Dialects, Cultural Identity, and Economic Exchange

Konferenzbeitrag

We investigate whether time-persistent cultural borders impede economic exchange across regions of the same country. To measure cultural differences we evaluate, for the first time in economics, linguistic micro-data about phonological and grammatical features of German dialects. These data are taken from a unique linguistic survey conducted between 1879 and 1888 in 45,000 schools. Matching this information to 439 current German regions, we construct a dialect similarity matrix. Using a gravity analysis, we show that current cross-regional migration is positively affected by historical dialect similarity. This suggests that cultural identities formed in the past still influence economic exchange today.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Beiträge zur Jahrestagung des Vereins für Socialpolitik 2010: Ökonomie der Familie - Session: Cultural Influences on Economic Behaviour ; No. C13-V1

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics: Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population; Neighborhood Characteristics ; Cultural Economics; Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology: General ; Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
• Subject: Dialects ; Language ; Culture ; Internal migration ; Gravity ; Germany

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Südekum, Jens ; Heblich, Stephan ; Falck, Oliver ; Lameli, Alfred
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Verein für Socialpolitik
• (where): Frankfurt a. M.
• (when): 2010

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/37364
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:45 AM CET