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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
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<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"> </span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">L O W L A N D S - L - 26 June 2007 - Volume 02</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">=========================================================================</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">From: </span><span id="_user_k9mw@yahoo.com" style="color: rgb(91, 16, 148); font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Mike Wintzer <<a href="mailto:k9mw@yahoo.com">k9mw@yahoo.com</a>
></span><span style="font-weight: normal; font-family: arial,sans-serif;" class="lg"></span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Subject: LL-L "Language politics"
2007.06.26 (09) [E]</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Dear LLers,</div> <div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">I am upset!
</div> <div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">I know there a Jutian minorities to the South of the border,</div> <div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">and LS minorities to the North.</div> <div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
I am revolted that the respective Central Government have</div> <div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">hijacked these minorities to claim they are theirs.</div> <div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Kumpelmenten Mike Wintzer
<br><br>----------<br><br>From: <span id="_user_helgetietz@yahoo.com" style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Helge Tietz <<a href="mailto:helgetietz@yahoo.com">helgetietz@yahoo.com</a>></span><span style="font-weight: normal;" class="lg">
</span><br>Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.06.26 (09) [E]<br>
<br>Dear Lowlanders,<br><br>As somebody who is a native Low Saxon speaker
while also being attached to the Danish minority I will first of all,
welcome the decision from the German goverment to allow bilingual signs
in Slesvig-Holsten, although correctly they soemtimes may need to be
tril-lingual as e.g. German-Danish-Frisian or German- Low
Saxon-Frisian. But it is certainly a step forward and helps to conserve
our seperate identidy in the whole of Sleswig-Holsten. I am pleased
that the current government of Sleswig-Holsten has pushed the matter
forward without any hesitation, this is a far cry from CDU-opinions 20
years ago. It certainly helps that prime minister H.P. Carstensen is
from a rural surrounding in Nordstrand and a Low Saxon speaker himself.
The matter of bilingual signs in Southern Jutland is indeed touchy
since the Danish language was oppressed when the area was under German
rule after 1871 and the memory of the Nazi-occupation is still very
much alive. It is somewhat similar as if there would be a call for
bilingual signs in both Flamish and French in the Flemsh speaking part
of Belgium.<br><br>However,
the German minority certainly has the right to ask for representation
because they are there and have been present in Southern Jutland for a
long time. Another problem is that they are in principal the
descendends of traders who came to Southern Jutland in mideaval times
when the Hanseatic league was at the height of its power. As such,
those traders were originally Low Saxon speaking but after becoming
isolated from the rest of Low-Saxon-speaking Northern Germany they
adopted High German as the language among them. Subsequently they do
not regard themselves as Low Saxons or resp. Holsteners in Southern
Jutland but simply as Germans and the Danes are somewhat reluctant to
grant them more rights then necessary for the reason mentioned further
above.<br><br>In addition, since the Napoleonic wars Denmark has been
reduced to its core which provoked a spirit to defend this core against
any intruders, no matter what. Though in some ways I understand this it
has also resulted recently in intolerance and racism as often expressed
through the Danish People's Party (DF), Karup's comment in the article
is an obvious hint where those people are coming from. Often their
taste is not too far away from "Der Stuermer". There is also a
prevailing opinion in Denmark that immigrants should adopt the culture
of the host nation if they want to live in Denmark and since the
Germans in Southern Jutland emigrated once from further south they are
regarded as the descendents of emigrants who should integrate in the
Danish society. I often reply if this is valid globally it is about
time that the European descendents in the Americas, Africa and
Australia/Oceania start learning the native languages and integrate in
the native cultures. Now, how many Danes in North America do speak then
any American-Indian language? Proabably not a single one.<br><br>Moreover, the German minority has
been there for so long and certainly contributed substantially to the
wealth of Danish population in Southern Jutland that I think they have
the right to be represented when it comes to signs as well. Often I
think the issue would be more tolerable to many Danes if the German
minority would re-discover their Hanseatic roots and with it the Low
Saxon language of their forefathers, if a request for the bilingual
signs would be done for adding the Low Saxon versions of the placenames
in Southern Jutland this would probably be a lot more tolerable to many
Danes. The problem is, that the Low Saxon forms are often not too
different from the Danish and in particular Soenderjysk forms. At home
we called the city of Aabenraa simply "Aap'nraadh", because Apenrade
