Language shift within a German-speaking community in regional Australia: Ideologies, utility, and attitudes

The German language has been a part of the Australian linguistic landscape since the early days of white colonisation (Harmstorf & Cigler, 1985; Tampke & Doxford, 1990). Much has been written on the communities formed by multiple waves of German-speaking migrants since then, particularly regarding the maintenance of German in contact with English as the unofficial national language and the associated monolingual ideologies of mainstream society (e.g., Clyne, 1988; Hatoss, 2006; Hunt & Davis, 2022). A dominant pattern of shift to English within one generation after arrival has been sustained against the setting of oscillating language and cultural policies both encouraging and discouraging multilingualism (Clyne, 1997; Clyne & Kipp, 1997; Djité, 2011). This paper will go beyond exploring the broader sociolinguistic factors and systemic ideologies which influence the maintenance and/or shift of German, elucidating the lived experiences and communicative practices of a “hidden” German-speaking community in a large regional city. We draw on semi-structured interviews with 40+ participants ranging in age from adolescence to those in their 80s, and spanning first, second, and third generations. We explore their attitudes and perceptions of the German language against the backdrop of the monolingual English mindset, and how these affect their plurilinguistic communicative practices. We find that attitudes towards language maintenance vary, but not in alignment with external and systemic influences, such as language policy and mainstream linguistic ideologies. Rather, inter-generational transmission of German depends upon individual and internal forces. While there is some degree of maintenance associated with each wave of migration, creating “pockets” of language maintenance, language shift swiftly follows, in some cases driven by each new generation of migrants, in other cases, driven by their children, and in still more cases, by disinterest within both generations. Therefore, maintenance of German in Australia appears to be largely reliant upon newcomers.