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L O W L A N D S - L - 29 December 2010 - Volume 06<br>
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<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:
<span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Marcus Buck</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:list@marcusbuck.org">list@marcusbuck.org</a>></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L
"Language survival" 2010.12.29 (05) [EN]</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com" target="_blank">sassisch@yahoo.com</a>></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 51, 102);">As many of you probably know by now, Low Saxon (Low German) is
used in various parts of the Americas
as well, and not only by Mennonite. In the USA there are still older people
for whom it is their first language. Their children and grandchildren tend to
know it poorly or not at all, and of those many learn (Standard) German in
school, probably because Low Saxon has never been made an educational subject.
(I believe a similar situation led to the demise of Low Saxon in Denmark where
the "German" minority can only choose between Standard German and
Standard Danish as their primary languages of education.)</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 51, 102);"><br>
I found a video recording of a Low Saxon conversation of an American couple.
According to their grandson, they know only Low Saxon and English, not German,
which seems to indicate that they are American-born.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 51, 102);"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 51, 102);"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMiElxOaHIo" target="_blank"><span style="color: rgb(0, 51, 102);">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMiElxOaHIo</span></a></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Nice find! From the sound of
their speech I would agree that they were exposed to English for a long time
but not exposed to Standard German or "Media Low Saxon" in any way
that affected their way of speaking. Aside from the English interferences they
seem to speak a decent and native Low Saxon. When I try to pin-point the
dialect to a specific region, I'd guess they are from the Land Oldenburg. This
is mostly based on the last word "Froolüe". In the north the final
"e" would be lost. In the south it would be "fru(g)"
instead of "froo". In the west it would be "viele" or
"völe" instead of "väle". And in the east it would be
"Froonslüe". A further lead is the first name "Josef" which
is a typical <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Verbreitung_der_Konfessionen_im_deutschen_Reich.jpg" target="_blank">Catholic </a>name. That would hint at the region around Vechta,
Cloppenburg, Wildeshausen. If the pronunciation "froo" instead of
"frau" is true to their ancestral home dialect, we can further narrow
it down to the region around Wildeshausen (I'd guess less than 15km away from
it). But that's very hypothetical from a 1 min clip that immediately cuts after
the most significant word.<br>
<br>
Marcus Buck</p>
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