There is a saying in linguistics attributed to every smart person who ever worked in that field: A language is a dialect with a navi and an army.
Basically saying it’s a political idea to separate dialects into distinct languages. Historically, it was the formation of nation states and it’s part of the national identity to speak a common language.
TLDR Sure, Flemish and Dutch form a dialect continuum but so does Dutch and German (and obviously Luxembourgish)
Yes. This is often true. But Flemish and Dutch are far far closer in linguistic distance than dutch and german.
And they are completely mutually intelligeble. Unlike Dutch and German, (which I prefer to call hochdeutsch, since german is a nationalist contruct that erases many other languages spoken by peoples living in Germany-Switzerland-Austria.)
Like here we get a distance between Flemish and Dutch of 5.6, that’s the lowest I’ve ever seen with this tool.
While 13.5 with Dutch and German.
Compare that to French and Occitan, Occitan is a Romance language in southern France, which got erased and often claimed it’s just “part of french”. The distance between them is 20.
Edit: Playing round a bit more with the tool, Your point is proven. The distance between Dutch and Afrikaans is lower. Only 2. Yet that’s considered different languages.
(which I prefer to call hochdeutsch, since german is a nationalist contruct that erases many other languages spoken by peoples living in Germany-Switzerland-Austria.)
Quite a bit to unpack here.
“Hochdeutsch” isn’t the term usually used in linguistics for two reasons: First, Hochdeutsch (or High German) refers to something else which is the upper and middle dialect groups (Ober- und Mitteldeutsch) combined, basically everything except lower German (Niederdeutsch aka Plattdeutsch). Second, “hoch” sounds like a value statement. As if it was the higher form of the language witch it is not. It’s the standardized form, hence Standard German (Standarddeutsch).
Which other languages are you talking about? Romani? Sorbian? Migrant languages? Because most if not all others are German dialects. Source: They have no army of their own.
And that’s basically my point: Someone from Oldenburg will have a much easier time understanding someone from Groningen than someone from Vienna, despite the fact that both speak German dialects and not Dutch. Now you can argue that Low German (Plattdeutsch) is its own language in its own right but, again, someone from Cologne will get along with someone from Duisburg (linguistically at least) while Duisburg is Low German and Cologne is Middle German. Where ever you draw the lines and how many lines you might draw, they are always arbitrary.
Now it makes more sense to me to speak of dialect groups where neighboring groups are mutually intelligible. This model comes much closer to the real dialect continuum that continental western Germanic languages form (it’s called “continental western Germanic dialect continuum” or in German “Kontinentalwestgerrmanisches Dialektkontinuum” and I had a linguistics docent who really loved this term). You can’t group these dialect groups to languages because each time you try, you will end up with neighboring groups in different languages. It’s better to just abolish the very concept of distinct languages as a nationalist idea. #nobordernonation
And sorry for the cliff hanger if you happened to read the comment before the edit. I hit “send” by accident.
Dutch, French, and German?
Suprised no ones attacked you for calling Flemish Dutch ahhaha.
(They lowkey are the same language but many people in Flanders hate it being called dutch ahhaha)
Well Dutch is the nothern accent of Flemish on which the language was based.
It’s mutually understandable but there are quite some differences. I would name them separately.
Both are just lower german with extra steps
There is a saying in linguistics attributed to every smart person who ever worked in that field: A language is a dialect with a navi and an army.
Basically saying it’s a political idea to separate dialects into distinct languages. Historically, it was the formation of nation states and it’s part of the national identity to speak a common language.
TLDR Sure, Flemish and Dutch form a dialect continuum but so does Dutch and German (and obviously Luxembourgish)
Yes. This is often true. But Flemish and Dutch are far far closer in linguistic distance than dutch and german.
And they are completely mutually intelligeble. Unlike Dutch and German, (which I prefer to call hochdeutsch, since german is a nationalist contruct that erases many other languages spoken by peoples living in Germany-Switzerland-Austria.)
Like here we get a distance between Flemish and Dutch of 5.6, that’s the lowest I’ve ever seen with this tool.
While 13.5 with Dutch and German.
Compare that to French and Occitan, Occitan is a Romance language in southern France, which got erased and often claimed it’s just “part of french”. The distance between them is 20.
Edit: Playing round a bit more with the tool, Your point is proven. The distance between Dutch and Afrikaans is lower. Only 2. Yet that’s considered different languages.
Quite a bit to unpack here.
And that’s basically my point: Someone from Oldenburg will have a much easier time understanding someone from Groningen than someone from Vienna, despite the fact that both speak German dialects and not Dutch. Now you can argue that Low German (Plattdeutsch) is its own language in its own right but, again, someone from Cologne will get along with someone from Duisburg (linguistically at least) while Duisburg is Low German and Cologne is Middle German. Where ever you draw the lines and how many lines you might draw, they are always arbitrary.
Now it makes more sense to me to speak of dialect groups where neighboring groups are mutually intelligible. This model comes much closer to the real dialect continuum that continental western Germanic languages form (it’s called “continental western Germanic dialect continuum” or in German “Kontinentalwestgerrmanisches Dialektkontinuum” and I had a linguistics docent who really loved this term). You can’t group these dialect groups to languages because each time you try, you will end up with neighboring groups in different languages. It’s better to just abolish the very concept of distinct languages as a nationalist idea. #nobordernonation
And sorry for the cliff hanger if you happened to read the comment before the edit. I hit “send” by accident.
Belgium!
Gesundheit
That was uncalled for 🥺
Germans always pop upp somewhere univited
As always is with Belgium
Leave Belgium alone!! 😭😭