Talk:Low German/Archive 1

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At the moment, Plattdeutsch redirects to Low German languages. But isn't Plattdeutsch the same as Plattdüütsch? Gryffindor 00:24, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it is the same. I changed the redirect so it points to this page. --::Slomox:: >< 02:16, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

And I removed the merge notice Saintamh 02:44, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Isn't this language just called "Low German" in English? Should this page be moved to Low German or Low German language? dbenbenn | talk 16:36, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Actually, "Low German" was the traditional name for Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages, which also includes the Dutch language and Dutch Low Saxon. But you'll get a lot of dirty looks from Dutch people if you still use such a term to apply to either one. This language needs to be renamed properly to Low Saxon, as it along with Low Franconian are (or at least were) considered "Low German". Actually, if I recall, the referring to Low Saxon alone (to the exclusion of Low Franconian) as "Low German" was an ideosyncratic edit owing to that most of these languages are spoken in Germany, but however, such languages are more accurately Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages in Germany (as opposed to the Netherlands or anywhere else). So, while "Low German" is still synonymous with "Low Saxon-Low Franconian", this distinction is politically incorrect, potentially very insulting, and no longer considered appropriate. However, this distinction was also historic, as Dutch, Flemings, Germans, Prussians, Austrians, Alsatians and Swiss Germans alike used to be called "Dutch" in English (hence terms like Pennsylvania Dutch which was never associated with the Netherlands). Note that, personally, I did not give these distinctions much thought before recently, and it was actually me who had created the new subcategories, using the names as they have already existed on Wikipedia. But later, in a vfd, I studied the issue and voted to agree with the renaming of pre-vfd "High Germanic" to "High German", pre-vfd "Low Germanic" to "Low Saxon-Low Franconian" (though personally I would have settled for politically-incorrect "Low German" for consistency's sake), and pre-vfd "Low German" to "Low Saxon". These names are in line with the reputable classification terminology used by Ethnologue. - Gilgamesh 03:20, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Requested move of "Plattdüütsch" to "Low German"

This is normally called Low German in English. The only reason why that article wasn't called Low German in the first place was because at that time, this name was being used for the language group that is now called Low Germanic languages. ― j. 'mach' wust | ✑ 20:38, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Voting

  • Support. ― j. 'mach' wust | ✑ 20:38, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. 'German' instead of 'Deutsch', 'Low German' instead of 'Plattdüütsch'. dbenbenn | talk 23:34, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support. Although I can't wait for somebody to say "low" is perjorative. LuiKhuntek 23:48, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support Low German is simply the standard name of the language in English, Plattdüütsch is an indigenous name and not an English one.--Nikostar 02:46, 26 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support - use English and do not use diacritics. --Henrygb 01:19, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support - diacritics may be necessary (as in Provençal), but üü is not found in English. I prefer Plattdeutsch (which I've seen in English), but Low German is better then what we have now.--Prosfilaes 18:17, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Discussion

"Low German" vs. "Low German language" and "Low Saxon (language)"

I prefer Low German to Low German language because the guideline Wikipedia:Naming conventions (languages) recommends: If the language's name is unique, there is no need for any suffix. The name Low German is unique (at least as unique as for instance Australian English), as you can see from the pages that link to Low German. Additionally, this has the invaluable advantage of being NPOV with regard to the controversial question whether Plattdüütsch/Low German is an independent language or not.

I prefer Low German to Low Saxon because Low German seems to be more common and because Low Saxon is sometimes only applied to the variety Northern Low Saxon. ― j. 'mach' wust | ✑ 20:38, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

How the concept first called "Low German" happened to be called "Plattdüütsch"

In order to understand why this article has the name Plattdüütsch and not Low German, as it would be normally called in English, we need to have a look at the evolution of how the different branches of what is currently called Low Germanic languages have been represented on Wikipedia:

From 2001-09 until 2002-12:

  • Low German
    • (varieties in Germany and other countries)
  • (Dutch, Afrikaans and varieties of them)

This means that in the beginning, the concept currently named Plattdüütsch already had the name Low German!

From 2002-12 to 2004-02 (after a series of edits by User:Toby Bartels):

  • Low German language
    • Low Franconian language
      • (Dutch, Afrikaans and varieties of them)
    • Low Saxon language
      • (varieties in Germany and other countries)

After these edits, the name Low German language was no longer used for the concept currently called Plattdüütsch, but for the entire branch of West Germanic languages. The concept formerly named Low German (currently Plattdüütsch) was renamed Low Saxon language.

From 2004-02 to 2005-07 (after a series of edits by User:Alexander.stohr):

  • Low German language
    • Low Franconian language
      • (Dutch, Afrikaans and varieties of them)
    • Plattdüütsch
      • Low Saxon language
        • (varieties in Germany and other countries)
      • East Low German
        • (varieties in Germany and other countries)

That is to say, when the article Plattdüütsch was created in order to describe the same concept that previously had the name Low Saxon (and still before that, Low German), the name Low German was not available any more since it had been made the name of the entire group of languages.

Currently, the structure of that tree is still the same, but several article names have been changed (after a series of edits by myself):

That is to say, the name Low German is available again, because it is no longer used as the name for the entire group of languages. ― j. 'mach' wust | ✑ 20:38, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Result

Moved. WhiteNight T | @ | C 06:16, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Please verify verb conjugations of hebben and slapen

I am not a native speaker of Low German, and only de-2 of Standard German but I was able to read the Low German page in its native language and found the information about verb conjugations but it was unclear about the plurals (as in, if hebbt or hebben are both acceptable for all plurals, or if hebbt is a specific person and hebben another). If the latter is the case then the information in the Verbs category should be changed to reflect this. --Godtvisken 18:49, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm no Low German speaker either, but native German speaker, and from what I understand, Low German has one plural ending for all persons, but the ending depends on the region: East Low German has -en and West Low German -et (or vice versa). ― j. 'mach' wust | ✑ 21:34, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
Added information received from a native.

