<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 - 24 October 2007 - Volume 03</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Song Contest: <a href="http://lowlands-l.net/contest/">lowlands-l.net/contest/</a> (- 31 Dec. 2007)</span><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_kevin.caldwell1963@verizon.net" style="color: rgb(91, 16, 148); font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Kevin & Cheryl Caldwell <<a href="mailto:kevin.caldwell1963@verizon.net">kevin.caldwell1963@verizon.net
</a>></span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.23 (03) [E]</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><div style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;" id="mb_2">
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<p><font color="navy" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; color: navy;">I don't know about their countries'
official stances, but Russian, Ukrainian, and Belarusan exist on such a dialect
continuum, although the settlement of ethnic Russians in western Ukraine during
the Soviet period probably served to accentuate some differences between
Russian and Ukrainian. I would guess (although I don't know) that the
Ukrainian government probably does as much as it can to emphasize the
differences as well, in an effort to counteract decades of Russian dominance.</span></font></p>
<p><font color="navy" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; color: navy;">Kevin Caldwell</span></font></p>
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<p><font size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span>Were it not for the international border and Sweden's
refusal to recognize any Scandinavian minority language within its borders,
Scanian of Southern Sweden and Danish would probably be considered one language
now. As in the case of Low Saxon, separatists point toward differences as a
result of separation to justify the separation. </span><br>
<br>
<span>In the absence of the international border, Galician of
northwestern Spain
and Portuguese of Portugal would probably be considered one language, as
linguists do. Again, there is a dialect continuum, though existing under
Spanish power has resulted in Castilian influences on Galician. </span><br>
<br>
<span>Any other such cases?</span><br>
<br>
<span>Regards,</span><br>
<span>Reinhard/Ron</span></span></font></p>
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</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_Karl-Heinz.Lorenz@gmx.net" style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25); font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
Karl-Heinz Lorenz</span><span style="font-weight: normal; font-family: arial,sans-serif;" class="lg"> <<a href="mailto:Karl-Heinz.Lorenz@gmx.net">Karl-Heinz.Lorenz@gmx.net</a>></span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.23 (05) [E]</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><div style="direction: ltr; font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span class="q">Ron wrote:<br>> The above would be a bit like Austria deciding that its main language was<br>> not German but, say, "Austrian" (Östareichisch) or "Austro-Bavarian"<br>> (Östareichisch-Boarisch),
<br><br></span></div><div style="direction: ltr; font-family: arial,sans-serif;">In
a way Austria has its own language as there is the "Österreichisches
Wörterbuch" (also used in South Tyrol) instead of the Duden, which is
more or less the "Regelwerk" for German in Germany and Swiss German.<br><br><a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96sterreichisches_W%C3%B6rterbuch" target="_blank">
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96sterreichisches_W%C3%B6rterbuch</a><br><br>Regards,<br>Karl-Heinz<br></div><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;" class="sg"><br>----------<br><br></span><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
From: </span><span id="_user_helgetietz@yahoo.com" style="color: rgb(91, 16, 148); font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Helge Tietz <<a href="mailto:helgetietz@yahoo.com">helgetietz@yahoo.com</a>></span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.23 (03) [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;">It is indeed often frustrating how successful
Dutch and German nationalist have been in the past 140 years and it is
hard work to convince many Dutch people here that Northern Germany has
linguistically and culturally a lot more in common with the
Netherlands, particularily the Nedersaksisch and Frisian speaking areas
than it has with the rest of Germany. The Frisians here in NL are
somewhat more open towards the existence of cross-border links because
they are made aware of the existing of Saterlandsch and North Frisian,
they see me often as their ally.</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Another set back was the case
of the so-called German re-unification which proved the point to
exclusive Dutch nationalist that a unified German national state seems
to be much more important in Germany, incl. the North than any
linguistic and cultural simularities to Drenthe, Groningen, Fryslan and
Overijssel. The sad thing was that in reality many people, at least in
Sleswig-Holsten rejected the re-occurance of German nationalism and
became increasingly sympathetic towards the idea of their anciant links
to their smaller neighbours, respectively Denmark and the Netherlands.
