LL-L "Romance connections" 2008.04.13 (02) [E]

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L O W L A N D S - L  - 13 April 2008 - Volume 02
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From: Roger Thijs, Euro-Support, Inc. <roger.thijs at euro-support.be>
Subject: LL-L "Romance connections" 2008.04.06 (05) [D/E]

Some more comments in reply to:
> From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at WORLDONLINE.NL>
> Subject: LL-L "Events" 2008.04.06 (02) [E]
> Beste Roger,
> There must be more ways to recognize Belgians

I have posted this song temporarily on the web. It has as well Brussels
Brabantish features (ending though with Belgian Dutch at the very end) as
also Belgian French:
*Jef Elbers: De Marollien* (The inhabitant of the Brussels area "De
Marollen")
http://www.euro-support.be/temp/b/marol.wma
(Pse save it eventually with your right mouse button, I will leave it only
for a short time on the web)

I did not transcribe phonetically, but midway to Dutch, for easyness of
understanding.
The French is kept (in bold).
An English translation is added in italics:

Hij was (e)ne ket (Brussels kereltje) (e)ne *Marollien*
*He was a young men, Inhabitant of the Brussels town area called Marolles
*Zijn poepa (vader) werkte aan de Gaz
*His father worked for the gas distribution company*
Zijn moema (moeder) was serveuse (kelnerin, barmeisje) *chez Firmin*
*His mother was waitress/barmaid at "Firmin"*
Ze woonden in de *Rue Blaes*
*They lived in the Blaesstreet*
En op (e)ne dag kwam hij een meisje tegen
*On a day he met a girl*
Ze was zo schoon (mooi), het was op de foor (kermis)
*She was so beautiful, it happened at the fun fair*
Hij voelde zijn klein harteke beven
*He felt his little hart trembling*
En 's avonds zei ze in zijn oor
*And that evening she wispered in his ear*
Ik zie u wel gaarne (graag) maar ge moet verstaan
*I like you very much, but you have to understand*
Thuis bij mijne pere (vader) is het in het Frans te doen
*At home, with my father, we speak French*
Hij is *employé* (bediende) op (e)nen* bureau* (kantoor)
*He is clerk at an office*
Dus spreek maar *français comme il le faut*
*So speak French as one should do.*

Hij is getrouwd (gehuwd) al 15 jaar
*He is married for 15 year*
Hij heeft een jongen (een zoon) die heet *François*
*He has a son, who's name is François*
Diene (deze) gaat naar het (de) school,* oui tous les jours*
*This one goes to school, indeed every day*
*à l'école française, comme il se voit*
*to the French school, as one can see*
Op (e)ne dag Soike (Françoiske) was nog een kind
*On a day, little François was still a child*
Hij zat in den hof (tuin) met zijn poepa (vader)
*He was in the garden with his father*
Die zij: "Jongen, haal mij eens een pint (glas bier)"
*Who said: "Get me a glass of bier*
Maar Soike antwoordde: "*Comprends pas*
*But little François answered (in French): Don't understand*
*Tu es un flamand et ça se voit*
*You are visibly a Flemish man*
*Un vrai paysan, j'ai honte de toi*
*A real peasant, I'm ashamed for you*
*Mes copains d'école me demandent souvent*
*My friends at school ask me often*
*Si à la maison on parle flamand*
*Whether we speak Flemish (means Brabantish? Dutch here) at home*
*Alors je leurs dis que je n'y puis rien*
I* then tell them that I'm guiltless for that*
*Mais que mon papa est un flamin*
*But that my father is a (retarded) Flemish*
*Et que j'ai honte de mon nom*
*And that I'm ashamed for the name I bear*
*Et qu' les flamins sont tous des cons* (klootzakken)"
*And that the Flemish rabble are all bastards.*

Zijn poepa (vader) heeft hem daar (toen) een peer gedraaid
*His father then gave him a slap*
op zijne smoel (een muilpeer gegeven) maar het was te laat
*in the face, but it was too late*
Ze bezien mekaar (ge)lijk als een vreemde luis
*They look at each other as weird louses*
en van dan af is er ruzie in huis
*and from than on there is much tension (quarrel) in house*
Dat is de moraal van mijn *chanson*
*This is the moral of my song*
In een Franse school wordt ge *fransquillon*
*In a French school one becomes French cultural imperialist*
Dus beste mensen vermijdt die boel
*So dear people keep off that mess*
En stuur uw kinderen naar een Vlaamse school.
*And send your kids to a Flemish (Dutch language) school.*

Some of the recognizable features:
 **
**
When switching from French to Brussels Brabantish and v.v. the rolling
uvular R is shared.
The *soft g* is kept in Brabantish (which is a difficulty for French
speakers inversely - as well as the Dutch "sch" is a difficulty for the
French -).

I recognize the French as Belgian Brussels French immediately from the
stressing pattern, e.g.:
 *BelgBruF:   JE leur DIS,      que JE n'Y puis RIEN*
*StdF:  j' leur DIS,     que j' n'y puis RIEN *
**
Some grammatical features of Brussels Brabantish

Belgian Dutch / Brabantish::
*ge* in stead of je as peronal pronoun
*-ke* as diminutive in stead of -je

phonetical
*ei was ne ket:   * *h*ij was een ke(rel)t(je): drop of initial h
oo --> uu:     *ze wuundege*: ze woonden;    *schuun*: schoon:  * fuur:*foor
*uur:* oor
oe --> u: hij voelde --> *ei vulde*
ei --> a:    meisje --> *maske*   zijn klein (hartje) --> *za klaa(n)*
a --> o:  *sovens*: s'avonds
a --> e:  hartje --> harteke -->  *hetke*
u --> aa: pronoun u --> *aa*
r + vowel = vowel + r: graag: *geire*

grammatical
*ze wundege*: zij woonde: additional to -*de*, also a *-ge* suffix in past
tense (optional, but not when syllable preceedeing the -de suffix has a
schwa
*...weurde fransquillon:* ... wordt je fransquillion: the presonal pronounn*ge
* becomes* e* when the verb preceedes the pronoun

