LL-L "Language survival" 2005.09.06 (06) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 06.SEP.2005 (06) * 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: Críostóir Ó Ciardha <paada_please at yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: LL-L "Language survival" 2005.09.05 (08) [E]



Gabriele wrote:
"Teaching an "indigenous" language in school will only work, and be accepted 
by the children, if it is also spoken outside of the school, in their home 
environment."

There is no need to put indigenous in inverted commas. I consider both 
Cornish and Irish to be my ethnic, indigenous languages, even though my 
first language or mother tongue is English.

Obviously immersion education as part of a holistic language revival is best 
accompanied by community usage. But in the case of Manx, Cornish and (for 
the most part) Irish, this is not possible. That is why immersion education 
is used - to create a viable speech community foundation for the language to 
strengthen from. In Belfast and Derry twenty years ago there were very few 
speakers of Irish. Now it is the case that there are very many speakers of 
Irish (up to a third of the population in some wards). Yes, Irish is not the 
sole language of any part of Belfast or Derry. But you are denigrating 
immersion educa! tion on the basis that it means nothing without community 
usage, whilst ignoring the fact that immersion education creates that usage. 
Why do you think Eliezer Ben-Yehuda fought so hard to create Hebrew-language 
schooling in Palestine? According to your stance he was simply superfluous 
in his efforts. Languages are lost through schooling, and schools are the 
best places to reacquire them.

Immersion education in indigenous languages absolutely _is_ better than the 
nothing you seem to be championing.

Go raibh maith agat,

Criostóir.

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From: burgdal32admin <burgdal32 at pandora.be>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2005.09.05 (01) [E]

> From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at WORLDONLINE.NL>
> Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2005.09.04 (03) [E]
>
> Beste Luc, it IS not a terrible accent, but you THINK it is.
You have a point here Ingmar, sorry for not being so clear.
But I didn't write about facts, just  what many of us think about it
and how we feel about the changes  over the recent  years.
In my imagination, when the two of us read the same book in Dutch, in
our minds it is a kind of "two different  books" also.

> Just as many British will think the American accent is horrible,
> or the Australian one, but of course that is bullshit as well.
Bullshit it isn't, just an opinion. This has nothing to do with right
or wrong.
> And many Westerners seem to hate Arabic etc, which is one of the
> most eloquent languages there is...
I find it a  pity that i can not read the lovely stories of 1001
arabian nights in its original language, even if i loved  the Dutch
translation (20 years from now). I was in Egypt last summer, and indeed
there are  quiet a few accents similar to  the North-Dutch
pronounciations, so i imagine you have no choise but to love it.

Groetjes
Luc Vanbrabant
Oekene

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From: heather rendall <HeatherRendall at compuserve.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2005.09.05 (01) [E]

Message text written by INTERNET:lowlands-l at LOWLANDS-L.NET
>I would frown upon any suggestion of a 50-50 division or bilingual
education.

In the spirit of going all the way, I propose that all minority
language communities follow the example of Cymru (Wales): education
completely in the minority language. It's a bit more complex than that
actually, but the basic principle has done wonders for the Welsh
language in recent years, and they are much more dramatic than those
of any crappy bilingual education program anywhere which insists on
using the LWC as well.

And obviously none of these kids have any troubles developing English
skills, for if they did, we'd be hearing about it a lot more.<

Except the children of English speaking families were made to feel 'less
worthy' because of it.

At least a 50/50 split values BOTH languages and cultures.

Imposing as they did in the WHOLE of Wales a language that was very much a
minority, many English speaking Welsh  children were less well off and
suffered as a result.
Especially in the early days.
Believe me! I have three grown-up children who still smart from the
recollections of how they were treated!

Because they were isolated from their Welsh friends (quite literally) in
school and the Welsh children were told not to play with the English or to
speak English, divisions arose that had not existed before,  based entirely
on language.  Very dangerous and regretable.

I had hoped my children would receive a bi-lingual education. Instead they
received a not-for-you-unless-on-our-terms education .

