Ask a Dutchman!

[warpus]

What do you think of East Frisians and their Plattdeutsch language? Are the two cultures as close as they appear to someone who neither speaks Dutch or Plattdeutsch? I saw more similarities than differences, by far, but granted I have never set foot in Holland.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is.. do all Frisians view themselves as some sort of an ethnic group.. or any other type of group or community? Or are east Frisians just foreign people who live in another country who west Frisians don't care about?

 

[Tahuti]

Most Dutch are hardly aware of the existence of such languages. To be honest, I don't know how Platduutsch sounds like. Nethersaxon spoken in Germany (and in the past in the Eastern parts of the Netherlands) sounds remarkably similar to Dutch however.

To be sure, German and Dutch represent a strain in the Germanic languages that is distinct from (West-)Frisian (or Frysk), which is closer to English. I am not entirely sure were Platduutsch fits into this.

Since I was raised in Friesland, I'll give some examples of Frisian (note that Frisian spelling may not be 100% correct).

Dutch: Kan ik jouw wat vragen?
Frisian: Ken ik jo wat fregjen?
English: Can I ask you something?

Dutch: Dit kan niet.
Frisian: Dat kin net. (it is often subject of jokes since 'net' sounds like and is spelled exactly like the Dutch word for 'barely', even though it means 'not')
English: This cannot be.

Dutch: 'oud land'
Frisian: 'Aldlân' (pronounced like Oldlon in English)
English: 'Old land'

Dutch: Vos
Frisian: Foks
English: Fox

 

[warpus]

Interesting, thanks. I'd post a Plattdeutsch video, but I have no idea what a good one might be.. Plus I have to get back to work

 

[Takhisis]

JEELEN is moving into r16 territory here!

Possibly.

 

[Jan H]

When I visited Bremen last year, I noticed that a lot of the historic buildings (especially the city hall) had inscriptions in Plattdeutsch. To read, those texts seemed more like Dutch to me, than German...

 

[Agent327]

To be fair, the oldest line in Dutch don't strike me as particularly Dutch:

olla vogalan nestas hagunan hinase ic anda thu

(all birds have begun to nest except me and you)

Vogel, nest and ik may be recognizable for modern Dutch speakers. Hagunan is vaguely reminding of begonnen (have begun). Anda seems closer to and than to en (Dutch; and).

What?

I thought my English was pretty plain - as the internal contradiction in your argument.

JEELEN is moving into r16 territory here!

r16's postings are generally hard to follow because of poor grammar - as opposed to mine, I'd have thought.

 

[Tahuti]

To be fair, the oldest line in Dutch don't strike me as particularly Dutch:

olla vogalan nestas hagunan hinase ic anda thu

(all birds have begun to nest except me and you)

Vogel, nest and ik may be recognizable for modern Dutch speakers. Hagunan is vaguely reminding of begonnen (have begun). Anda seems closer to and than to en (Dutch; and).

Dutch also has dropped most 'Th' sounds that still exist in German and English.

 

[Takhisis]

To be fair, the oldest line in Dutch don't strike me as particularly Dutch:

olla vogalan nestas hagunan hinase ic anda thu

(all birds have begun to nest except me and you)

Vogel, nest and ik may be recognizable for modern Dutch speakers. Hagunan is vaguely reminding of begonnen (have begun). Anda seems closer to and than to en (Dutch; and).

Having had to study some things about Old English (which was closer to what eventually became present-day Dutch than the two languages are now), it's not that strange. Remember that, back when there was case-based declension (and, at least in English, better verb forms), the word order was far freer.

I thought my English was pretty plain - as the internal contradiction in your argument.

Erm, no, I'm not sure what you meant in your last post, and I'm not sure whether you've understood what I said. Legal English is hard even for native speakers, just like law in general.

r16's postings are generally hard to follow because of poor grammar - as opposed to mine, I'd have thought.

r16 does it intentionally. Even the best make mistakes sometimes.

 

[dutchfire]

What do you think of East Frisians and their Plattdeutsch language? Are the two cultures as close as they appear to someone who neither speaks Dutch or Plattdeutsch? I saw more similarities than differences, by far, but granted I have never set foot in Holland.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is.. do all Frisians view themselves as some sort of an ethnic group.. or any other type of group or community? Or are east Frisians just foreign people who live in another country who west Frisians don't care about?

The local language in Niedersachsen/Bremen/Hamburg is quite easy to understand when you know Dutch. Dutch might even be more helpful than German.

 

[Takhisis]

I think Dutch-Deutsch form a linguistic continuum that nowadays ends rather abruptly on the Polish borders.

 

[Agent327]

I disagree. German has conjugations, which in Dutch only exist in certain archaic formulations - just as in English. These are extremely hard to learn once your own language no longer has them. (Not as hard as Latin, but still.)

Having had to study some things about Old English (which was closer to what eventually became present-day Dutch than the two languages are now), it's not that strange. Remember that, back when there was case-based declension (and, at least in English, better verb forms), the word order was far freer.

Not to mention lack of a unified language or unified spelling. I'm only somewhat familiar with 17th century Dutch (which, with some practice, isn't that hard to read). anything before that is largely a mystery to me.

