<div dir="rtl"><div dir="auto">Plautdietsch is thriving, mostly in South America where old conservative colonies settled. What stands out most is that its situation is much like that of Yiddish, in that frumer communities have a favorable aspect in next generations inheriting the language. That contrasts to communities in Winnipeg where they're much freer mennonites and consider it a language of the eldery.<div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Recently, Google and Facebook added West Frisian, and although I don't believe it as a language (rather than a dialect of dutch) I'd really like to see them add Gronings since its a stem of Plautdietsch.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div>-<span style="font-size:12.8px">Best wishes,</span></div><div>Eitan</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">בתאריך 9 באוק׳ 2017 1:31 לפנה״צ, "Lowlands Languages & Cultures" <<a href="mailto:lowlands-l@listserv.linguistlist.org" target="_blank">lowlands-l@listserv.<wbr>linguistlist.org</a>> כתב:<br type="attribution"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">
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<p>Hello dear Jack Driedger, can you tell us whether the
Plautdietsch community is rapidly dwindling just like the Low
German community is? Or does it maintain some low-level stability?
Is there any deliberate and organized support of young speakers?
This is just emerging in the Low German community, most probably
too late for the language.</p>
<p>By the way, I live near Bad Oldesloe, a place where the historic
Menno Simons has lived and worked for a considerable time. This
<a class="gmail-m_-6236103845353264161m_-3402339883290897825moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.plattpartu.de/gott/erinn/wernecke_menno.htm" target="_blank">http://www.plattpartu.de/gott/<wbr>erinn/wernecke_menno.htm</a> Text about
the place where he lived is written in Low German, you will have
no problems reading it.</p>
<p>Hartlich!</p>
<p>Marlou<br>
</p>
<br>
<div class="gmail-m_-6236103845353264161m_-3402339883290897825moz-cite-prefix">Am 08.10.2017 um 22:41 schrieb Lowlands
Languages & Cultures:<br>
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<blockquote type="cite">
Very interesting. I grew up speaking Plautdietsch. I have written
a book Enn Bloomenheim Oppjewossen. If you Google Jack Driedger
Plautdietsch you my run across some Plautdietsch reading I have
done. I am a 91 year old retired teacher in Saskatoon,
Saskatchewan. My grandfather Johann Driedger arrived in Canada
from Ukrain in 1875 at age 15.
<div>
<div>Jack Driedger<span class="gmail-m_-6236103845353264161m_-3402339883290897825Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre-wrap"> </span></div>
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<div>On Oct 8, 2017, at 2:03 PM, Lowlands Languages
& Cultures <<a href="mailto:lowlands-l@listserv.linguistlist.org" target="_blank">lowlands-l@listserv.linguistl<wbr>ist.org</a>>
wrote:</div>
<br class="gmail-m_-6236103845353264161m_-3402339883290897825Apple-interchange-newline">
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<p><br>
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<div class="gmail-m_-6236103845353264161m_-3402339883290897825moz-cite-prefix">On 10/8/2017 2:46 PM,
Lowlands Languages & Cultures wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div style="font-size:13px;font-family:arial,sans-serif">This article was on the front
page of our local newspaper yesterday. I hope it
opens.<br>
</div>
</blockquote>
I received my undergraduate degree from Middlebury in
1967. Years after I left the state of Vermont, I hung
out with Mennonites in Ontario most of whom spoke or at
least still understood the Plautdietsch they or their
prents brought with them from Russia after WWII. This
dialect was absorbed by them during the century or so
that they lived in the Danziger Bucht after fleeing
persecution in Holland. The founder, Menno Simons
(right, you ask, why aren't they called Simonites?), was
Friesian. The Rhineland Amish were there after fleeing
from persecution in Austria and Switzerland (hence the
name Yoder). I have a former brother-in-law named
Yoder, and his son Kevin is a Congressman from Kansas.
There are perhaps half a million speakers of
Plautdietsch mostly in South America, but substantial
numbers remain in Ontario and especially Manitoba. They
are the only remaining speakers of the language which
was the lingua franca of the Hanseatic League.<br>
<br>
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