LL-L "Etymology" 2008.01.28 (06) [E]

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L O W L A N D S - L  -  28 January 2008 - Volume 06
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From: Diederik Masure <didimasure at hotmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.01.28 (05) [E]

Here in and around Antwerp (and probably in a lot more (southern?) Dutch
dialects) "wijf" is/used to be the normal word for a woman/one's wife. Its
status as dialect word, however, confirms people's perception of it as a
'vulgar'/pejorative term. Thus I feel like one is either an old-fashioned
dialectspeaker when using it in the neutral meaning, or using it jokingly
for a woman/wife to mock its neutral use it has/used to have in the 'vulgar'
vernacular.
I myself tend to use 'wijf' for 'vrouw', and alongside 'kop' for 'hoofd' and
some more 'pejorative/vulgar' vs. standard forms, but people even from this
region (and people who even use it themselves) will always notice and almost
always address/correct you about this vulgarity. (like eg. my dad)
So my 50cts are that within half a generation 'wijf' will lose its neutral
connotation also in this area and only retain the pejorative, standard
language meaning.

Diederik

PS from my short stay in Amsterdam I feel free to conclude that less
prestigious variants of Hollandic street languages also apply the term
'wijf' to any female, which probably strengthens its perception as vulgar in
the standard language.
PPS the first example I could think of is a line out of a song by Katastroof
"terug nor me waëf en nor m'n joeng", which basically means back to my wife
and children... notice that its exclusive use in dialect also made the word
"joeng" sound pretty vulgar by now. The only people still using these words
are either a) very old, b) from the lowest of the lowest classes of society
or c) very "taalbewuste" (language conscient?) speakers.

>>From: Gary Davenport <gldavenport at student.ysu.edu>
>>Subject: Etymology -- Wife
>>
>>Dear Lowlanders: >>
>>I am interested in the use of cognates of the the English word *wife* in
the Germanic languages, Lowlands here specifically. For instance,
>>German retains *Weib, *while Dutch retains ***jf* (a pejorative if I
understand correctly) and the OED2 lists cognates for O. Frisian and O.
>>Saxon (*wif*). I haven't found any data on modern Frisian, Plattdeutsch,
or other Lowlandic cognates or usage, however.
>>
>>What are your personal experiences with it? Do you use it in your language
everyday? Or only archaically or poetically? What connotation
>>does it carry?
>>
>>With regards,
>>Gary
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