"Do They Know the Normal Language?": Language Attitudes and Ideologies in German Hip Hop Culture

Authors

Matt Garley, CUNY York CollegeFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2019

Abstract

This article presents a theoretical discussion of the relationship between language ideologies and language attitudes and builds on previous work by providing an organized framework connecting these notions. This framework is evaluated with reference to online and offline ethnographic work surrounding attitudes and ideologies about anglicisms, or English loanwords, among German hip hop fans and artists. Language attitudes are theorized as individual thoughts and expressions about language, and are often, but not always, informed by individual reproductions of language ideologies, which are conceived of as systematic, shared over groups of individuals, enduring, and mediated. Language ideologies can then be organized into interacting language ideology complexes, and I identify here a Standard Language Ideology Complex constituted of standard language ideology, Herderian ideology, and language purism working in concert. This Standard Language Ideology Complex frames metalinguistic discourse in the German-speaking sphere, and interviews with hip hop fans and artists in this study demonstrate the extent to which this ideological complex fundamentally frames and underlies conversations about language, even, somewhat surprisingly, in a space and subculture which has been conceived of as creative and counterhegemonic.

Comments

This article was originally published in Volume 7, Issue 3 of Critical Multilingualism Studies (ISSN 2325-2871), available at https://cms.arizona.edu