More of this in: *Sera De Vriendt, Grammatica van het Brussels, 2003*

Further, relevant urls:
in Dutch
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jef_Elbers
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brussels_(dialect)<http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brussels_%28dialect%29>
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marollen
in English
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marols
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marollen

This song was written in the seventies. Momentarily there generally is not
that same negative attitude against Dutch anymore, but most French speaking
people are still reluctant to use the Dutch they learned at school.
There is even a movement now of French speaking parents sending their kids
to Dutch language schools.
Yesterday I shopped also in some Moroccan book shops at the Bvd Lemonnier.
Most books they have are religious and in Arabic, but they also have a
selection in both French and Dutch (including religious books for kids).
Since these people are already plurilingual, they are more open for
acquiring other new languages I think. Further, they are not integrated in
the closed French speaking Brussels world and I think, they see the
importance of Dutch for their kids (as language of 60 percent of the
Belgians, surrounding the enclave of Brussels).

Further reading about Brussels Brabantish:

Historical phonology:
*A. Van Loey, Bijdrage tot de kennis van het Zuidwestbrabants in de XIIIe en
XIVe eeuw - Fonologie, 1937, Brussel, Standaard Boekhandel*

Phonology & morphology:
*G. Mazereel, Klank- en vormleer van het Brussels dialect met zijn
plaatselijke verscheidenheden, 1931, Leuven, De Vlaamsche drukkerij*

Dictionaries;
Dozens of it are published from the French side, but these include quite a
lot of standard Belgian Dutch.
My preferred:
*Eie ma vast? Het levend Brussels dialect, een bloemlezing van merkwaardige
woorden en gezegden, 1998, Brussel, Academie van het Brussels*
Eie ma vast? => Heb je mij vast? => Heb je mij begrepen? = Did you
understand me?

*ketsje* (a contraction of kereltje)
= 1. a street urchin, guttersnipe in Brussels (comparable to "un titi" in
Paris)
= 2. Brussels for a little boy
= 3. a surname for Brussels speaking people (the official surname though is
"kiekenfretter", swallower of chicken)
= 4. a pseudonym of the former Brussels dialect cabaret performer, radio
speaker and writer Renaat Grassin (1900-1964)
read more in: *Marcel De Schrijver: Ouver Brusselse Ketsjes, p. 47-52 in "De
Brabantse Folklore en Geschiedenis", Nr. 290-291; September, 1996*
**
A couple of days ago I scanned a few pages with Belgicisms from:
 Maurice Piron, Aspects et profil de la culture romane en Belgique
1979, Liège, Editions Sciences et lettres,

Yesterday I found downtown Brussels these two books about Belgian French and
Swiss French:
- *Lebouc, Dictionnaire de belgicismes, 2006, Racine, Brussels*
- *Catherine Hadacec, Le suisse romand tel qu'on le parle, Lexique
romand-français, 1983, Lausanne, Favre*

Curiously both share some vocabulary, e.g.:
*septante* for soixante-dix
*nonante* for quatre-vingt-dix
*déjeuner *for petit déjeuner (breakfast)
*diner *for déjeuner (lunch)
*souper* for diner (evening dinner)
*sous-tasse* for soucoupe etc.

The list of Lebouc is longer than the list of Piron, since Lebouc includes
quite a lot of Brussels French, while Piron focusses on just common Belgian
French only.

The VUB (Vrije Universiteit Brussels, Brussels University) regularily
publishes studies about the language situation in the Brussels capital
region (19 municipalities including Brussels-itself).
A recent publication:
*Rudi Janssens, Van Brussel gesproken, Taalgebruik, taalverschuivingen en
taalidentiteit in het Brussels Hoofdstedelijk Gewest (Taalbarometer II),
Brusselse Thema's Nr. 15, 2007, VUB-Press, Brussels*
(with a preface by Bert Anciaux)

Janssens compares a survey of 2000 with a new one of 2006.
(the survey sampling population: 2500 inhabitants each time)

Some headlines:

Most spoken languages (I limit to the top 5)
*Can speak* the language from good to outstanding:
2000
1. French 95.52 percent
2. *Dutch* 33.29 p
3. *English* 33.25 p
4. Arabic 9.99 p
5. *German*: 7.61 p
2006
1. French 95.55 p
2. *English* 35.40 p.
3. *Dutch *28.23 p.
4. Spanish: 7.39 p
5. Arabic: 6.36 p.
Our third national language* German* is now 7th with 5.56 p.
Spanish was 6th with 6.90 p in 2000.
*Lingala *mounted from a 13th place with 0.39 p to a 10th place with 0.99 p;
*Berber* losts its 9th place with 3.09 p. and is now 13th with 0.36 p.
I think it is quite an evolution over so short a time.
(small numbers may be affected by the size of the sampling)

Home languages:
                     2000/2006
*Dutch 9.5 p / 7.0 p*
French: 51.6 p / 56.8 p

I leave it to that, because all the statistics require some technical
comments.

I had a burrito yesterday evening in the ChiChi's TexMex on Bvd Anspach
downtown
http://www.chichis.be/en/bruxelles.php?lang=EN
Spoken languages: Spanish, French and English
None of the (Mexican looking) waiters or waitresses spoke any Dutch, they
diverted all to English.

Regards,
Roger
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