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<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" align="center">=====================================================<br>
<b>L O W L A N D S - L - 05 August 2010 - Volume 02</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" align="center"><a href="mailto:lowlands.list@gmail.com" target="_blank"><span style="" lang="FR">lowlands.list@gmail.com</span></a> - <a href="http://lowlands-l.net/" target="_blank"><span style="" lang="FR">http://lowlands-l.net/</span></a><br>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: <span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">DAVID COWLEY </span></span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:DavidCowley@anglesey.gov.uk">DavidCowley@anglesey.gov.uk</a>></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L "Language politics" 2010.08.04 (06)
[EN]</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Dear Mark,</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
Thanks for your comments.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
On the point about the future of languages being in the hands (or</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
rather mouths and tongues) of their speakers, certainly that is</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
essential, I agree. You speak of state support as being a 'crutch' and</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
you're far from alone in thinking that way. But there is the point I</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
think that all official languages of states like the </span>UK<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">,
</span>France<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">, </span>Germany<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
or wherever have all of this background support taken for granted.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
There's no question of government staff, official documents or state TV</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
NOT speaking/ being in English, French or German in those countries</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
respectively - yet we'd never call that a crutch; so I think the support</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
that Welsh enjoys is an important background fact, the lack of which</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
would be an unfair disadvantage. And I think without it Welsh would be</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
under a lot more pressure. So, for Low Saxon, North Friesian or indeed</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
Scots, though those things on their own would not be enough, I suggest</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
that the fact that they're by and large not there means there's a lack</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
of background things that should be taken for granted.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
On the Afrikaans comments: please don't think for a moment that I want</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
to defend the British and their track record in South Africa or really</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
anywhere else they colonised. Many shameful episodes. It would be</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
surprising to find that there was any colonial history anywhere in the</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
world that didn't involve some serious suffering and pain for the native</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
folk whose land was being colonised.</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
I wasn't saying that the Afrikaaners now deserve what they get, only</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
commenting on human behaviour - the same effect would tend to work</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
anywhere really. Again, you'll probably know much better than me about</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
rivalries between African tribes/ linguistic groups in </span>Southern
Africa<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
to back up that point. But surely its clear that by using skin colour as</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
the baseline for defining where folk where in society, what they could</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
do, where they could go and suchlike, the South African govt of the time</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
was hardly going to build up goodwill amongst most of the population for</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
the future, for wanting to speak Afrikaans. Again, human nature, even</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
though by now there will be many more Afrikaaners who were really</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
nothing to do with the system, as there always were. I personally hope</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
that Afrikaans can survive, ja, Swaar!</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
(I can also add that when I was a student in the '80s, the BIG thing</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
that was being campaigned against was Apartheid. I recall thinking,</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
right, but what about the other cases of oppression that got no</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
attention at all, because many regimes that were significantly more</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
brutal were ignored. I dare say books could be written on the psychology</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
behind that.)</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
Best wishes</span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
David</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;">----------</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;">From: <span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(91, 16, 148);">M.-L. Lessing</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:marless@gmx.de">marless@gmx.de</a>></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;" lang="FR">Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L "Language politics" 2010.08.04 (02)
[EN]</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;" lang="FR"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">Dear all, </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">"is there a future for
Low Saxon?" seems a déja-vu-topic to me, but a welcome one :-) I feel as
if I had seen the discussion two or three times here on LL-L in the few years
that I have been reading LL-L. This proves to me there is (still!) a
lot of passion in it, and also a lot of frustration, because little ever
happens in the real world. But I love to discuss it or read others dicussing
it, and I think every time we do it we distill a higher concentration of
clearsight out of it, although we may be repeating an argument now and then. </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">What Marcus wrote (3.8.)
is cuttingly true, what Mark Dreyer wrote (also 3.8.) comforts me a little
more, because a lot of it has been achieved already, such as compiling grammars
and, in parts, dictionaries; and more of what he writes can be achieved <em>without
government support or government money</em>. If we hope to bring Low Saxon on
at all I fear we must put up with having no official money or support. Now what
exactly can be done with private initiative only, and how effective can it be?
