WALSERSPRACHE - The four main objectives of the Alpine Space ...

Sergio Maria Gilardino
they were interpreters, but always kept to one only, their own. One must elicit the desired
words from them by narrowing meanings down and zeroing in through synonyms. If
they start spinning a tale, let them go on, without interrupting them, since they might not
be able to return to their yarn if interrupted. Many times attaining the desired results
may require lengthy sittings and lots of patience. Many scholars committed two mistakes
when questioning locals: a) they questioned them in a national language to elicit words
the meaning of which they not always understood, b) they forewent asking certain words
because they took for granted a “dialect” could not possibly have them. What with the
negative answers from people who did not understand what they were asked, what with
words they missed out on because they assumed they were not there, a lot was omitted
and the wrong conclusion was reached as to the status of this “dialect”. In carrying out
such delicate chores one should also distance Titzschu from either German or any other
major language, and deal with it as a fully autonomous language. It is not true however
that Alagna’s Titzschu has so many words (22.000 entries thus far) because it has a written
literature behind it, since words from written sources make up only a portion of the
entire stock. Other varieties of Titzsch(u) probably offer at least as many, if one goes
about extracting them using the most efficient techniques. It comes then down to either
continue dealing with the Walser linguistic issue either as spoken-only dialects, each
taken in isolation, or to face it as a unifiable language, studying it from a diachronical
perspective, while enriching it with ever new findings. To carry out such an ambitious task
we need cover much more terrain. We trust those in charge will help us by sending us young
researchers willing to look into the various aspects of this fascinating, yet complex issue.
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