LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.24 (03) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L  -  24 October 2007 - Volume 03
Song Contest: lowlands-l.net/contest/ (- 31 Dec. 2007)
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From: Kevin & Cheryl Caldwell <kevin.caldwell1963 at verizon.net>
Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.23 (03) [E]

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.

Kevin Caldwell

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.

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.

Any other such cases?

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
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From: Karl-Heinz Lorenz <Karl-Heinz.Lorenz at gmx.net>
Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.23 (05) [E]

Ron wrote:
> The above would be a bit like Austria deciding that its main language was
> not German but, say, "Austrian" (Östareichisch) or "Austro-Bavarian"
> (Östareichisch-Boarisch),

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.

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96sterreichisches_W%C3%B6rterbuch

Regards,
Karl-Heinz

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From: Helge Tietz <helgetietz at yahoo.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language politics" 2007.10.23 (03) [E]

Dear Lowlanders,

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.

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.

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.

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.

Groeten vun
Helge, currently Utrecht/NL

I didn't know they were considered different languages. I know that Catalan
is used in Catalonia ( Catalunya), Valencia (País Valencià ) and the
Balearic Islands (Illes Balears), Murcia ( Múrcia) and the Aragon
Fringe (Franja
d'Aragó) of Spain, in the Eastern Pyrenees (Pirineus Orientals) 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 ( l'Alguer) in Sardinia is a separate language.

Here's another case in Europe. While it was a part of the Soviet Union, the
Moldavian Republic promoted its main language as "Moldavian" (МолдовенÑ
Ñ ÐºÑ ). Post-Soviet Moldova appears to be unsure if the language of the
land is "Moldovan" ( Moldovenească) or "Romanian" (Română). 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)" ( Română
(Moldovenească)). They are clearly one language, though the Moldovan
standard is dialectically somewhat differently based and has bunches of
Russian loans.

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.

The above would be a bit like Austria deciding that its main language was
not German but, say, "Austrian" (Östareichisch) or "Austro-Bavarian"
(Östareichisch-Boarisch),
or Northern Belgium declaring that its official language was
"Brabanto-Flemish" (*Braobans-Vlams).

Back to Western Flanders and Zeeland ... "Zeelandic-Flemish" ( Zeeuws-Vlaams)
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.

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.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
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