Verb table

Should the verb table be removed in favor of a more general description of verb inflection? --Godtvisken 19:52, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Number of speakers

What does native to about 1,000 mean? This number is incorrect, when not the number of 'Low German only' speakers is meant. There are far more native speakers, even if they are not 'Low German only' because most of them speak German too. --::Slomox:: >< 22:45, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Correct, it is far more. Don't know the exact number but from what I know many speakers especially in the rural areas of Schleswig-Holstein still speak it natively, while a significant decline has happened in recent decades. Expecially in the Cities it has been fallen out of use.

Speakers still number in the millions. Yet, Low German must be considered seriously endangered if not moribund, as there are very few children speakers and, what is more, there are virtually no areas left where Low German still is the normal everyday community language. Even in the supposed strongholds of the language, esp. Eastern and Northern Frisia, children speakers are scarce and those who speak the language, rarely use it when speaking to their peers.
In many of the cites, in the area around Berlin and in the Ruhrgebiet, Low German is to all purposes dead. On the southern fringe, the youngest native speakers are now probably in their seventies or even eighties. In the central area, i.e. Westfalia, the southern half of Lower Saxony, northern Sachsen-Anhalt and northern Brandenburg, the youngest speakers were usually born in the 1940s and in the northern areas, near the North Sea and Baltic Sea coast, intergenerational transmission of the language usually ceased in the 1950s or 1960s.
Many of the speakers have not used the language for decades and there are many who are not native speakers but have, for various reasons, acquired a working knowledge of Low German later in their lives. This includes most of the people who proclaim themselves Low German speakers in TV talk shows or in Low German radio programmes. --Unoffensive text or character 12:17, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

"Tied" cognate

It isn't entirely accurate to say that "Tied/Zeit" has no cognate in English; "tide" is cognate, as is "time" (distantly), though the former doesn't have the same meaning, and the latter doesn't reflect the sound change as well. In short, I'm not sure how or even if the chart should be modified. Bws2002 11:15, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, I did not realize this before. I changed it to say "tide (literally: time)", although maybe a better wording that "literally: time" could be used to note that the meaning has changed but they are still cognates. Removed "Timmerman" until someon can find a cognate for it, if there is one. --Godtvisken 00:21, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
The cognate for Timmermann or timmern is to timber. --::Slomox:: >< 22:08, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Last Sentence in Intro

The last sentence in the introduction makes no sense and sounds unprofessional. Why ought dialects of Low German and Frisian in Denmark to be considered extinct? Should we not consider these dialects in other regions to be extinct? Can anyone with some authority on the subject say if the dialect (or language, it is unclear from the intro how we should classify Low German) as a whole is moribund or extinct? This article needs help.

Requested move: Low German to Low Saxon

See Talk:Low Germanic languages#Requested moves. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 15:26, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Formerly "Low Germanic languages" has been moved to "Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages"; this page should be named accordingly. Please move it. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 22:58, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

This is nonsense! I'm sorry I only discovered this discussion after the move had been made. Low Saxon is English for Niedersächsisch, which relates to one German Bundesland. As a translation of Niederdeutsch/Plattdeutsch it is simply wrong. We do usually call the Early medieval language Old Saxon, but we do not use Middle Saxon (let alone Middle Low Saxon) for the language of the high Middle Ages, and the modern language (dialect) is called Low German. Look at any standard English-language book on the history of German if you want confirmation. The consistency argument doesn't hold water: just because the language family is renamed (also controversial, but just about defensible) is no reason why the individual languages within it need to be given names which they never had before. Or are we going to move Dutch to Low Franconian, just to satisfy the desires of a few people who want the language tree to look neat? This move needs to be reversed. --Doric Loon 18:30, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, I have reverted this move. It was made without due consultation - the discussion related entirely to the Low Germanic Languages article, not to this one. We need a consensus here before a move is legitimate. --Doric Loon 19:24, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

I know that the Ethnologue is not reliable at all, but it says Low Saxon, and I have no other English sources right at hand.[1] ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 00:51, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
I think it's better to continue this discussion at Talk:Low Germanic languages#Requested moves, since that's where it has been lead in the first place. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 11:02, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
ISO 639-2 labels it Low German; Low Saxon, with Low German first.--Prosfilaes 00:00, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, no, I think the discussion should be here. What we do with "Low Germanic languages" is an entirely different question from what we do with "Low German". As for Ethnologue, it lists dozens of German dialects as though they were languages, which doesn't inspire confidence. Low Saxon may well mean Niedersachsen in their thinking. The point is, for there to be a "low" anything there has to be a "high" one too. Low German in contrast to High German makes good sense. But there is no High Saxon language. As a state, Niedersächsisch makes sense in contradistinction to Sachsen-Anhalt etc, but "Low Saxon language" means nothing at all. --Doric Loon 11:46, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but according to my move requests, the moves are directly linked to each other, see Talk:Low Germanic languages#Requested moves: If Low Germanic languages is renamed to Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages, then it is at least to me quite obvious that this group should consist of Low Saxon and Low Franconian.
I'm not going to repeat the whole recent argumentation on Talk:Low Germanic languages#Requested moves, but only this: Nedersaksisch ('Low Saxon') is the official Dutch name for 'Low Saxon/Low German', so your argument that any Low variety implies a corresponding High variety and vice versa is pretty pointless. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 19:06, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course that is not obvious. The group has been called a variety of things, but you cannot on that basis just rename Dutch as "Low Franconian". There is a fundamentally flawed approach here. A number of you have been trying to construct neat trees for Germanic languages, which is something linguists no longer really believe in because in practice it never really works neatly. You are playing with terminology to try to make it look neater than it is. But this is not legitimate. We MUST use the terminology which is actually standard in the textbooks, not terminology which we think is better. So the only argument which will support you is if you can show a consensus in recent published literature. And despite being challenged on the other page, you have not attempted to do this. --Doric Loon 19:21, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

