PhD thesis - School of Informatics - University of Edinburgh

Chapter 2. Background and Theory 11
2.1.2 English in German
As English is currently the dominant language of business, science & technology, ad-
vertising and other sectors, it has become one of the main sources of borrowing in
German. Androutsopoulos et al. (2004) show that, after 2000, the number of English
slogans in German advertising amounted to 30%, compared to the 1980s when only
3% were English, a 10-fold increase in only 20 years. In some domains such as IT or
clothing, the percentage of English slogans reaches of 50%. However, borrowing from
English is not a new development.
2.1.2.1 Historical Background
Language contact with English dates as far back as the 8th century but was, at that
time, limited to the Northern regions of today’s Germany and mainly occurred in the
domains of religion and trade (Viereck, 1984). First anglicisms like the word Boot
(boat) appeared in German during the Middle Ages as a result of emerging trade with
English merchants in the Rhineland as well as trade relations between Britain and the
Hanseatic League (Huffman, 1998; Viereck, 1984). However, the number of angli-
cisms found in German at that time is relatively small, amounting to 31 at most as
suggested by some studies (cf. Hilgendorf, 2007). With the Industrial Revolution in
the 18th century, English became more and more popular in German-speaking territo-
ries and its growing influence eventually presented a challenge to the well-established
status of French which used to signal social prestige (Gentsch, 1994). However, En-
glish had an even stronger influence on German during the 19th and 20th centuries.
Hermann Dunger emerged as one of the first critics of this trend (Hilgendorf, 2007).
At the end of the 19th century, he published a dictionary of superfluous germanised
foreign words and protested severely against the influx of English into the German
language (Dunger, 1882, 1909, both reprinted in 1989).
While British English was the main source of borrowing before World War II,
the establishment of the USA as a global power resulted in a concomitant influx of
American English expressions into German (Hilgendorf, 1996). This development was
further amplified by technological advances such as the invention of the internet as well
as increasing globalisation. Towards the end of the 20th century and at the beginning
of the 21 century, linguists recorded an enormous increase in the number of anglicisms