LL-L "Language survival" 2003.04.13 (03) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 13.APR.2003 (03) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
 L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
 S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Zeêuws)
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From: jpkrause <jpkrause at weblink2000.net>
Subject: Language Varieties

Here in Kansas, the language decimation began a generation earlier with WWI.
There are many local stories about signs being posted in shop windows in
Newton, KS the heart of Kansas German country saying "No German spoken
here."  To bring this into closer relation to our Lowlands Languages
interest, Low Saxon/Low German has nearly disappeared.  I cannot find any
one locally who speaks it better than I.  And I only speak it very brokenly.
So imagine my surprise when I overheard two elderly gentlemen speaking Low
German after church services one Sunday in Newton.  I think WWI really dealt
the death blow to the survival of Low German in Kansas.

[Jim Krause]

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language survival

Hi, Jim, Lowlanders!

Similar things happened in Australia, apparently mostly during World War I.

In the state of South Australia, which has been associated with early
immigration from Germany (supposedly including speakers of Lowlands Saxon
[Low German], Frisian and Sorbian), speaking "German" in public became
unacceptable, and German place names (e.g., in the Adelaide Hills and in the
wine-growing areas of the Barossa Valley)  were replaced with English ones.
For example, Hahndorf, in the Adelaide Hills, a state heritage site since
1988,
(http://www.teachers.ash.org.au/dnutting/germanaustralia/e/hahndorf.htm,
http://www.adelaidehillsinfo.asn.au/Hahndorf/), named after Captain Dirk
Hahn (a native of Westerland, the main town of the North Frisian Island of
Sylt) came to be renamed Ambleside in 1917.  During that dark period,
achievements by German-Australians
(http://www.teachers.ash.org.au/dnutting/germanaustralia/e/beitrag19.htm)
were played down, such as the works of the influencial painters Sir Hans
Heysen (widely considered one of the pioneers of non-Eurocentric Australian
art).  The name Hahndorf was readopted in 1935 during an effort to recognize
South Australia's German heritage, namely during Hitler's rise.  Perhaps the
South Australian public was wising up, realizing that affirming and
respecting a group's heritage is more likely to affirming this group as
loyal Australians than rejecting its heritage.

However, the effects of such actions cannot be easily reversed.  During my
visits to previously predominantly German-speaking communities in Australia
I was told that language loyalty suffered particularly severely, and no
German-humptata-beer-stein-type (predominantly tourism-oriented)
celebrate-German-heritage campaigns can reverse the damage.  I suppose this
is in part because these communities lost their true heritage, the heritage
with which their ancestors had arrived, a blend of various regional cultures
and language varieties that under ideal conditions would have developed into
something new and uniquely Australian.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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