in locating the seals in the ice environment, in the hunters' actions during the hunt and in the utilisation of the seal as a resource. A number of categories for seal which were used during the late winter and early spring hunt are the same in the whole area of investigation and can be said to constitute a cognitive and communicative basic level. / digitalisering@umu

I den här uppsatsen beskrivs den syntaktiska distributionen av en andra negator, e i två svenska dialekter. Det finns tidigare belägg för att e förekommer i slutet av negerade satser i icke-standarddialekter. Uppsatsen redogör också för tidigare forskning om ett relaterat rikssvenskt fenomen (inte... inte), dialektforskning om e samt språktypologisk forskning som relaterar till negation och i synnerhet dubbelnegation. Uppsatsen baseras på en parallell\-korpusundersökning med material från två svenska dialekter, Forsamål och Jarssemål. I undersökningen studeras syntaktiska mönster som är relevanta för distributionen av en andra negator, såsom satstyp, underordning, upprepning av subjekt med mera. Huvudresultatet är att e är mycket frekvent, särskilt efter huvudsatser. E är mycket ovanligt i bisatser, men annars finns det få tendenser till andra syntaktiska mönster i materialet. Olika teorier om vad denna andra negator skulle kunna ha eller ha haft för funktion presenteras. Vidare forskning om den syntaktiska distributionen av e i fler dialekter såväl som dess funktion i desamma behövs. / This bachelor thesis is a description of the syntactic distribution of a second negator, e, in two Swedish dialects. Previous research establishes the occurence of this e in clase-final position in non-standard dialects of Swedish, but does rarely provide in-depth analysis of e as a second negator. A background of previous research on a related phenomena in standard Swedish (inte... inte), research in swedish dialects and the linguistic field of negation and double negation is presented and used in the understanding of e. The data used is from a parallel corpus of Swedish dialects called ''Mormors katt'', the two dialects are Jarrsemål and Forsamål. This data is analyzed for syntactic patterns in the distribution on e, such as subordination, clause type, repeated subject etc. The most important finding is that e is very frequent in the data and that it is especially frequent in main clauses. Different theories on why this is and what function e has are put forward. Futher research on the distribution of e in even more dialects is required.

In Swedish dialects we find the terms ris,skäver and skärva referring to illnesses in children. The words are also parts of various compounds which refer to variants of the illnesses. The terms are linguistic expressions denoting two folk categories of illnesses, RIS and SKÄVER/SKÄRVA. These categories are investigated from a cognitive semantic perspective. The cognitive perspective argues that we organize our understanding of reality by using Idealized Cognitive Models (ICM) based on our physical, mental and emotional experiences of the world. The aim is twofold: to demonstrate the bases on which an experienced illness is placed in a certain category, and to show how a folk conception of illness is reflected in the word formation strategies. The word formation strategies emanate from notions of characteristic symptoms, and from notions of causes of illnesses. Both categories, RIS and SKÄVER/SKÄRVA, are based on a number of ICM's. The category RIS is a radial structure, which means that the category is held together although its members have no structural criteria in common. The category SKÄVER/SKÄRVA is a concentrating structure, meaning that all members share all structural criteria. There is a strong connection between word formation strategies and the structures of the categories. Terms related to symptoms refer to members of a category which are part of a radial structure, while terms related to causes refer to members of a category which are part of a concentrating structure. This can be explained by two of the basic assumptions of cognitive semantics: semantic content is structred and symbolized overtly on the surface form of a language and categories are conventional, based on cultural assumptions about the world. / digitalisering@umu

In Swedish dialects we find the terms ris, skäver and skärva referring to illnesses in children. The words are also parts of various compounds which refer to variants of the illnesses. The terms are linguistic expressions denoting two folk categories of illnesses, RIS and SKÄVER/SKÄRVA. These categories are investigated from a cognitive semantic perspective. The cognitive perspective argues that we organize our understanding of reality by using Idealized Cognitive Models (ICM) based on our physical, mental and emotional experiences of the world. The aim is twofold: to demonstrate the bases on which an experienced illness is placed in a certain category, and to show how a folk conception of illness is reflected in the word formation strategies. The word formation strategies emanate from notions of characteristic symptoms, and from notions of causes of illnesses. Both categories, RIS and SKÄVER/SKÄRVA, are based on a number of ICM's. The category RIS is a radial structure, which means that the category is held together although its members have no structural criteria in common. The category SKÄVER/SKÄRVA is a concentrating structure, meaning that all members share all structural criteria. There is a strong connection between word formation strategies and the structures of the categories. Terms related to symptoms refer to members of a category which are part of a radial structure, while terms related to causes refer to members of a category which are part of a concentrating structure. This can be explained by two of the basic assumptions of cognitive semantics: semantic content is structred and symbolized overtly on the surface form of a language and categories are conventional, based on cultural assumptions about the world. / digitalisering@umu