So far, I've been the only one to cite anything at all. Nobody ever intended to rename Dutch. I'm well aware of the flaws of "genealogic" "trees". ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 21:04, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
I guess I have to repeat here what I've said on Talk:Low Germanic languages#Requested moves: The English language offers two equivalent names, Low German and Low Saxon (I guess it is no coincidence that these correspond to the respective autodesignations in Germany and the Netherlands). Which one should we choose? The Wikipedia:Naming conventions say nothing about such a case. I don't think the decision should be based on mere frequency (like you say), but rather on the questions like: what would native speakers do? or: what avoids confusion? (no, despite its name, Low German is really not just a simple variety of the German language like Scottish English is a variety of the English language). ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 21:33, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually, it does have something to say about the case: "Names of Wikipedia articles should be optimized for readers over editors; and for a general audience over specialists." That is the most common name usually; what the native speakers do has little use for a general audience.--Prosfilaes 00:00, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
There are contrary examples where a lesser known name has been chosen out of consideration for the native speakers: Lapps redirects to Sami people, Hottentot redirects to Khoikhoi, Gypsy language redirects to Romani language. Then, the naming conventions also talk about a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, and the recent contribution by User:Liam D (see below) is just another perfect example of the ambiguity of the term Low German. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 18:38, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Move request

I have moved the page in line with the other articles, which all have been moved, and consistency can be a good argument. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 03:34, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

As I see it, there's still an open discussion here. Let's not try to unilaterally preëmpt that discussion.--Prosfilaes 09:00, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Liam's comment

I'm moving the following comment by user:Liam D here because it belongs with this discussion and is not well placed at the top of this page. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 17:54, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

    • no it would be wrong to redirect Low German to Low Saxon. Low German is still used in German linguistics (Niederdeutsch) and French linguistics (bas-allemand) to designate all the Western Germanic languages shown on that map :
    • Low German includes Low Saxon and Low Franconian languages (Dutch, Flemish, etc).
    • I agree that the term German is, with that meaning, not politically correct, but it is still used in modern linguistics, and it's not up to Wikipedia users to interfere in that. Anyway, Plattdeutsch or Plattdüütsch contain the word deutsch that means German, and even the word Germanic contains the word German. The term German is to Germanic languages what Romance is to latin languages... Even the Swiss refer to their language as Düütsch, which means German... And English use the same root to designate the language of the Netherlands: Dutch.
    • A solution would be to name the page Low German languages rather than Low German, and then make clear that this group is actually split into Lower Saxon languages and Low Frankish languages (or Low Franconian languages, Franconian being an Anglo-English way to designate what the Germans call fränkish and the French call francique).
    • The best way to call that group would be Low Westgermanic languages but this does not exist.

Liam D 22:32, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

The Low German you're referring to has been moved to Low German languages a long time ago, see above. This article is not about what you've referred to as Low German, but only about what you've referred to as Low Saxon, that is to say, not about all West Germanic languages that are neither High German languages nor Anglo-Frisian languages, but only about the Easter part of them. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 18:09, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Most English speakers who have any idea about German affairs know the phrase Low German and know exactly what they mean by it, and there is no ambiguity, because it means only one thing. It does not include Dutch, it means only the northern dialects of Germany. Possible ambiguity only arised because of a possible confusion with Low Germanic (itself a fringe usage), but it is not hard to keep those apart. Low Saxon in this sense is hardly known to anyone in the English speaking world. Low German is the normal, standard phrase, and the one that readers will recognised. --Doric Loon 18:55, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

You keep claiming that, so I'm sure you won't have any trouble proving it. I've shown that the name Low Saxon is really used in English in this sense and I've explained why I'd prefer it over Low German.
However we decide, the decision must not only affect this article but all of the articles mentioned in my original move request in Talk:Low Germanic languages#Requested moves, including of course the corresponding categories (and therefore I'm still disappointed that the discussion has split). If we keep this article at its current name Low German, I wouldn't like the article name Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages at all, since then the very same concept would be called Low German in the name of this article and Low Saxon in the name of the article Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 19:16, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Well what you do with the group is up to you, but we can't name a language after a group, it has to be the other way round. Because the languages are "real" in a way that the group isn't; it is an academics' construct. I personally would call the group "the Low-German/Dutch continuum", but the existence or meaningfulness of the group is a matter of opinion, so the term can be twisted to whatever your theory happens to be.

But the language is a well-established entity and we know what we call it. You ask for sources. Well, most of my books on German affairs are in German of course, but just reaching out to what is on the shelf next to me, I can confirm that "Low German" is the term used in the classic works which we all studied with: Arthur Kirk, Introduction to the historical study of New High German, Wright, Middle High German Primer, M.O.Walshe, Middle High German reader, J.G. Robertson, history of German literature; or if you want something bang up to date, the new 10-volume Camden House History of German literature (one volume still in press) or the Gentry Companion to Middle High German Lit (2002); they all talk about Low German. A quick glance down the abbreviations at the front of the Oxford English Dictionary shows that it uses LG = Low German in its etymologies. You will notice I have deliberately not gone to linguistics text books but rather to more general works, because my point is to show that this is what most English-speaking non-specialists say. But just in case my book collection is untypical, I went to the British Library on-line catalogue and did a quick search. Putting in "Low German" gave me 273 hits. "Low Saxon" produced just 7. And I am not convinced any of those 7 are really evidence of what you want them to be. --Doric Loon 05:35, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I have no problem with "Low German"—I merely recognize that today it can be an insensitive term. However, it is absolutely undeniable that Low German is the same thing as Low Saxon-Low Franconian, and that it includes Low Franconian. The linguistic boundaries don't honor the Germany-Netherlands international border (northwestern Low Saxon veers into the Netherlands and southeastern Low Franconian veers into Germany), and Low Saxon and Low Franconian are more closely related to each other than to any other language family, including Frisian or High German. This article, however, is talking only about Low Saxon to the exclusion of Low Franconian. If you want to argue about the use of the name "Low German", go to Talk:Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages and discuss it there. This article must properly be renamed Low Saxon languages. - Gilgamesh 08:29, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

