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Language shift in the Raeto-Romansh community 203
The prerequisite for language shift is always language contact. In a situation
of contact, a community with the minority status speaking L1 interacts with
a dominant group speaking L2. In prolonged contacts, monolinguals in L1 learn
enough of L2 for basic communication. At this stage L2 is used externally in
a diaglossic relationship. Next, the economic pressure, with time, induces full
bilingualism on the part of the minority in question. If bilingualism is unstable,
it may develop into monolingualism in L2, and this is where the shift occurs.
The last stage of the cycle means the death of L1. The usual duration before
a shift is complete takes at least three generations. For Haugen (1980: 152) it is
not a unidirectional development as he says that “there is nothing inevitable in
this cycle”; and then he adds: “One of the external factors that can speed it up or
slow it down is the deliberate will of a group to do so. But this can only occur if
the development is perceived as a problem calling for a solution”.
For the recent decades, German has kept pushing Romansh back into the
mountain valleys of Grisons, where it evolved into five distinct geographical
varieties: Surselvan, Sutselvan (i.e., Upper and Lower Rhenish), Surmeiran,
Puter (Upper Engadine), and Vallader (Lower Engadine). The borders between
German- and Romansh-speaking areas are blurred with appreciable numbers of
German speaking Swiss even in predominantly Romansh localities. Romansh
people have no urban centre, which used to be Chur. In the opinion of Gottfried
Kolde (1988: 518), “today we are witnessing what may be the final phase in the
Germanization of this region”. Indeed, if we compare the figures of Romansh
presence in Chur with those in the entire canton of Grisons, the decrease is
greater in Chur than in the canton. In the case of the Romansh, within a decade
from 1990 to 2000, their share fell from 6,9% to 5,4% (2 269 vs. 1 765 persons),
i.e., by 22,5%, whereas in the Grisons from 17,1 to 14,5% (29 679 vs.
27 038), i.e., by 15,3% (Grünert et al. 2008: 251–252).
The prolonged contact between two languages may transform into diglossia.
Charles Ferguson (1972 /1959/: 232) originally described such a situation as the
one in which “two varieties of a language exist side by side throughout the
community, with each laving a definite role to play”. For Ferguson the specialization
of function for the High variety and the Low variety was the paramount
feature of diglossia, as he wrote that “[i]n one set of situations only H is appropriate
and in another only L, with the two sets overlapping only very slightly”
(1972: 235). Many discussions concerning Romansh failed to produce an agreed
standpoint on the standard variety. Christina Bratt Paulston (1988: 5) explains
that “shift does not take place in a diglossic-like situation in which the two languages
exist in a situation of functional distribution where each language has its
specified purpose and domain and the one language is inappropriate in the other
situation”. The classic Fergusonian concept of diglossia seems too “narrow” for
the language behavior demonstrated by Romansh speakers. German permeates