If much of that may have been said in former discussions, don't hesitate to
repeat it. I may have missed or forgotten. And we may distill it again and
again on the fire of Marcus' skepticism and Mark's and my enthusiasm... See
what we get.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">My first ideas:</span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">1. We need a sound, <em>useful</em> low
saxon nonfiction literature. Not translations, but original texts. I had set
out on this with computer manuals etc. at <a href="http://plattpartu.de/" target="_blank">plattpartu.de</a>, but have since digressed from it under
the pressure of lots of texts sent to me and of my own literary tastes. Mea
culpa!!</span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">2. As to low saxon
Kindergärten (Marcus' suggestion), low saxon Tagesmütter (Ron, please
translate...!) would be easier to achieve. If there are any, they could perhaps
organize. In the case of success, Kindergärten might follow on their own
accord. Networking and publicity would be the first steps -- should be no
problem in the internet age!</span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">What say you?</span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">Hartlich!</span></p>
<p style="font-family: times new roman,serif;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"><span style="font-family: times new roman,serif;">Marlou</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Arial;"> </span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">----------</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">From:
R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com" target="_blank">sassisch@yahoo.com</a>></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Subject:
Language politics<br>
<br>
Thanks, David and Marlou!<br>
<br>
David, I do agree that the case of Welsh teaches us a lot. But there is one
difference that I think should not be ignored: Welsh is very different from the
power language English, and no one ever doubted that it is a language in its
own right. <br>
<br>
In the case of Scots and Low Saxon there is still this widespread perception
that they are dialect groups of English and German/Dutch respectively, and this
is because they are closely related to the respective power languages. While
people outside Scotland and Northern Germany are catching on that the two regional
languages are really difficult to understand, many people that grew up exposed
to them still grapple with the old “propaganda” that they are merely
“dialects”. (A young Scotsman once told me “Scots” is “slang.” In the Netherlands
many people still refer to Low Saxon as “dialect” too.) It is very similar to
the case of Occitan in France.
So you are dealing with the psychological results of centuries of denial and
hierarchical thinking on top of the more obvious political issues.<br>
<br>
The Welsh people as a whole have always been conscious and proud of their
linguistic heritage, so this was a firmer psychological foundation for language
activism. This is so as well in the case of Basque in Spain and France. In Spain, the
cases of Catalan (including Valencian and Balearic) and Galician are
interesting in that these could similarly be represented as dialects of Spanish
(Castilian). However, linguistic and cultural awareness and an actual sense of
separateness in those areas are much stronger than they are in Northern Europe (e.g. Scots, Low Saxon, Jamtlandic,
Scanian and Darlecarlian). Frisian is a bit of an anomaly in that its
independent status has never been questioned.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Marlou,
I would translate <i>Tagesmutter</i> as “day nanny” or “(female) childminder.”<br>
<br>
I quite agree that private initiatives are very important, Marlou. Government
support tends to follow it, as has been the case with Welsh.<br>
<br>
The few publishers that deal with Low Saxon have been a serious obstacle in
that they go only for works with supposed mass appeal, i.e. those that <i>they</i> think sell.
Most of these aim at the lowest denominator, are of the usual humorous and/or
nostalgic ilk. Better writing is largely ignored as too marginal. So it does
not get published and thus remains marginal, a.k.a. unknown. </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Apart
from Web exposure, Low Saxon writers (and other writers of course) now have the option of more effective
self-publishing, such as books on demand, and also electronic books. Since it
cuts out the (obstructionist) middleman (i.e. triaging conventional publishers) there is
the added bonus of self-publishing authors (who retain all rights) earning
royalties of 70-80% rather than the usual 7.5-10%. <br>
<br>
I recently read that these days more electronic books than conventional books
are being sold. Of course conventional publishers are beginning to take note of
this, but so far it turns out that electronic books have not really cut into
the earnings of conventional publishers. Most of them are simply representatives
of what ends up, usually unread, in the large wastepaper basket of publishing houses.
Interestingly, some of these “rejects” have lately become bestsellers and the very
publishers that at first rejected them are now scrambling to get paper copy publishing
rights for them. <br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
Reinhard/Ron<br>
Seattle, USA</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
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