LL-L "Language varieties" 2006.04.01 (01) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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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 (Zeeuws)
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   L O W L A N D S - L * 01 April 2006 * Volume 01
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From: Sandy Fleming <sandy at fleimin.demon.co.uk>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2006.03.27 (04) [E]

> From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Language varieties
>
> When as a youngster in Germany I studied English and Scandinavian 
> languages, unofficially also some Dutch and Afrikaans, I definitely 
> did so through Low Saxon in my mind, "privately," because to my mind 
> it had more in common with those languages.  I did so even if the 
> official medium was German.  It was simply an easier step "to get the 
> feel" if I approached these languages from LS.  When I studied 
> Malay/Indonesian, Japanese and Chinese, I initially did so
Being a Scots speaker always seemed to me to give a big advantage in 
learning other languages, compared to most English speakers. Obviously 
there's certain consonants such as /x/ and /r/ that can stand you in 
good stead for some languages, but perhaps more important is the rather 
full set of undiphthongised vowels, fairly essential for most of the 
languages I've studied and from which new diphthongs can be constructed 
if necessary.

Or you can learn a sign language and gain no advantage at all from 
previous languages  :)

Sandy Fleming
http://scotstext.org/

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