LL-L "Language attitudes" 2008.01.02 (01) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L  -  02 January 2008 - Volume 01
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From: Helge Tietz <helgetietz at yahoo.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2008.01.01 (02) [E]

Dear Heiko and Reinhard,

I agree in with you about the relationship between the Nazies and Low Saxon.
Of course, we can only try to recount on what we got forwarded from our
parents or grandparents but on the whole Low Saxon was not promoted by the
Nazies at all and even in Holsten the Hitler-Youth and BDM was in High
German only. Although the "Plattduetsch Schoolbook", issued by the
Fers-Gilde was still handed out to schoolchildren during the
Nazi-dictatorship (I still have a copy  which my mother passed on to me),
the attitude was indeed to promote uniformism, which meant High German had
the absolute preference. In North Friesland, famously the poet Mungaard from
Sylt was prosecuted for refusing to write in High German instead of his
local Frisian, he was an outspoken anti-nazi (one of the few unfortunately)
and died in 1940 in a concentration camp. The attitude of the Nazies towards
any minority or non-High-German language is documented by Goebbel's commend
on a letter in Dutch written by the Dutch Nazi-organisation which he refused
to read because "it is impossible for him to recite all German dialects...".
Somebody told me once that she wouldn't speak Low Saxon to her children
because of the peasant-attitude it is associated with, I replied that if she
is concerning about language attitude she should rather stop speaking High
German because Adolf Hitler spoke High German only! I only received a
somewhat puzzled look as a response....

Groeten vun Helge!

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language attitudes

I'm pretty sure your general assessment is correct, Helge.

The tendency at that time was to pretty much make no distinction between
"German" and "Germanic." The Nazi propaganda apparatus -- and it included
many academics and writers -- followed this ideal to shmooze the populations
of other "Germanic countries" both before and during occupation, and, yes,
also "Germanic countries" that were not invaded, such as Sweden and Iceland.
This did make a difference in that it converted some people to Nazi ideas
and galvanized racist attitudes that had existed there already -- something
people in those countries usually don't want to talk about these days.
Especially people in border regions found themselves in precarious
situations, especially right after the end of World War II when they were
prime suspects as "collaborators" unless they were known to have been active
in the resistance movements. And this is no doubt a major reason for their
particularly standoffish and even hostile attitudes toward Germans for a
long time.  It was not only a matter of chagrin over the occupation but also
a need to dissociate and to reaffirm national allegiance. This is why many
people in the eastern parts of the Netherlands often refused to speak Low
Saxon with visiting North Germans. Closeness had to be denied as a counter
reaction.

Yes, the idea then as later was that Low Saxon was a dialect group of
German. As such it didn't constitute a threat and could be dismissed, or it
could be exploited in the "Blut und Boden" genre of propaganda: stories of
"simple, pure, noble-minded peasants" that needed to be liberated from evil
"foreigners" and "bolsheviks."  It didn't matter what "dialects" those
"peasants" spoke and if Low Saxon, Frisian and Dutch fell into the same
category as Bavarian, Swabian, Hessian, Alsatian, Luxembourgish or
Thuringian. However, it was different if people that were not "simple
peasants" insisted on using "dialects" with language ambition.  In other
words, language activism was a definite no-no.  Besides, not all "German
dialects" were necessarily "good" and "pure." Some were "perverted,"
"degenerate," namely those that had too much foreign influence and those
used by "inferior races," such as Yiddish and also German-based varieties
with Romany and Yenish substrata, and there were the highly Slavicized
German and Low Saxon varieties used by Slavs, especially by Sorbs, Kashubs
and Slovincians.

By the way, public use of Sorbian was outlawed, and all Sorbian publishing
organizations were dissolved. (Sorbian, or Lusatian, denotes two Western
Slavic languages that nowadays are unique to Germany.) Although there is
little more than anecdotal evidence, it seems that the long-term plan was to
enslave all people of Slavic descent, including Sorbs as well as Germans of
clearly Slavic descent (which was in part to be determined by Nazi-trained
physical anthropologists).

I don't think the Nazis were too worried about Frisians on German soil,
since they were a small minority, were "Germanic" and were conversant in
both Low Saxon and German as well. However, language activism and anything
outrightly promoting ethnic "otherness" was seen not only as acts of
defiance but also as threatening precedents in the ethnically fluid, less
loyally German and thus at least potentially volatile border region. If
Frisians and Danes on German soil couldn't be kept in line, how could the
occupied people of Denmark be kept in line?

I do believe that any Low Saxon language assertion movement would have been
declared treason had there been one. There was extant literature, such as
that by Groth, that talked about *Spraak* in this context, but "language" is
vague enough a term. *Egenstännige Spraak* ("independent language") would
have been a different matter and would not have been tolerated.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

P.S.: In true Mecklenburg fashion, my friend Hannelore Hinz (
http://lowlands-l.net/anniversary/feature_hanne_en.php) calls me "Reining."
Now that I like! In part it may be because it reminds me of my maternal
grandfather after whom I'm named but whom I never got to meet (because he
was killed in the carpet bombing of Hamburg). This *-ing ~ -ink* diminutive
suffix supposedly comes from Pomeranian Slavic **-inkë*.
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