LL-L "Language policies" 2002.08.26 (07) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 26.AUG.2002 (07) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian L=Limburgish
 LS=Low Saxon (Low German) S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic Z=Zeelandic (Zeeuws)
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From: "Daniel Prohaska" <daniel at ryan-prohaska.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language policies" 2002.08.26 (05) [E]

John wrote:

For fifteen years I worked in a hospital for the mentally handicapped
(as it was known then) where almost everybody - staff and patients -
spoke Scots almost all the time. Even lectures on aspects of nursing,
when they were undertaken by local charge nurses rather than by external
trainers, were given predominantly in Scots.

One of the shocking aspects of the so called Scots Language Movement is
that most of those involved in it come from places in Scotland where the
role of Scots is very much depleted, and their entire approach to Scots
is determined by this. They have no experience of living or working in a
situation where Scots is actually used. Thus you have Scots for schools
being written by people who have never used it in everyday life -
perhaps since their own childhood - and who have lost any feeling they
ever had for the language. In other words, Children are being taught
Scots by people who themselves haven't learned it.

John M. Tait.

Dear John M. Tait,

   What you describe is so very typical of a language-change-situation.
In
the areas where a language is gradually getting lost, the absence of it
is
keenly felt and inspires activists to work against language loss. Thus a
language movement almost requires the absence of a traditional
linguistic
community, otherwise its loss would not be felt.
    Where the minority language is still the every-day form of
communication for in-groups, it is perceived as being quite healthy and
not needing support, even if the language is not being passed on to the
next generation.

   Work in order to preserve a retreating language is thus often started
when it`s almost too late, when one generation has failed to pass it on
to
the next for whatever reasons, and the older speakers are beginning to
die
away. Only then do most people realise that something is being lost.

   Here in Austria, dialect is perceived to be alive and kicking. But
the
situation in the cities is that children are increasingly spoken to in
standard German (in its Austrian form). Parents do not feel they are
depriving their children of their common linguistic heritage, but rather
adding to their communicative skills trusting in the fact that dialect
will
be acquired at school, or in out-door contexts, or through
grand-parents.
This may have been true for the generation of the now 20-40 year olds,
but I think it is quite different for those beginning their schooling
now.

   Outside the cities the dialects appear to be healthier, but like
everywhere city life is appealing to the youth and manners of speech are
copied.

   I`m telling you this, because I think by way of analogy, without
overinterpreting what`s going on here, I can understand what may have
occured in northern Germany in the late 50ies, 60ies, and early 70ies
when
children were no longer raised in Low German. The language appeared for
a
few more decades to be alive and well because the influential working
population was still raised in a Low German context. Nowadays they are
the
pensioners, with today`s work force entrenched in standard German (with
exceptions, of course).

   As the linguistic gap between the Austrian dialects and standard
German
is not as abrupt as between Low German and standard German, I fear the
dialects here will slowly be watered down to a heavily accented variety
of
standard German with the occasional dialect word strewn in for regional
flavour.

   Does this resemble the situation of Scots somewhat?

   If awareness is sparked in those regions where the traditional
language
community is still intact, it would probably be helpful to advise and
nurse-maid the lingustic "reconquista" going on elsewhere with
understanding, tolerance and support. Saying "what you are doing feels
weired and artificial" can be perceived as being very discouraging and
even
intimidating, despite the fact that it really is "weird and artificial"

Pfiat eing,

Dan

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