But because the German medias portrait a picture of a uniform Germany
(probably because they saw a huge new market in East Germany to sell
their newspapers etc. and regarded critical voices as conflicting with
their business interests and possibly ignored critical voices
deliberately) this was difficult to communicate abroad. The fact that I
can draw to the existance of the officially recognized Danish/Frisian
minority in Sleswig-Holsten and my own family's involvement with it
helped me a great deal to prove my case. But if I point out to Dutch
people that Dutch was indeed taught in schools in the
Kleverland-region, in parts of North Friesland (and possibly other
parts of Northern Germany) before 1871 I often earn disbelieve. Often
people here in the Randstad believe that the Nedersaksisch dialects are
influenced by High-German and they attach a negative stigma to it
because they are not aware that the old Saxon language is simply a
different one from Dutch and German altogether.</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">As
far as I can tell I would say that in Sleswig-Holsten it is nowadays
generally accepted that Low Saxon is a different language apart from
German and not a German dialect and those who have visited the
Netherlands are aware that Low Saxon is closer to Dutch than it is to
High German although they are often not aware that a form of Low Saxon
is also spoken in the eastern parts of the Netherlands because nobody
has told them (unless they found out by themselves or by accident,
Fritz Reuters's "Ik weet een Eekboom" also mentions the Netherlands as
the Low Saxon linguistic western extreme). The North-Frisians, though,
are very much aware about their kin in the Netherlands.</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">This
could certainly be changed if the educational system would include Low
Saxon knowledge and local/cultural history lessons which, in return
would include awareness of the extend of the old Saxon language area. I
don't know what the ordinary school curriculum is telling them in
Sleswig-Holsten but judging by the sentiment among the people in SH I
could imagine that including a notion about this would not be
controversial anymore although there is an underlying danger that some
people might conclude from this that the Netherlands are in principle
German, as has been done before. Somehow I fear it would actually be
more controversial to bring this across to those teachers who are not
from the region, I found those the most vocal to reject any
"seperatist" ideas in Northern Germany. </span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Groeten vun</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">Helge, currently Utrecht/NL</span><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;"><div style="margin-left: 40px; color: rgb(0, 0, 153); font-family: arial,sans-serif;">
I didn't know they were considered different languages. I know that Catalan is used in Catalonia ( <span style="font-style: italic;">Catalunya</span>), Valencia (<span style="font-style: italic;">PaÃs Valencià </span>
) and the Balearic Islands (<span style="font-style: italic;">Illes Balears</span>), Murcia (<span style="font-style: italic;"> Múrcia</span>) and the Aragon Fringe (<span style="font-style: italic;">Franja d'Aragó
</span>) of Spain, in the Eastern Pyrenees (<span style="font-style: italic;">Pirineus Orientals</span>)
of France and, as the the national language, in Andorra. But I thought
that within that region it was considered one language, lately called
"Catalan-Valencian-Balear." I was only aware of some people claiming
that the Catalan of Alghero ( <span style="font-style: italic;">l'Alguer</span>) in Sardinia is a separate language.<br><br>
Here's another case in Europe. While it was a part of the Soviet Union,
the Moldavian Republic promoted its main language as "Moldavian" (<span style="font-style: italic;">ÐœÐ¾Ð»Ð´Ð¾Ð²ÐµÐ½Ñ Ñ ÐºÑ </span>). Post-Soviet Moldova appears to be unsure if the language of the land is "Moldovan" (
<span style="font-style: italic;">Moldovenească</span>) or "Romanian" (<span style="font-style: italic;">Română</span>).
There are contradictions here in documents and in what local
politicians say. I suppose it depends on if you're a unificationist or
a separatist. So lately you often find it written as "Romanian
(Moldovan)" ( <span style="font-style: italic;">Română (Moldovenească)</span>).
They are clearly one language, though the Moldovan standard is
dialectically somewhat differently based and has bunches of Russian
loans.<br><br><span class="q">Outside
Europe there is "Persian" as a general term, hacked up into Farsi of
Iran, Dari of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Tajik of Tajikistan and
Uzbekistan. Again, they are basically one language with somewhat
different bases and influences. I have attended meetings at which
people from Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and (partly Tajik-speaking)
Uzbekistan attended and discussed in their respective standard
varieties without any difficulties at all. While Afghani Persians are
somewhat undecided and Iran tends to refer to all varieties as Farsi,
Tajikistan has recently been shutting itself off from the rest, and
references to Farsi or Persian within a Tajik context are not generally
considered quite kosher. So, apparently for the sake of strengthening
national identity, they decided not to seize the post-Soviet chance of
linguistic and cultural unification. </span><br><span class="q"> </span><br><span class="q"></span>The above would be a bit like Austria deciding that its main language was not German but, say, "Austrian" (<span style="font-style: italic;">
Östareichisch</span>) or "Austro-Bavarian" (<span style="font-style: italic;"> Östareichisch-Boarisch</span>), or Northern Belgium declaring that its official language was "Brabanto-Flemish" (*<span style="font-style: italic;">
Braobans-Vlams</span>).<span class="q"></span><br><span class="q"></span><br><span class="q">Back to Western Flanders and Zeeland ... "Zeelandic-Flemish" ( <span style="font-style: italic;">Zeeuws-Vlaams</span>)
is considered a it to denote specifically the dialects of Zeeland
(Netherlands) that they consider Flemish. The latter camp does concede,
thus, that the linguistic divide does not perfectly match the political
divide. </span><br><span class="q"></span><br><span class="q"></span>The separatist camp in Northern
Germany, however, regards the political border as perfectly coinciding
with the linguistic divide between "Platt" in the east and
"Nedersaksisch" in the west (and most don't dare use German
"Niedersächsisch" because of the name of the neighboring German
state). Dutch vs German influences is considered justification enough.
It helps to avoid issues of looking at the language within an
international context, as a language that is neither Dutch nor German,
and it thus avoids issues of spelling and coordination. And the fact
that the language descended from Old Saxon remains pretty much a piece
of guarded or irrelevant esoterica with regard to the general
population in Northern Germany. "It's too confusing for the average
person," is what people ell me, and "Those Dutch people are still too
touchy to handle." It's always someone else's fault, and "Don't let
those foreigners come here and mess around in our backyard!" is often
implied. Europe's political boundaries may be invisible now, but they
aren't gone by any means, nor are the boundaries of the mind. <br><br>Regards,<br> Reinhard/Ron<br></div> <br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">