The dialect continuum between Low German and Dutch makes categorisation problematic, but traditionally the term Low German does not include Dutch. If you want to see how general linguists use these terms, have a look in the prologue and apparatus to the Oxford English Dictionary, or indeed in any other major dictionary. They have to compare all Germanic languages in their etymologies, and they use the terms Low German and Dutch as distinct entities. (They do not use Low Saxon at all!) I really can't see what can be insensitive about the term Low German when used in this conventional way - we are in the middle of a football world cup here in Germany, and who do you think the North Germans are cheering for? The same team as the south Germans! There is an argument about whether Low German is a dialect of German or whether the two Germans are in fact two different languages, but there is no argument that the Low German speakers are ethnically and politically German. The term is only insensitive if you try to make it include Dutch, which really is silly. --Doric Loon 15:04, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Do the sources you've named only mention the term Low German, or do they just prefer it to Low Saxon (like the ISO)? In any case, the name Low Saxon is also used in English, as I've shown, and as I've already said, I don't think that the article name needs to be the more frequently used term – there are contrary samples (see above). If we keep Low German, two questions remain:
  1. How do we handle the Low German speakers in the Netherlands who don't call their speech Low German, but Low Saxon?
  2. What is a fitting name for the article Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages? Its present name is based on the Ethnologue. What about a descriptive name like Low Franconian-Low German dialect continuum (or vice versa)? I guess that Low German speakers sensitive about their speech not being considered a dialect would strongly disfavour that name.
― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 16:25, 6 July 2006 (UTC)


None of those surces seem to know the term Low Saxon at all, as far as I can see. But that is not surprising, since it seems to be a relatively new pseudo-PC term (in English, if not in German). I don't doubt that there are alternative terminologies in English which I have not encountered, but if in years of studying Germanic philology I have never heard a term then it is not wide-spread. Low Saxon just doesn't have a significant status as an English term. The title of the article SHOULD be the most commonly used term, and certainly it should be a term which most English speakers who know about the subject would be expecting. I don't think the fact that there are some Low German speakers in the Eastern Netherlands affects this, any more than the presence of High German speakers in Eastern Belgium affects the naming of the German language article.

As for naming the group article, I have no preference, but if you feel the two article titles should harmonise, the articles on the individual languages should be the starting point, and not the other way around. I don't think any Low German speaker would have a problem with you speaking of Low German dialects or a dialect continuum, because obviously that refers to the relationships within Low German (or within the Low German-Dutch continuum), without prejudice to the relationship with High German. --Doric Loon 05:37, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Have we forgotten that Low Franconian languages veer into Germany as well? And as they are more similar to Low Saxon dialects than to High German, wouldn't these German Low Franconian dialects be considered "Low German" too? And if, as Low Franconian dialects, they are more closely related to Standard Dutch than to Low Saxon, would that necessarily disqualify the German Low Franconian dialects as being "Low German", or would it qualify Dutch as being "Low German"? The political distinction between the Netherlands and Germany is relatively young, only a few centuries old, and through most of that time, a contiguous "Germany" did not itself exist as a political entity. The Netherlands and Germany were formed out of the Holy Roman Empire, and they congealed into a separate Netherlands and Germany largely by circumstance. That is not to discredit the very important cultural differences they have now (just as those that also exist between Netherlands and Belgium, between Sweden and Denmark, between Czechia and Slovakia, between Russia and Ukraine, etc.), but as far as linguistic differences go, there are few. It has always been my understanding that Dutch and all the Low Franconian dialects are just as much part of the Low German continuum as the Low Saxon dialects are. To say that Low Saxon is Low German and that Dutch is not Low German, you end up having to split a great deal many hairs. If you only define Low German as those dialects in the Federal Republic of Germany, it attempts to draw a linguistic border at the international border, but they don't match—not even close—and that's politics, not good linguistics. - Gilgamesh 07:34, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

@Gilgamesh: It seems to me that you are misunderstanding Doric Loon. He does not question the separation of the different varieties (which in itself is questionable enough). I think we all agree that there are (1) the varieties spoken from certain parts of France almost to Cologne, including standard Dutch; (2) the varieties spoken mostly in Northern Germany and Northeastern Netherlands; (3) a group that is composed by the former two (that group may be questionable – its wikipedia article still cites no reliable sources). We agree that (1) is called Low Franconian, but we don't agree how (2) and (3) should be called, though I think we agree that their names should harmonise (which is to say nobody likes the current names):
(2) (3)
Current names Low German Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages
Doric Loon Low German Low Franconian-Low German dialect continuum?
Gilgamesh Low Saxon Low German languages
me Low Saxon Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages
Note that Gilgamesh's terms seem to be essentially the Dutch usage.
@Doric Loon: If you are saying that with respect to the name of the language they speak, the relevance of the Dutch Low Saxon speakers is comparable the relevance of the German-speaking Community of Belgium, then you haven't gotten my point. There is an important difference: The Dutch Low Saxon speakers don't use the name Low German for their own language, but Low Saxon (a name that is also used in Germany, see [2]). The German-speaking Community of Belgium, however, simply use the name German for their own language.
However, I'm fine with Doric Loon's position now. Keep the name Low German (and note at the beginning of the article that it's called Low Saxon by Dutch Low Saxon speakers). This would require Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages to be moved again, as well as the other pages mentioned at Talk:Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages#Requested moves (see now why I wanted to keep this discussion there? ;) including, of course, their corresponding categories. I'd propose the name Low Franconian-Low German dialect continuum. The problem is that we'll hardly find any source that uses that exact name, but then, it's a descriptive name composed by the well attested names Low Franconian, Low German and dialect continuum. Do we have prejudices for that? ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 17:59, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Not prejudices, but just an objection. You see, the Low Saxon language are in a different situation than the Low Franconian languages. For example, Low Saxon is only spoken natively by 3 million people (and I think that's a very positive guess) Dutch alone is spoken by 22 million people natively.These 3 million speakers (mostly elders) are scattered over Northern Germany, it is very hard for me, to imagine a genuine dialect continuum between the two. Rex 18:09, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Research issue

