Munich (dpa / lby) – According to linguist Konstantin Niehaus, many young people use Bavarian dialects as a matter of course when writing chat messages. “It’s totally normal for many young people,” said the Germanist, who researches dialect and dialect in social media at the University of Salzburg, the “Münchner Merkur” (Wednesday). “In chats it is often i instead of me, ned/net instead of not, des instead of that and mi instead of me.” It is “typed the way it is spoken in everyday life”.
Writing messages in dialect is “a question of generation,” said Niehaus. Many over 30-year-olds were brought up to write in written language. That has changed. “Dialect is accepted – probably because it also appears in the media today,” said Niehaus. “For young people it’s so normal that they even use it more or less consistently when chatting in everyday life.”
There is a north-south divide both in Germany and in the Free State, said Niehaus. “The closer to Austria’s border, the more Bavarian – now also in chat.”