Erm, no, I'm not sure what you meant in your last post, and I'm not sure whether you've understood what I said. Legal English is hard even for native speakers, just like law in general.

I was just commenting on you saying justice is usually served by the victors concerning war crimes. Neither the Netherlands nor the ICJ in The Hague are an actual party in the Eastern Ukrainian conflict.

The local language in Niedersachsen/Bremen/Hamburg is quite easy to understand when you know Dutch. Dutch might even be more helpful than German.

As far as I understand people in the border regions have very little trouble (if any) to understand those from just across the border. Some of my family in Westphalia actually encourage to speak Dutch, which I'm never happy to do, as then I can't practice my German.

 

[Takhisis]

I disagree. German has conjugations, which in Dutch only exist in certain archaic formulations - just as in English. These are extremely hard to learn once your own language no longer has them. (Not as hard as Latin, but still.)

I think you mean 'declensions' but your point does stand.

Latin is harder for you because you're not used to any of its descendants. I've posted it in Plot's thread:
Profficient or native speakers of Romance languages who also speak Latin are usually better than speakers of other languages.

Not to mention lack of a unified language or unified spelling. I'm only somewhat familiar with 17th century Dutch (which, with some practice, isn't that hard to read). anything before that is largely a mystery to me.

Oh, standardisation is a complicated process. Especially when there are different regional spellings and one is imposed over the others, for later generations the earlier forms can be rather hard to understand.

I was just commenting on you saying justice is usually served by the victors concerning war crimes. Neither the Netherlands nor the ICJ in The Hague are an actual party in the Eastern Ukrainian conflict.

Well, Nürnberg and the Balkan war trials are just two of many examples of victor's justice.

My point is, anyway, that the ICJ shouldn't intervene. Not at this stage, at least. The perpetrators of the attack must be tried under Ukrainian law, not under any foreign system.

 

[Agent327]

I think you mean 'declensions' but your point does stand.

Latin is harder for you because you're not used to any of its descendants. I've posted it in Plot's thread:
Profficient or native speakers of Romance languages who also speak Latin are usually better than speakers of other languages.

It would seem to me that speaker of declinated/conjugated languages would have trouble with languages that have not. and vice versa. (I only mentioned Latin, because I'm familiar with it.)

Well, Nürnberg and the Balkan war trials are just two of many examples of victor's justice.

My point is, anyway, that the ICJ shouldn't intervene. Not at this stage, at least. The perpetrators of the attack must be tried under Ukrainian law, not under any foreign system.

If they are tried under Ukrainian law, they will be tried by the victors. That is exactly the internal contradiction I was referring to. Ergo they should not be tried under Ukrainian law. Separatism in general is a difficult issue: to the state in question they may appear as traitors, but that is not a helpful approach. Hence prosecution for a war crime is the obvious course for the airplane victims' representatives. Shooting down a civilian airplane is considered not acceptable in war - if indeed that is what happened. (The ICJ does not intervene. One has to bring a case before it or it does nothing. That is elementary to courts of law: they decide on matters of justice brought before them.)

 

[Agent327]

The number of Dutch victims in the MH17 crash has now been set at 195. Meanwhile in Eastern Ukraine today investigators were finally able to visit and examine the crash site and have recovered any human remains still found there.

(Source in Dutch: http://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2014/08/01/experts-verlaten-voor-vandaag-rampplek-mh17/)

 

[Tahuti]

Still dislike it how the MH17 crash has been used as an excuse for designs against Russia.

 

[Agent327]

The only 'design' the Netherlands have is to see the investigation concluded properly. And while on that subject, apparently there are still partial bodily remains on the crash site. It truly must have been gruesome.

 

[Agent327]

Key first findings published yesterday by investigators (summary of prelininary report):

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-29122816

In short:

No indications of technical malfunction were found, communication to and from the plane ended abruptly as it disappeared from radar. It was found that the plane crashed as a result of multiple objects hitting the plane from below.

Since this is a preliminary report on;y facts found are reported, no conclusions have been drawn.

(Actual report in Dutch : http://onderzoeksraad.nl/uploads/phase-docs/700/b0183934171fprem-rapport-mh-17-nl-interactief.pdf)

 

[Hygro]

If this had happened to a US plane a large portion of the population and punditry would be calling for war. What was the sentiment in Nederland?

 

[Agent327]

Since at that point it was unclear what exactly had happened (from what I remember) there were mostly expressions of horror and sympathy with the victim's families. The largest newspaper called it an act of terrorism, but our PM for once acted quickly in calling for justice to be done and to find out who was responsible.

I don't recall anyone calling for war - which seems an odd reaction when not knowing who or what is responsible for a plane crash. It also presupposes intent on the part of whoever is responsible. Airliners have been shot down by accident in the past; I don't think it ever resulted in a government declaring war - even if there was clamour for such an act, which I don't really know..

 

[Tahuti]

What was the sentiment in Nederland?

Most of the major Dutch media unfoundedly implied there was deliberate malice, further reinforced by convenient edits. Fortunately, I haven't seen Anti-Russia(n) sentiment popularly flare up despite of that. The Dutch government did attempt to send commandos to Eastern Ukraine, but we hardly in the mood for war.