Posted on 08/26/2007 2:04:22 PM PDT by Dysart
AUSTIN --Although stories of der Cowboy and die Stinkkatze mayno longer get told in Texas, Germanic linguistics professor Hans Boas wants to make sure nobody forgets them.
Boas, an assistant professor at the University of Texas, is the founder and manager of the Texas German Preservation Project. Every month or so Boas ventures forth from his campus office in Austin to small towns like Boerne, Fredericksburg and Crawford to conduct interviews with the dwindling number of old-timers who speak the odd mixture of English and 19th-century German.
It's a dialect unique to the Lone Star State, and most of the 8,000 or so remaining speakers are in their 60s, 70s or 80s. Their numbers are expected to dwindle precipitously over the next few years, and Boas says that by 2040, the dialect will probably be gone.
And so die Stinkkatze -- the Texas German word for skunk -- and der Cowboy will become just a memory.
"The Texas German Dialect Project I started right after I got [to the University of Texas] in September 2001," Boas said. "The main reason was because no one else has been interested in Texas German from an academic point of view. But there are fewer and fewer speakers, and in 30 years it will be gone. I thought it would be a good idea to record the remaining speakers who are left."
Boas says he has interviewed more than 200 Texas German speakers and recorded more than 350 hours of the conversations. Interviewers are typically UT students who ask about childhood memories, games, social interactions -- anything, really, that will get Texas German speakers to provide a window into their lives.
'The culture's legacy'
Boas has preserved audio recordings of these interviews on an Internet database, which also includes video recordings and written text. Besides helping to preserve the dialect, the archive will allow further study of the linguistic features and grammar of Texas German. "It also is important to create a popular account of Texas German to share with local schools, preservation societies and museums -- the dialect is part of the culture's legacy, but it is rapidly eroding," Boas said.
Der Cowboy is Texas German for "cowboy" -- it's basically the English word spoken with a German accent. "Die Stinkkatz" literally means "stinky cat"; that is, it's the Texas German word for "skunk." Boas explains that because there were no skunks in their native country, German immigrants invented their own word.
The word "Luftschiff" is also unique to Texas German -- or at least, it's unique the way Texas German speakers use the term. During a vacation some years back in Germany, New Braunfels resident Bill Moltz used "Luftschiff" to describe his long flight across the Atlantic. For speakers of Texas German, "Luftschiff" means airplane.
But in modern German, "Luftschiff" means "airship." Texas Germans have been using the word since before the invention of the airplane and never updated it to reflect a post-Wright Brothers world.
"I remember people looked at us in Germany like we were nuts -- they said you flew here in a dirigible?" recalls Moltz, 68, still laughing about the incident. "But that's what happened. We use those terms."
Although fewer than 10,000 speakers remain, at one time as much as 20 percent of the Texas population may have spoken the language. Moltz said that many German settlers arrived in Galveston and spread out during the mid-1800s, and now a swath of German communities can be found running north and south down the middle of the state.
The immigrants settled in dozens of towns like Fredericksburg, New Braunfels and Boerne. At one time there were more than 150 German-language newspapers in Texas, and in many towns German was spoken almost exclusively.
Wars brought decline
But the dialect began to fade during World War I, Boas said.
"A little before World War I, there was a big nativist movement in the U.S. and [the idea] was that if you're in the United States, then you better speak English -- there just wasn't a lot of tolerance for people who speak differently," Boas explained.
He said there was another steep decline during World War II and that the last of the monolingual Texas German speakers are pretty much gone. Those who are left -- fifth-generation Texans like Moltz -- spoke the dialect as kids, but also speak English.
The Texas German Dialect Project has been funded through grants, although that funding expired at the end of last year, Boas said. He said it costs about $35,000 a year to maintain the program.
It also accepts contributions though a University of Texas endowment.
"Every time we lose a language, we lose a data set -- if researchers have more data, we can create and test theories about how language works more accurately," Boas said.