I'm a bit confused here J. 'mach' wust, first you suggest the name Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages naming ethnologue as a reputable source ... then later you add a template saying that the source isn't reliable. I mean I agree that ethnologue is not the most trustworthy source, but it is a much used source on wikipedia, who uses the term. Would you care to explain :-) ? Rex 18:01, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Hehe, you've revealed my inconsistency. I've never claimed the Ethnologue to be most trustworthy, but I've just used it as a source. The article would benefit if there were better sources. I haven't found any so far.
In the best case, we could have a history of how the term has been used in different places and different times. The modern German source I've added to the article doesn't mention it at all, but I wouldn't be surprised if it were different in 19th century German sources (and certainly not in Nazi German sources). However, such a history of the term's usage would require many reliable sources, but for now, we should have at least one. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 18:46, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Well it's not a very big issue for me, I just was surprised. I mean you introduced the term, supported it, and then you opposed/questioned it! You're turning into me! Rex 18:59, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Number of speakers

I've done a little google search to get an idea on the number of native speakers of Low Saxon, I normally don't rely on Ethnologue, as I believe it is often inaccurate but what I found there was astonishing ... it said there were 1,000 native speakers.Personally I don't believe that it's that low, but the reason I did a quick survey was because I don't trust the 3 million either. 1,000 vs 30,000,000 that's a huge difference. Yet we list 3 million ... does anyone have a reference or perhaps a realistic idea of the number of speakers?  Rex  20:47, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Does anyone know who wrote down there were 3million native speakers?

At the moment the number in the article is 150,000. The problem is: There is no census data or something like that, because the language often is seen as a dialect (despite the linguistic facts and the fact it is dying, cause the gap between Standard German and Platt is much too big to do shifting between it [normally you can use several degrees of formality between dialect and standard according to context, Platt doesn't allow this.]). And the second question is: Whom do you consider a native Platt speaker in an area, where all speakers of Platt are familiar with Standard German (or Dutch in the Netherlands)?
The number 1,000 is just plainly wrong (I notified ethnologue about this some time ago, but they didn't react). 150,000 is also too low. In 1984 there was a survey (only 2000 people) about the abilities in Platt of the inhabitants of the Platt speaking areas in Western Germany (Eastern Germany and the Netherlands were not included). These areas have roundabout 18 million inhabitants. 20% said, they speak Platt very well. When we consider this as native, we have 3.5 million natives. But there are plenty people that have learned Platt as mother tongue, but switched to Standard German later and don't use their mother tongue any more (I think such people have stated good or some Platt abilites in the survey [36%]). These are natives, but should they be considered natives if it is about the number of speakers of Platt? So every number is only made up of wild guesses. --::Slomox:: >< 12:25, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Low German/Low Saxon

If I may be allowed to jump into the fray--as a near-native speaker of German who has lived several years in in Schleswig-Holstein/Luebeck area (and consequently picked up some Platt along the way), I vote for the use of Low Saxon/Niedersaechsisch as a primary designation for the article.

Although Platt/Niederdeutsch/Low German are of course the most familiar terms to most people, Low Saxon is the most accurate, as we are not only describing the Low German language in Germany itself, but also the language spoken by many in the Netherlands as a secondary language. In the Netherlands, it is known almost exclusively as "Platt", and any reference to "Low German" would be confusing. Given the fact that Platt crosses the border so indescriminately, "Low Saxon" is the only possible choice, with "Platt", "Plattduutsch", "Low German" or "Niederdeutsch" as alternates.

For more arguments why it should be called "Low Saxon", you can browse Reinhard F. Hahn's website: http://www.sassisch.net/rhahn/low-saxon/lowsax.htm

I would suggest that a link be established (if it hasn't been already) to the Institut fuer niederdeutsche (yes, I know) Sprache in Bremen, an excellent organization that promotes Platt through the schools, radio programmes, etc. Here is the URL: http://www.ins-bremen.de/ Thanks,--Cbrodersen 16:16, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I think you overemphasize this. Calling people in the Netherlands German is not that problematic. They considered themselves for long time up until the 20th century as German. The term Low Saxon has also its problems (East Low German is not really Saxon in first line etc.). The best term would be "Platt", as it makes no statements on the "nationality" of its speakers, but I think this is no optio as it is not a term used by any scientist. And you should notice that Low German includes also Low Franconian, which is not Saxon. --::Slomox:: >< 11:47, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Looking at the article it indeed should be something like Platt as the article is about he modern regional language and not the theoretical linguistic divisions made by the terms Low Saxon and Low German. You Englishmans should coin a new name for modern Platt ;-) --::Slomox:: >< 11:53, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I can assure you the Dutch never considered themselves to be Germans.  Rex  12:11, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

See de:Niederländisch (Name) or the anthem Wilhelmus van Nassouwe ben ick van Duytschen bloet. They considered themselves to be Duits, Dutch, Düütsch, Deutsch. --::Slomox:: >< 13:06, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Please, learn to read our anthem properly, I could go on for days about the actual meaning of "duits" in the context of its time (which isn't German) but apart from all that. The Dutch anthem is about William of Orange, not the Dutch people. In fact the anthem is "sung" by william.  Rex  13:19, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I am aware of the fact, that duits doesn't mean 'from modern day Germany' or anything like that. In fact we are one people, one folk, in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Austria and Switzerland (even in England the term theodisc was used in very early times, they were Saxons). All the borders inbetween this area are more or less arbitrary. The people of Kerkrade are no others than the people of Hertogenrade on the other side of the street. I am not saying, that Netherlanders are all German, but if you like that better: Germans are all Dutch ;-) I understand if you feel uncomfortable, when it seems, that Germans want to incorporate you (yes, bad experiences in the past with some of them...), but it is the opposite. I, for example, also feel uncomfortable, when at the opening ceremony of the soccer world cup there were this group of people performing in Lederhosen. As a Lower Saxon I feel so not-represented by Bavarian Lederhosen. Grachten and dikes as in the Netherlands would represent us much better (But perhaps you are from Limburg and don't feel much closeness to dikes ;-). And be aware of the fact, that the term plattduytsch was coined by Cornelis Lettersnijder, a dutchmen, who wrote a New Testament in goeden platten duytsche, in good vernacular dutch. --::Slomox:: >< 21:01, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

