Aptum, Zeitschrift für Sprachkritik und Sprachkultur 20. Jahrgang. 2024, Heft 2

This research paper provides an argumentation analysis of the salient political sentence “What creates workplaces is social”, which can be traced back to the Minister for Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Food in Adolf Hitler’s first cabinet of government, Alfred Hugenberg, and figures prominently in German economic- and sociopolitical discourse since the early 2000s, put forward by conservative and economically liberal politicians. As a starting point of analysis, this paper classifies the sentence as a political aphorism. Focusing on an exemplary quotation from 2003, a mainly implicit argument is then reconstructed and analysed, which necessarily bases on the argument scheme of a-minore, yet fails to instantiate the scheme correctly. To show this, a necessary condition of comparative arguments, which the reconstructed argument does not fulfil, is identified, and a shift in the meaning of social is proven: In the course of the argument, the term social deviates strongly from its usual political meaning in normal language games, as is shown from a Wittgensteinian point of view on semantics. Thus, the grounding a-minore argument as well as the argument as whole turn out to be fallacies of equivocation. Moreover, they do not only, as aphorisms usually do, playfully combine incompatible concepts, but seriously confuse different “Begründungssprachen”, i. e. categorial systems of problem analysis and reflection, namely, an ethical one and a profit-logical one, thereby simulating the former, while actually dissolving it in the ladder. Finally, the reconstructed argument’s conversational implicature of the political measures proposed being sufficient to create workplaces is falsified. In summary, the argument proposes neither a social nor a workplace creating policy, but a cost and tax relief of high earners and enterprises at the expense of dependent employees.

The aim of this article is to show how groups and hierarchies are constructed in and with language thematisations and language-critical statements and what functions this fulfils. This case study will focus on the juxtaposition of the concepts of woke and civic (bürgerlich). This will be analysed from a discourse-linguistic perspective and with a view to linguistic parameters such as nominations (Nominationen) and predications (Prädikationen), flag and stigma words and their deontic dimensions. The question that will be pursued in the following is: How and with which linguistic means are the groups WOKE and CIVIC juxtaposed in language-critical utterances and what functions do different forms of hierarchisation assume in the process? In addition, it will be analysed how the self-described civic or middle-class perspective questions woke language use as an allegedly discriminatory language system and how the supposed consequences of this ‘wrong’ language use for middle-class society are presented. It becomes clear that the accusation of exclusion and discrimination, which is always attached to the criticism of woke language use or woke in general, itself establishes marginalisation and exclusion. An opposition is always constituted where one side feels morally superior to the other. Language criticism here is a symptom of these exclusion mechanisms and a justification strategy to establish rigid group boundaries in order to react to marginalisation and (potential) bans from the “other side”.

The article deals with the latest edition of the Duden volume 9 dictionary for cases of linguistic doubt. Since 2007, the Duden volume 9 dictionary has been adapted and edited by various linguists. Consequently, the dictionary has been changed from a prescriptive, normative guide book which tells language users which linguistic variants are correct to a guide book which uses modern linguistic insights and principles to help the users decide themselves which linguistic variants are most suitable for what they want to express. Thus, the 9th edition of Duden volume 9 (2021) for the first time integrates corpus data into the dictionary in the field of prepositions with variants in the government of genitive or dative case. The article explains this new form of dealing with linguistic variants within the dictionary. Furthermore, the article shows and discusses results of a survey on how this way of presenting linguistic variants is being received by the users of the dictionary. Finally, the question is being raised whether this descriptive approach leads to a new concept of codification.

Language change is a permanent and continuing process. On the one hand, some words become outdated and obsolete (Archaism). On the other hand, new words are created and used today (Neologism). There are new words which are used only once or seldom (Occasionalism) and others which become very popular. There is a difference between “Häufigkeitswörtern” (words of high incidence) which are used very often and “Trendwörtern” (trend words) which refer to phenomena being just of great importance and actuality. There are also “Modewörter” (fashion words, buzzwords) which everybody uses all the time. Buzzwords are not looked upon as an enrichment of vocabulary by all people. Some of them refuse these words, thinking of them as unnecessary and calling them “Neudeutsch”. But they can be found in several newspaper articles. In this essay, some examples are cited and analyzed. Buzzwords which are used very often can develop into mere word sleeves with little meaning. For example, there exist many famous signals of agreement or contradiction in conversations as response or comment to the remarks of a dialogue partner. Instead of a short and clear Yes!, unnecessary fillers are used. There are also special words which are connected to different worldwide crises. New popular words were produced in the field of information technology and the present teenage slang has brought popular words into the vocabulary of general language. The influence of English vocabulary on the German language is remarkable. People try to increase their personal prestige by using widespread words that stand for cultural and linguistical developments in the USA — the country which is regarded as very progressive. Many Anglicisms became part of the German language, but are often rejected as “Denglish” and “Neudeutsch” by language purists.

This research paper compares two publications with the almost identical title “Hundred Words of the Century” and “Hundred Century-Words”. The first one was published in 1999, the second one in 2023. Except for the almost identical titles, they are totally different. For the older publication, seven celebrities chose the words and 100 renowned researchers from the relevant fields of study or from media dealt with the words. On the other side, a renowned linguist and critic of language use, the youngest-ever holder of the “Duden”-Prize, chose the words under the sometimes quite individualistic criterion ‘As I like it’. He comments those words mostly on only one page, sometimes with very personal and funny associations without any critical apparatus. Out of the hundred words, very few in both publications are identical – such as, “Bikini” or “Wende” (“turnaround” in the former German Democratic Republic). Heringers book is, in any case, a valuable analysis and a very different approach of transferring the results of research into the public.