LL-L "Language varieties" 2003.10.26 (02) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 26.OCT.2003 (02) * 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: Peter Snepvangers <snepvangers at optushome.com.au>
Subject: Grammar Books

Hello Ron,
I have just purchased a book "Dutch a comprehensive grammar" by Bruce
Donaldson and was offended by the the terminology used in the book to
describe Plat or Platt. The preface and glossary describes it as a label
used in Dutch to refer to any linguistic phenomenon that is considered sub
standard or stigmatised and is better avoided by the learner. My
understanding of Plat is that it refers to Non Dutch languages such as
Limburgs and Niedersassich by speakers of those languages and is more
commonly called countryside languages as these people spoke their local
languages and dialects of those local languages as well as the official
state languages when required. It seems to me the description being applied
to the meaning of Plat in this book is by a government in denial of these
languages or someone who has no ownership of these alternative to Dutch
languages and seeks only to undermine and delegate to the vulgar or simple.
In other words those who speak those languages are vulgar, simple people and
should only speak Dutch. There is no mention of Frisian, Lowlands Saxon or
Limburgs and their influences to and from Dutch. Perhaps I am over reacting
here but I remember all the Limburgers living in Australia who my parents
shared their lives with always saying their language and culture was
different to Dutch. It was always being denigrated as just some silly
carnival stuff for fools by the those living in the northern part of
Netherlands. Limburgers were made to feel as if they had a chip on their
shoulder. (Sounds like the USA). I have relatives in Hilversum and  other
areas as well as Frisian relatives living in Amsterdam and I know they do
not refer to Plat as second rate. Should I write to the author and ask for
an explanation or possibly an addendum in the next issue? The ISBN is
0-415-15419-7 Routledge Grammars.
Tot Ziens
Peter Snepvangers
snepvangers at optushome.com.au

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From: daniel <daniel at ryan-prohaska.com>
Subject: Grammar Books

Gabriele wrote:

Native Southern Germans tend to have a very hard
> time indeed disguising their local accent.
>
> Gabriele Kahn

From: Dan Ryan-Prohaska daniel at ryan-prohaska.com
Subject: Help Needed

Dear Gabriele,

As do Northerners. For me as a 'Southerner' Northerners stick out like a
sore thumb. I find most regional pronunciations of the standard language
are influenced by the local dialects, whether they are spoken by the
majority or not.

I have no difficulty telling a Hamburger from a Münsterländer, and an
Eastphalian from a Mecklenburg-Pommeranian. I do admit that t gets
harder on a more localised level.

The point is that many Southerners don't even make an attempt at
'disguising' their local accent (and why should they in the first
place?). Dialect speech seems more wide spread in the South and the
linguistic differences between dialect and standard are more gradual
than up North.

I've also often encountered the phenomenon that women try to disguise
their dialect or local accent more often than men do. Of late (meaning
the past 50-100 years) women have shown a strong tendency to moving
towards the standard (not just in the German speaking area), whereas it
was they who were always the preservers of local speech as they tended
to stay in one area more often while men had contact with the 'outside'
world through, jobs, military and the like. Nowadays men tend to use
dialect as a kind of an in-jargon while women strive to speak the
standard and teach it to their children.

This leads to an interesting situation in Austria. Small children are
generally spoken to in Standard German, at least in the larger towns and
cities. Later at school they are (the boys more than the girls) immersed
in dialect speech. Parents' attitudes to my asking them why they speak
Standard German to their children is often "because they'll learn
dialect at school (!!!) anyway". I think 'at school' here means in
'their social context' rather than their receiving lessons in dialect.

I've seen (or rather heard) boys coming of age who started out being
speakers of standard German, becoming dialect speakers the older they
get. Interesting reversal of the linguistic situation I thought.
Comments?

Dan

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

Peter, my opinion of Donaldson's book, although overall favorable, is
similar to yours.  What you need to bear in mind is that only a few years
ago it was not entirely kosher to make a to-do about linguistic diversity
beyond the dialect level in the Netherlands (as in Germany).  Frisian as a
separate language from Dutch (and German) was (and by some still is)
considered "burden" enough.  Giving Lowlands Saxon and Limburgish a separate
language label, even if only by implication, was not the done thing at the
time Donaldson wrote the book.  These attitudes influenced and in part still
influence foreign academics that deal with Dutch (and German).  (Even now
few foreign departments of Germanic or Germanistics deal with the results of
the European Language Charter, still present LS as part of Dutch and German
to their students.)

Dan, Lowlanders, I keep wondering if North German supression of linguistic
diversity versus the South German and Austrian tradition of acceptance or
even celebration of it have some roots in the fact that there has never been
any doubt about Southern varieties being German dialects while Northern
diversity came with the underlying question "dialects or language?", that in
the North it was a matter of suppressing a *language*.  Until the total
collapse of the Hanseatic Trading League, "Saxon" had been a separate
language.  Martin Luther, who had translated the Bible into German, still
considered "Saxon" a separate language and suggested that Bugenhagen
translate the bible into it for the Saxon people.  Its decline, the erosion
of it separate language status and its social stigmatization (none of which
were coincidental, as far as I am concerned) created a climate in which
social and economic prestige came to be in part dependent upon supression of
ones ancestral language in favor of "pure" German, a German that was as
"un-Saxon" as possible, at least to Northern ears.  This may in part also
explain some of the prejudicial attitudes among Northerners toward what to
them seems like Southern dialect "flaunting."

Something to ponder perhaps?

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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