Linguaggi “superdiversi” e “metrolinguali”: il caso del Kiezdeutsch

Due to the diffuse nature of migration since the early 1990s, the multiculturalism of an earlier era has been gradually replaced by what Vertovec (2007) calls ‘super-diversity’. Super-diversity is characterized by a tremendous increase in the categories of migrants, not only in terms of nationality, ethnicity, language, and religion, but also in terms of motives, patterns and itineraries of migration, and so on (cf. Vertovec 2007). The predictability of the category of ‘migrant’ and of its sociocultural features has disappeared. ‘Super-diversity’ intended to underline a level and kind of complexity surpassing anything the country has previously experienced. Such a condition is distinguished by a dynamic interplay of variables among an increased number of new, small and scattered, multiple-origin, transnationally connected, socio-economically differentiated and legally stratified immigrants who have arrived over the last decade. Outlined here, new patterns of super-diversity pose significant challenges for both policy and research. In this regard, this contribution aims to analyze Kiezdeutsch, multi-ethnic /dialect (Wiese 2012) of the German language, considering it as a manifestation and paradigm of a “superdiverse” society. Another concept that will be taken into consideration for the analysis of the Kiezdeutsch will be that of Metrolingualism (Pennycook and Otsuji) through which the current metropolis is observed as a key place for the construction of creative linguistic practices that question: "the authenticity and ownership of language” and “one to one association among language, ethnicity, nation and territory” (2010, p. 241).