No I'm afraid that's a bit of a warped view on reality. No matter how much the German wikipedia rants on and on (and it does) its views on the Dutch and their relation to Germans is often based on information provided between 1933 and 1945.No offence at all.  Rex  22:13, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, I should have had a look on your user page before trying to make my point again. Now I see, that you have a specific view on this topics and I won't do any more words. --::Slomox:: >< 22:28, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
The assertion that Dutch and German are one people, one folk, is plain nonsense. Don't be surprised if such an assertion will provoke a harsh reaction from a Dutchman (or a Swiss, etc.). The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland are different countries with different national identities. The status of German and Dutch as independent languages is indisputable. The status of Low German, however, is disputable. There is a strong tradition of considering it a language of its own, yet in German Linguistics, many enumerate Low German (as spoken in Germany) along with other German varieties. What difference is there between the status of Low German (in Germany) and Swiss German? I'd say it's only politics, not linguistics. Both are very different from standard German, but nevertheless, standard German is dachsprache to both. By the way, I think the importance of the dachsprache to Low German is very clearly illustrated by the Low German wikipedia having split up into a wikipedia with German dachsprache (plattdüütsch) and another wikipedia with Dutch dachsprache (nedersaksisch).
And as I've said, platt is also a problematic term since that selfdesignation is appearently also used by speakers of Middle Franconian/West Middle German varieties that are certainly not Low German.
In the end, I think we'll have to deal with the name Low German anyway, since it seems to be the most common name in English, though we must point out that it's called differently in the Netherlands (I'm just going to do so). One of the reasons why I would have preferred Low Saxon is that this designation avoids any Dutchman to be called German, whereas I don't think the Low German speakers in Germany would have troubles being called Saxons. By the way, Slomox, why would you say that East Low German is not really Saxon? East Low German was brought to its current place by Low Saxon settlers, as far as I know, so consequently I wouldn't see any problem with calling it Low Saxon.
Anyway, I have the impression that the division between East Low German and West Low German is just as problematic as the association of Low German and Low Franconian, since I haven't found either in linguistic literature. They would just describe the different varieties of Low German without distinguishing a Western group and an Eastern group. However, that's another discussion... ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 20:44, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
East Low German is not only Saxon, but there also were Hollandish and High German settlers. But the Saxons dominated. This was not meant as a major concern. I intended to write, that 'Saxon' nonetheless is fine to me, but forgot to note it ;-) I only wanted to relativize that only possible choice comment.
The distinctions between Austria, Germany etc. are more or less products of state-bound nationalism. From the people living there, Bavaria is closer to Austria than to the remainder of Germany. I don't understand and don't like this tendency to culturally center around the capital of a political state, even if this does not match the reality of the cultural landscape.
One example: Uganda recently has decided to do primary school education in the native languages for first three classes. But there was great argueing, that this would fasten the local cultural ties and jeopardise the creation of a single Ugandan nation. But why should Uganda, a country, whose borders were shaped by British officers without considering culture or languages, why should this country form a single nation? Why is 'I am proud to be a Ugandan!' better than 'I am proud to be an Acholi!'? I plainly don't understand it. Hope, this non-European example amkes my point clearer. --::Slomox:: >< 22:56, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
You're free to dislike national identities, but it's no use denying them. And I wouldn't be so sure that Bavaria is closer to Austria than to the rest of Germany, since apart from insitutional and cultural ties between Bavaria and the rest of Germany, there are also linguistic differences between Austria and Bavaria, and not only in lexical innovations (for instance a flat tyre of a bicycle is called Platten in Germany but Patschen in Austria, see [3]), but also in functional words (for instance the frequent use of the particle fei in Bavaria, but not in Austria, see [4], or the use of nei 'into' in Bavaria, but eini in Austria, see [5]). Anyway, I guess the difference between the neighbouring Low German varieties across the Dutch-German border is likely to be greater than the difference between the neighbouring Austro-Bavarian varieties across the German-Austrian border because the latter share the same dachsprache, standard German, but the former don't (which caused them to split up into two different wikipedias). ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 11:41, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
I am not "denying" or generally "disliking" national identities, I only say they are overdone. Our cultural ties are thousands of years old, our national identities were formed in much shorter times. I don't see black and white and I am not mandating to create a new "pan-Germanic nation", far way, but I don't understand why there is so much emphasis on the made-up borders in a continuum. And, by the way, do you want to 'triez' me with repeating the 'two Low Saxon wikipedias' thing ;-) --::Slomox:: >< 19:58, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
We agree about the basics, that's good! What is triezen? I just think that it's a very illustrative sample for the real impact and not made-uppance of national borders (which, by the way, are just as well a part of our cultural ties). ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 09:59, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Kollumerlands

I've deleted Kollumerlands, because it doesn't exist. I had done it before, but something or someone put it on the page again. Kollumerlands doesn't exist, it is a part of the Groningen dialect Westerkwartiers. This has official been confirmed by the University Groningen. It's sometimes called Kollumerlands, because it is also spoken in a part of the Frisian municipaltly Kollumerlân & Nijkrûslân, but is still is a part of the Westerkwartier dialect. See also nds-nl:Westerkwartiers for more information. If you can't speak/read the Groningen dialect (which should be very likely), then you should ask me, then I'll translate it and make an article about it. Grönneger 1 20:54, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Terminology

There's an awful lot of talk on this page about people's preferences, terms that people from this or that country might not like, and arguments from first principles. All of this, to my mind, is entirely irrelevant.

The study of Germanic linguistics is a well established branch of scholarship in English-speaking countries. It is not the job of Wikipedia editors to replace the established terminology of a subject on the basis of their own opinions and arguments, whatever merits they may have.

