LL-L "Language varieties" 2008.01.01 (02) [E]

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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
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L O W L A N D S - L  -  01 January 2008 - Volume 02
Song Contest: lowlands-l.net/contest/ (- 31 Dec. 2007)
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From: Heiko Evermann <privat at evermann.de>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2007.12.30 (01) [E]

Dear Lowlanners,
> Talking 'bout Nazis, guess they didn't talk so much Platt (I could be
> wrong)...
> I have often heard Platt given the stigma of a nazi language. Has anyone
> information about a role of Plattdeutsch in nazi ideology? Was
Plattdeutsch
> supported by the nazis? Or was it just a language as languages are, medium
> of communication for good and bad ideas? I heard there was a slogan "Ein
> deutscher Jung snackt Platt", a slogan that is said to have done much harm
> to the language after the nazis were done with.
My father was born in 1922 in Altona. (He insists that he was born in
"Altona
- now Hamburg-Altona" and not in Hamburg as Altona was only incorporated
into
Hamburg much later.) He told me that when he was young the boys in the
street
spoke Platt and the girls insisted on speaking Hochdeutsch, as Platt was not
"fein" enough.

Concerning the Hitlerjugend that became mandatory in 1936 when he was 12
years
old, he told me that the Hitlerjugend was Hochdeutsch only.

Kind regards,

Heiko Evermann

----------

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

Moin, Heiko!

My mother was born in the same year and place. What you shared with us
pretty much tallies with what I know from her, even though she, though
native there, may not have been so typical in that her parents were
immigrants from the east, her mother of Central-German-speaking former
Sorbian background and her father from a rural area in which Eastern
Mecklenburg Low Saxon was spoken. At home, her father spoke Low Saxon mostly
when he was being angry (which was very, very rare) or when he was in a
loving or joking mood, and which time everyone got the typically eastern *
-ing* diminutive added to their names (*Marting, Franzing, Herting, Greting*
).

What needs to be added perhaps is that Altona had a higher percentage of
Jewish population on pretty much all socio-economic levels, and from my
mother's accounts I gather that Jewish-Gentile relations were on the whole
good, even close and interwoven, and Jewish charity benefited the entire
population. Altona had been a haven for Jews for a long time, beginning with
the arrival of Sephardim from Portugal at the time of the Inquisition. This
means that local antisemitism and support for the Nazis was pretty weak and
had to be boosted by "expert importation" at the end of the Weimar Republic
and early during the Hitler years. The Social Democrat base was very strong,
and my grandfather was typical in that regard. He and others, and especially
communists, would stick their heads out of windows or wait in alleyways to
hurl all manner of objects and words at the (allegedly mostly imported)
marching Hitlerjugend before the takeover, which got many into trouble after
the takeover.

At that time it was mainly at the now famous fish market that Low Saxon was
used "full on," though Missingsch always had a strong role to play there
too.

Kumpelmenten,
Reinhard/Ron

P.S. for English speakers: "Altona" is stressed on the *first* syllable.

•

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