LL-L "Language varieties" 2008.09.06 (07) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 06 September 2008 - Volume 07
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From: Lee Goldberg <leybl_goldberg at yahoo.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language varieties" 2008.09.06 (05) [E]

On the spread of the "High"/"Low" terminology, I remember hearing an
Italian-American classmate in New York (where most of the Italian community
have their origins in Sicily and Calabria and other areas of southern Italy)
complain that people in Rome spoke a "High Italian" that was hard to
understand.



(That was in the 1970s and I really don't know how popular that terminology
is.)

--- On *Sat, 9/6/08, Lowlands-L List <lowlands.list at GMAIL.COM>* wrote:

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

I have long been aware that some German-speaking linguists have expanded the
qualifiers *Hoch...* versus *Nieder...* or *Platt...* to other languages,
including examples like *Hochchinesisch* (for Standard Mandarin and its
written equivalent), also *Hochd**änisch* versus *Plattdänisch* (or
"non-scientific" *Kartoffeldänisch* "Potato Danish") ... all of which irks
me no end. I had hoped that this could be contained, but recently I noticed
that several English writers follow this tradition with "High" and "Low".

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

----------

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

Hey, Lee! Nice to hear from you. This seems to be the day of rare
appearances.

I heard of "High" and "Low" in this sense in the 1970s also. I think some
people actually thought it was "with it" to follow that German trend.

Lee, as you know, at one point Litvak ("Lithuanian Yiddish") was on the way
toward becoming "High Yiddish" (הויך־יִידיש *hoykh-yidish*, perhaps because
it sounds more like German than do other dialects of Yiddish). The Holocaust
put an end to that.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
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