The question here is not "what term do we want to use?" but "what terminolgy is used in English-language scholarship?. Three widely used handbooks on the history of German (Keller, Wells, Waterman) all overwhelmingly use Low German. I think it's the job of those who want a move to show that any move they're proposing is to a term that is more widely used in published research and specialist handbooks than the current page title. Page tiles need to be supported by reputable sources in just the same way as the content of the articles. --Pfold 21:27, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Do these handbooks have a name that corresponds to the topic of that article? ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 22:05, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
I need to look go through them more carefully when I get time. Actually, I'm not sure it's as clear cut in any of the books as I first thought! Though my basic point remains - let's decide this on sources, not on personal beliefs. --19:17, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Politics has a lot to do with this. The Low Franconian languages are linguistically under the wider Low German umbrella (in contrast to High German, but not including English or Frisian which are in the separate Anglo-Frisian family). However, it seems that people from the Netherlands don't want to be associated as being "German", and many Low Saxon speakers in Germany simply call their language what translates back into English as "Low German" or "Low". And if you look at the map of the entire language area in this article, you can see that the international boundary between the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Federal Republic of Germany does not correspond at all with the linguistic boundary between Low Saxon and Low Franconian. You are right—traditionally and accurately, that group is called "Low German", but this article here is about the eastern group at the exclusion of its Low Franconian sibling. But we can't very well call this article "Low German" at the exclusion of Low Franconian, especially when its speakers in the Netherlands do not call themselves nor their language "German" (they are "Low Saxons"), and as far as I understand, the Low Franconian dialects that veer into Germany are just as easily referred to as "Low German" or "Low". We have to agree on the terms to use here—unfortunately, politics involving the foreign relations of the Federal Republic of Germany are involved in this debate. Personally, I don't see why they should be. If Netherlands citizens don't want their language to be under the umbrella of "Low German" in an academic sense (which they are certainly entitled to do in a social naming sense), they should find a time machine and go back in time and change their language so that it's not Low German. - Gilgamesh 18:08, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Few of us, individually, are in a position to influence the terminology used by scholars publishing in English in the future, and none of us can change what the usage has been to date. To choose a terminology that is not used but is prefered by a particular section of the editors of this page because of their particular sensitivities or to show respect for others' sensitivities, however justified, is not NPOV. Making a serious attempt to establish what the professional usage is offers us a way to avoid factionalising the discussion.
What disturbs me is the argument which supported the use of Low Germanic - the "I know this is non-standard, but I prefer it" argument. Incidentally, am I the only one who is struck by the fact that so many of the pages on Germanic languages cite no sources? --Pfold 19:17, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
With respect to Low Saxon vs. Low German, I was under the impression that both terms were used. That'd leave room for the NPOV argument to decide which one to use (or other arguments). That impression, however, was based on the Ethnologue.
Up to now, the Ethnologue also remains the only source for the group composed of Low Franconian and Low German. I consider the article about that group to be much more controversial than this article. Not only is the name of that group controversial, but rather its very existence as a linguistic concept. The concept represented by this article, in change, seems to be widely established in linguistics, and its name, Low German, seems to be far less controversial (according to the literature you and Doric Loon alluded to).
@Gilgamesh: Do you have English sources for the term Low German as an umbrella term embracing Low Franconian? And Dutch people are no Saxons, they are Dutch, or Franconian at best, but certainly not Saxon. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 21:46, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Certainly, Go here and skip over the links that link back to Wikipedia, and it's mentioned several times. You see...though the Franconians and Saxons were separate groups, they spoke the same language where they lived in proximity, and only diverged relatively recently, in the past millennium at best. High German, however, diverged from the Low languages much longer ago, maybe two millennia ago. But what is notable is that both Saxons and Franconians spoke High and Low languages that were more closely related to one another by region than by historic nation. In fact, the modern regions of Saxony Proper and Franconia Proper are both in the south today, with Franconia in particular being part of Bavaria and having a High German dialect. The traditional languages of Lower Saxony and the Low Countries (Low Franconia) also remained the same by proximity, diverging gradually within the past millennium. So genetically, Low German encompasses both Low Franconian and Low Saxon, just as High German includes both High Franconian and High Saxon (along with the Alemannic dialects and such). This demonstrates that the traditional distinctions between Saxons and Franks were not greatly-pronounced linguistic divisions, but rather of identity. Indeed, though Low Franconian and Low Saxon are easily extinguished at their eastern and western extremes, the border dialects between the two groups share a great deal of transitional features. It's a no-brainer that Dutch Low Saxon is closest to the traditional dialects of Lower Saxony in Germany, but it may not be so obvious that the Limburg Low Franconian dialects do not end at the border with Germany, but there would also be considered Platt. - Gilgamesh 09:29, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Come on guys: sources means peer reviewed publications, not web pages. --Pfold 10:11, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I would have no problem with Low German, except that it creates so much "laymen" confusion. Then again, Low German was once proposed to be the hypothetical ancestor of both Low Saxon and Low Franconian ... which is was not as Low Saxon and Low Franconian never had a common ancestor after the high German consonant shift, to me it just indicates that a language has not experienced the HGCS or the AFSS ... but I'm convinced others will not grasp this so easiliy Also, some claim the terminology used in this article is based on politics, but werent the terms invented by those early german linguists as well?  Rex  10:17, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Two points, I'd like to clarify: The language "High Saxon" is not derived from Saxon. They only took the name. And Platt actually meant vernacular, not low. --::Slomox:: >< 13:15, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

One more clarifacion: The designation platt is also used by speakers of West Middle German varieties, see [6]. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 13:41, 18 July 2006 (UTC)


Ok, I've now spent some time looking more closely at the terminology used the main English-language handbook as well as the Modern German Dialects book edited by Charles Russ. There seems to be a clear difference between the way the terms are used for oldest stage of the language and more recent ones. For the modern situation, Low German is the almost universal term for the dialects of nothern Germany - it is not used to encompass Low Franconian. Low Saxon is used but much less frequently. For the older period LG certainly is used to cover the combined Saxon and LFranconian dialects, and is more rarely used as a synonym for Old Saxon. However, given the paucity of texts, especially for Old Low Franconian, it is not always posible to tell what meaning is being given to LG (though it's explicit in Waterman's map, for example) Typically the early stages of "Low Saxon" are called Old Saxon and Middle Low German. I haven't come across Middle Saxon or Middle Low Saxon. The authors are entirely aware that the terms are problematic but their own usage does seem to have a clear tendency.