Texas German Dialect Project: www.tgdp.org
A different dialect
A sampling of unique Texas German words and their translations in European German and English:
Airplane
das Luftschiff -- Texas German
das Flugzeug -- European German
Blouse
die Taille -- Texas German
die Bluse -- European German
Car
die Car (pronounced Kaa) -- Texas German
das Auto (pronounced otto) -- European German
Little town
die kleine Stadt -- Texas German
das Dorf -- European German
Piano
das Piano -- Texas German
das Klavier -- European German
Truck (semi)
der grosse Truck -- Texas German
der Lastwagen -- European German
Skunk
die Stinkkatze -- Texas German
das Stinktier --European German
Squirrel
die Eichkatze --Texas German
das Eichhörnchen -- European German
Socks
die Strumpf --Texas German
die Sökchen -- European German
Source: Texas German Preservation Project
This thread is making me seriously homesick. The cultural varieties of the Hill Country is just one of the many things I love about the place. I’m going to have to go drink a Shiner Bock.
{{key the “London Homesick Blues...}}
Prince, that’s right. I was thinking duke. Prince Karl of Solms-Braunfels.
And I can’t belive I misspelled Gruene. I was thinking of the Groene family, because I always mispronounced *their* name, calling it “Green” like the town of Gruene. Yikes, outliving my memory cells here.
How strange, life’s symmetries. I was just talking to a friend last night about his departed brother, a beloved teacher in the town of Munster, TX.
Kosmo Spoetzl would thank you. So you wanna go home with the armadillo, good country music from Amarillo and Abilene?
There's one advertising flyer that's been floating around and it's a hoot. Firstly it said that Texas wasn't as hot in the summer as Minnesota. Uh huh.
Secondly there's this bit that struck me as so funny I had to cut and paste and still have saved:
"Texas is a democratic, free state, and there is no danger at all that fanatic, slippery hypocrites can take power and throw the state into servitude as has unfortunately has happened in many a state of the North. A German can without exception, freely and openly drink his glass of beer. He is welcomed everywhere and his work and services are properly appreciated. As a result of this, Texas can show more immigration, more German communities than most other states; indeed there are entire counties which are almost purely German."
Maybe not then...
For some reason, perhaps simply because of isolation, the German colonies in Texas didn't dilute as fast as they did in other areas of the US.
For whatever reason they held their culture visiting was my first experience of "culture shock" as a Baptist kid coming from a dry county in east Texas.
I think I remember those times with great fondness. Certainly as a bit hungover.
***Boas explains that because there were no skunks in their native country***
I can think of several but they shot or poisoned themselves in 1945.
friendliest people and the prettiest women you ever seen.....
Everyone in the USA needs to speak English. Not Spanish, or Dutch, or German. English. The liberals love this cultural diversity thing, it divides people and makes them dependent upon the state.
Sorry if Texican-German has to die out, but it is for the good of the country. Now we just need to make Spanish die out.
Spaetzle? It is a kind of knudeln, made like noodles, but that is not important right now...
Addendum - I wasn’t *too* far off. The Prince was the son of the Grand Duke of Braunfels.
This is culture that contributes to the overall Texas Culture, not detracts from it.
No, I love spaetzle! And I make it from time to time to go with my goulash. You just rub dumpling dough through the big holes on a cheese grater! So simple. Love them all by themselves with a bunch of butter, too.
My PA Dutch grandfather used to make his own sauerkraut, even made his own graters for the cabbage, but I’ve not done that, lol.
No, Mr Spoetzl was the owner/founder of the Spoetzl Brewery in Shiner, TX, which brews Shiner Beer, bock, and others.
*truer words were never spoken*
The Germans settled here in the mid 1800’s, that’s pretty early for Texas. There were English speaking settlements in the eastern part of the state and I suppose Spanish speaking people in the south. I can see where 20% could be the German speaking settlers.
It’s easy to imagine it wasn’t easy being of German descent back in the day and makes you wonder if there will ever come a time when we are completely at ease when we learn our pilot for our transatlantic flight is none other than, “Ahmed.” Shouldn’t take more than 100-150 yrs or so.
Yep, that link works. Thanks.
LOL Why? I have a preference for the simple, the quaint, etc. Just don’t tell me Willie Nelson won’t be on his porch strumming his guitar. That would be devastating.
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