I am totally against any social engineering - someone always suffers.

If the Welsh had wanted to speak Welsh, ( as they did in our area) then
they would have continued to speak it ( as they did in our area) but the
greatest proponents of Let's rather speak English were the middle class
Welsh from the 19th century onwards in order to have greater job
opportunities.

The 'wonder' that Welsh teaching has created is based simply on the fact
that you could not ( cannot???) get a job without being able to speak
Welsh. Hence the incentive!

If the same rule were installed throughout Europe, Welsh would become the
lingua franca of the continent!

Language follows jobs.
It is a matter of simple economics.

What is invidious wherever it happens and whoever says it , is the
disparaging of one language and its belittling by the other.

It would have been GOOD to see 50/50 education and BOTH languages equally
valued.

Heather

PS Boy! Did you touch a raw nerve!

PPS Guess what: when we did complain - no-one listened and people's jobs
were put on the line! Neil Kinnock tried to support a more tolerant
attitude and to my everlasting shame I was too fearful about my job to put
my head above the parapet and write to support him.  ( I did, once I had
moved out of Wales! What a miserable coward I am!)

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From: Heiko Evermann <heiko.evermann at gmx.de>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2005.09.05 (01) [E]

Hi Jonny, hi Ron,

> What's the alternative?
> Dry-freeze the lexicon, soak the language in formaldehyde and display it
> into a museum showcase never to be touched again?  What makes it different
> from other languages that it must be frozen in time and space?
Right. And do not forget: tell everyone who is trying to learn the language,
that he is not speaking it properly. This is very important, when you want 
to
make sure that the language does not change any more.

> In other words: we need a 'Patentplatt' with words like 'Nettbreef'
> (Evermann), 'Postleettall' (Buck/slomox) and 'Tempoövertreden'
> (Fehrs-Gilde).
Well, Jonny, we do need a word for e-mail. High German did not even manage 
to
find a word of its own for this. And they even started to misuse English
words to coin English words of their own.
* They say "handy" instead of "mobile/cell phone"
* They say "USB-stick" instead of USB-keydrive
etc.
The fact that German is no longer able to find words of its own for computer
related terms shows clearly that German is on the way of dying.

So e-Mail is not an option in Platt. Now there is a problem: whatever word I
try to use, you will say that it is "Patentplatt". (BTW: what do you call an
e-mail in your Platt? Perhaps you have a much better idea?)

Concerning the origin of Nettbreef you are indeed right to blame me, because 
I
imported it into Low Saxon. (And the other two guys from the Linux op Platt
project liked it and we started using and spreading it. And I do hope that
the language community starts to use and to like it. (Unless, of course, 
they
come up with a much better proposal.) I had had a long discussion with a
norwegian friend. She told me that Nynorsk had put a lot of effort in
translating computer terms (whereas Bookmal has the tendency to use English
terms). She specifically mentioned Nettläsar (net reader) as translation for
web browser. And she also mentioned a word for URL/web page, something like
nettsteed. Then I had the idea that Nettkieker for browser was nice and
Nettbreef (net letter) would be a fine word for e-mail, because it is
transmitted through the world wide net (internet). I talked about this with
her, and I do not remember precicely whether she proposed it. (I do think 
so,
but I am not 100% sure.)

Don't you think that it is really nice and platt enough? If not, then please
propose another nice word.

Kind regards,

Heiko Evermann

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

Afrikaans has _e-pos_ for "e-mail," etc. etc.

I'm beginning to suspect that at the root of the anti-development camp's 
attitude is the opinion that a language like LS *should not* be used in 
certain contexts, which is when German or whatever other "real" language 
takes over.  In other words, whichever way you turn it, they do not *really* 
think of it as a real and independent language, more like an incomplete 
dialect to be used and read for fun at non-serious times.  I have no other 
explanation.  If there is one, *please* explain!

Kumpelmenten,
Reinhard/Ron

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