would be pronounced like that in our Low Saxon dialect and thus very
similar to the Danish spelling and pronunciation, although in
Soenderjysk it is actually pronounced "Affenraa". Haderslev would
become "Hadhersleeven" or "Haa'rslee", just like Soenderjysk,
Soenderborg would be "Sonderborgh" and Toender will actually be the
German "Tondern". I could imagine if the German minority would bring
the idea forward that this could ease reservations in Denmark, at least
among the more liberal minded Danes. Whatever will happen now in
Soednerjylland, it appears that the SH-government is committed to
introduce bilingual signs no matter what and this is certainly welcomed
by all linguistic groups in SH.<br><br>Groeten vun <br><br>Helge<br>
<br></div><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">----------</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">From: </span><span id="_user_helgetietz@yahoo.com" style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25); font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
Helge Tietz <<a href="mailto:helgetietz@yahoo.com">helgetietz@yahoo.com</a>></span><span style="font-weight: normal; font-family: arial,sans-serif;" class="lg"></span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.06.26 (09) [E]</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Dear Lowlanders!</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
I have to make another comment to Euroland's
article: Their reflection of the Jyllands Posten article is actually
wrong. Jyllands Posten itself has not uttered any opinion about the
matter itself (as Eurolang claims) but simply reflected opinions of a
variety of persons they have interviewed and both pro- and contras are
very well documented while JP refrains of taking sides. Their final
comment is by H. Juergensens (from the German minority) and calls for a
constructive and tolerant discussion on the matter. I am somewhat more
sceptical about the article by "Die Welt", it is a lot more populistic
and creates the impression that the Danes still hate the Germans, the
article focusses on the apparent rejection of all Danes to the idea,
which is not true, according to Jyllands Postens's article. H.
Juergensen final comment is not present at all! That's a shame. It
shows how little a newspaper like "Die Welt" understands of Slesvig and
Holsten. Their article sounds like "The world still hates and oppresses
the poor Germans" and they have obviously not noticed that times have
changed and things in Slesvig-Holsten and Soenderjylland are moving on,
no matter what.</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Helge</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">----------</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com">
sassisch@yahoo.com</a>></span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Subject: Language politics</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Thanks, Mike and Helge!</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">By the way, Helge, you provided the long-sought answer to why Low Saxon ("Low German") seems to be gone from Danish soil.
</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">As for what appears to be </span><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;" class="small">
Peter Josika's quotes and <span style="font-style: italic;">Die Welt</span>'s bias, I am copying the editor of <span style="font-style: italic;">Eurolang</span> on this, and am adding, to make it abundantly clear a repetition here, and I hope that this matter can be followed up on the basis of more reliable sources in
<span style="font-style: italic;">Eurolang</span>.<br><br></span><div style="margin-left: 40px; font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 153);">I am somewhat more
sceptical about the article by "Die Welt", it is a lot more populistic
and creates the impression that the Danes still hate the Germans, the
article focusses on the apparent rejection of all Danes to the idea,
which is not true, according to Jyllands Postens's article. H.
Juergensen final comment is not present at all! That's a shame. It
shows how little a newspaper like "Die Welt" understands of Slesvig and
Holsten. Their article sounds like "The world still hates and oppresses
the poor Germans" and they have obviously not noticed that times have
changed and things in Slesvig-Holsten and Soenderjylland are moving on,
no matter what.</span><br></div>
<br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Whatever the truth of the matter may be, the Danish People's Party's power gain and general sentiment in this issue seems to go back to the "pre-enlightenment" attitude of "This is country X where we speak language X (only)." We see this here in the US where there are English-only movements that are primarily anti-Hispanic and are fundamentally opposed to diversity in general (considering that throughout history all immigrant families eventually adopted English at least as a second language despite the absence of a language policy). While road sign regulation may not seem all that important in the great scheme of things, some of what we have been witnessing in this young century alone goes to show that
</span><span style="font-weight: bold; font-family: arial,sans-serif;">no</span><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"> nation, no matter what its track record and reputation may be, should consider itself immune to embarking on the dangerous path of turning inward and complacent.
</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Regards,</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
Reinhard/Ron</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
•
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