LL-L "Language maintenance" 2007.03.25 (0) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L - 25 March 2007 - Volume 01

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From: Jonny Meibohm <altkehdinger at freenet.de>
Subject: LL-L "Language maintenance" 2007.03.24 (04) [E/S]

Ron,

you wrote:

Jonny,

I never suggested that any speaker should be forced or feel obligated to
give up his or her dialect.

And I never said or thought you did!

Allerbest

Jonny Meibohm

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From: Wesley Parish <wes.parish at paradise.net.nz>
Subject: LL-L "Language maintenance" 2007.03.24 (04) [E/S]

On Sunday 25 March 2007 08:18, Lowlands-L List wrote:
<snip>

Minas freondas,

If I might intrude in on this discussion, could I mention something my
father
said once in discussing the Tok Pisin Baibel, which he contributed to in the
form of editing the text?

He said the Bible Society chose to focus on one specific dialect, because
that
was felt to be less "contaminated" by English, and thus likely to have a
wider group of people who would understand it.  Not necessarily speak it;
understanding it was the more important value.

It's also the same reason why in the Arab nation, everybody speaks their own
dialect, but everybody understands Egyptian Arabic - it's got the most
cultural weight.

I would argue that that is the most important focus for producing a written
LS
language - it's also worked for English - ie, I can understand most forms of
English I've encountered, from Ebonics to Scottish English (and even some
Scots ;) to Jamaican English, etc.  The language I write in is a dialect of
English based on the common-or-garden London dialect as transmitted to
the "Colonies" during the Colonial Error - oops, should that be Era?  And
practically all written English is based on that London-based dialect -
which
owes quite considerably to the pre-eminence of one William Shakespeare.

So what is the dialect that most LS speakers would be able to follow, with a
minimum of misunderstanding?  What has the greatest cultural weight?

It doesn't matter if everybody's got their own dialect and has some
dialectal "peculiarities" not shared by anybody else, if there is a set of
reasonably well-understood dialectal commonalities that will serve as
their "lingua franca" and written language.  (Of course, if one of those
dialectal areas throws up a brilliant writer or playwright or singer or
poet,
or suchlike, who creates world-class literature from their own dialect, then
everybody else will seek to emulate that person, and the language will take
its lead from them.  That's the way it works. ;)

ond nimst thu mid penings-weorth of salas, gif thu wilst.

thin freond

Wesley Parish

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From: "heatherrendall at tiscali.co.uk"
Subject: LL-L "Language maintenance" 2007.03.23 (04) [E]

Jonny wrote > But- who will really speak this language? The boring question:
who
> speaks Latin today? A circle of freaky scientists and crazy
> hobby-linguists?

What about most of Italy, France, Spain & Roumania? + bits of Switzerland

Surely it is more likely that a language will develop into a new form than
remain frozen in unchanging form for ever. It takes efforts of National
Academies to freeze a language in an attempt to 'resist change' and then you
end up with a mess like French where the spelling is frozen in the 18th
century but the pronunciation has moved with the people.

What should be resisted at all costs on the other hand is the deliberate
surpression of any language. The moment one group says to the other " Thou
shalt not talk like that ever" and the 2nd group believes what they are
being told, then a language is doomed.

re rural/urban change - in urban areas of the UK  the number of distinct
dialects of English that are being created by ethnic goups is quite amazing.
Most creative perhaps - Caribbean English which loves 'poetic' symbolism,
euphemisms etc.
Some areas boast gangs who will not allow others to join UNLESS they speak
their 'tongue'

BW
Heather

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From: Yasuji Waki <yasuji at amber.plala.or.jp>
Subject: LL-L "Language maintenance" 2007.03.24 (05) [E]

March 25, 2007
Dear Lowlander-friends,
 The following must be a very primitive question for all of you.

I have been learning so-called Plattdeutsch for several years using a book
"Sprachführer Plattdüütsch" von Czriacks/Nissen und auch "das Neue Sass",
etc. Also I have several books.
Sometimes I see the HP of Radio Bremen to listen how to pronounce Platt.

I know and see many internet- sites of Plattdeutsch and there are many
different  spelling systems. As a foreigner it is a big problem which
orthopgraphy is better to learn.
And maybe there are uncountable variations in Grammar, too.

Please advise me which variation I should learn to get better effect to read
various works such as
Groth, Trede, Reuter and also modern authors.

I can understand Modern Standard German, which is taught in foreign
countries as the standrd language in German speaking countries.

Hartlich Greuten,

Yasuji Waki
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