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Wilko Lücht: Zur "Überlänge" im ostfriesischen Niederdeutsch

Vowel length in Northern Low Saxon cannot be adequately described in terms of a simple opposition between short and long vowels. Until recently, it was therefore naively assumed that a three-way opposition pertained between short, long and overlong vowels. A vowel was considered “overlong” when it was of significantly longer duration than a long vowel. Vowel length in Low German has now been extensively investigated, phonetically and phonologically, and two more or less distinct types of theory have emerged, referred to here as tree and tier theories, as briefly introduced in the first section. While tree theories limit themselves to the intrinsic characteristics of vowels und attempt to analytically describe these on a one-dimensional theoretical level, tier theories are consistently suprasegmental in focus and attempt to develop multi-part models of vowel length within a phonological word.

In the research literature on overlength (Überlänge) in East Frisian Low German, its phonemic status has in part been explicitly denied, in part implicitly disallowed through a failure to systematically engage with it. This article aims to demonstrate that overlength in East Frisian Low German can be regarded as a genuine phonological category. Both a diachronic and a synchronic account of the phenomenon based on previous models help substantiate this claim.