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From:   "PERRIDGE, Tom" <[log in to unmask]>

20% discount for members of the German Studies mailing list!

Language and German Disunity
A Sociolinguistic History of East and West in Germany, 1945-2000

By Patrick Stevenson, University of Southampton

Oxford University Press is pleased to announce the publication of
Patrick Stevenson's Language and German Disunity, the first review the
whole history of the east-west question in Germany from a
sociolinguistic point of view.

This book investigates the history of national disunity in Germany
since the end of the Second World War from a linguistic perspective:
what was the role of language in the ideological conflicts of the Cold
War and in the difficult process of rebuilding the German nation after
1990?

In the first part of the book, Patrick Stevenson explores the ways in
which the idea of 'the national language' contributed to the political
tensions between the two German states and to the different social
experiences of their citizens. He begins by showing how the modern
linguistic conflict between east and west in Germany has its roots in a
long tradition of debates on the relationship between language and
national identity. He then describes the use of linguistic strategies
to reinforce the development of a socialist state in the GDR and argues
that they ultimately contributed to its demise.

The second part considers the social and linguistic consequences of
unification. The author discusses the challenges imposed on east
Germans by the sudden formation of a single 'speech community' and
examines how conflicting representations of easterners and westerners-
for example, in personal interactions, the media, and advertising-have
hindered progress towards national unity.

German division and re-unification were crucial to the development of
Europe in the second half of the twentieth century. This fascinating
account of the relationship between language and social conflict in
Germany throws new light on these events and raises important questions
for the study of divided speech communities elsewhere.

288 pages, Oxford University Press, December 2002

Paperback (0-19-829970-2): RRP £16.99, Discounted price £13.59
Hardback (0-19-829969-9): RRP £50.00, Discounted price £40.00

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