My suggestion is this:

  1. We abandon the Low Franconian-Low Saxon page - look at how little information it contains, with not a single common innovation nor a single isogloss apart from the sound shift. (Incidentally, Martin Durrell's article on Wetsphalian in Russ gives half a dozen isolglosses separating Westphalian from all Franconian dialects, Low and otherwise.)
  2. We keep this LG page as a LG page but incude the info on both meanings that are given to the term.
  3. A Low Saxon page redirects to this one - this term is only occasionally used by specialist and I would be very surprised if it were known to the non-specialist. There is no evidence in any text that the term Low Saxon cannot be replaced in any context by the more common LG, where the modern language is referred to.

--Pfold 15:59, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I AGREE. Well done Pfold, you've looked at what is actually done in standard academic texts (as opposed to what some of us might like to see done) and have proposed something not so very different from what I argued for earlier. I support this proposal. --Doric Loon 17:42, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


I suppose something different.
  • We drop the title "Low Saxon Low Franconian" , and replace it with "Low German".
  • This page will contain extensive information about the meaning of the concept Low German.
  • The current "Low German" article will be called "Low Saxon".
 Rex  16:22, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
With all due respect, Rex Germanus, but please explain why. We're speaking sources here. It may be that your wording is more common in the Netherlands, but this is about the usage of the terms in English.
I agree with Pfold's suggestions. However, I see a problem if we abandon the Low Saxon-Low Franconian page. Sooner or later, it will be restituted or, even worse, this page about Low German will be changed into it (I'd bet that already happened before, though the history of these pages is very difficult to tray, cf. above). We should keep it as a disambiguation page that explains by citing hard sources why this concept is not further detailed – and we should certainly keep it at a name that "harmonises" (as Doric Loon has said above) with the names used for the concepts of Low German and Low Franconian, so I still suggest to move it to Low Franconian-Low German dialect continuum.
And with regard to Rex Germanus' above objections against calling it a dialect continuum: The entirety of the continental West Germanic languages is often considered to be a typical sample of a dialect continuum, similar to the dialect continuum of the western Romance languages (and regardless of your changes to the dialect continuum article). That means it's not unusual at all to use this term in a rather historical sense. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 17:50, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


j. 'mach' wust, what exactly do you mean by "It may be that your wording is more common in the Netherlands"? Both Dutch and German wikipedia use "Low German" [7] [8]

As for the dialect continuum, and really no offence to you or anybody, but I refuse to believe in a fairytale.The modern "low Franconian-low Saxon" dialect continuum is nothing compared to what it was 200 years ago.  Rex  19:13, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

These are not what we call reliable sources, but wikipedia articles. I have made a (rather superficial) research on the topic in German publications, and I've found no mention at all of the concept of 'Low Saxon-Low Franconian' languages, but I've found the concept of 'Low German' to be called Niederdeutsch. But anyway, this is the English wikipedia, so the German usage matters as little as the Dutch usage. You're free to have you're own opinion on the West Germanic dialect continuum, but that doesn't change the scientic literature on the topic (the only source I have readily at hand is the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language by David Crystal, translated to German by S. Röhrich, A. Böckler and M. Jansen, Cologne: Parkland 1998, ISBN 3-88059-954-8, p. 25). Mind that if you're refusing that there is a dialect continuum across the Dutch-German border, then you're claiming that dialect speakers on either side of the border are unable to understand each other – that's all the term 'dialect continuum' claims for. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 19:35, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Note that I'm not claiming there isn't a dialect continuum, I'm saying that this dialect continuum is nowadays far from "fluent", and that the border is, rapidly, turning into a real language border even on dialectal level. I am not denying the historical dialect continuum.  Rex  20:07, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

So I suppose the article name Low Franconian-Low German dialect continuum is all right to you? ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 00:38, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

No not really. We need something standard term, something that everyone else uses. And I dearly propose we use "Low German" as the main term. Oh, and by the way. I found a source:

There are two principal divisions of the German language: High German, or Hochdeutsch, and Low German, or Plattdeutsch. One of the most striking differences between them is the result of a consonant shift (usually referred to as the second, or High German, sound shift) that took place before the 8th cent. A.D. in certain West Germanic dialects. This sound shift affected the southern areas, which are more elevated and hence referred to as the High German region, whereas it left untouched the Low German prevalent in the lowland regions of the North.''In a broader and purely linguistic sense, the term Low German can also be extended to cover all the West Germanic languages in which the second sound shift did not take place, such as Dutch, Frisian, and English.

From: The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001-05 (See:High and Low German)  Rex  08:31, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that the very concept of a Low Franconian-Low German group appears not only to be far from a commonplace in linguistics, but rather to be hardly used in linguistics at all. So far, we still have no evidence of any linguistic publication using that concept. Since the concept is not standard, it's obvious that there is no standard term for it.
You'll note that in the source you've provided (which in any case is not a linguistic source at all), Low German is primarily used for the concept described in this article, while the "broader and purely linguistic usage" refers to yet another different concept than any of the concepts we have been discussing here. It is called North Sea Germanic or Ingvaeonic by some historical linguists (cf. for instance Stefan Sonderegger 1979: Grundzüge deutscher Sprachgeschichte, Band I, Einführung – Genealogie – Konstanten. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter, pp. 117 – 122). From what I know, the concept is not a commonplace shared by all historical linguists, and I've never heard the name Low German used for that concept. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 09:52, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Incidentally, do we have a source for this being a dialect continuum? I ask because Martin Durrell's article on Westphalian & Eastphalian in Russ makes exactly the opposite claim, that the dialect boundary can be "established with relative clarity", and he cites some fairly important isoglosses, such as the Einheitsplural, lack of ge- in part partciples. Of course, this doesn't mean there's no code switching is the areas near this boundary, but that's not the same as a continuum. --Pfold 11:28, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Why should bundles of isoglosses hinder a dialect continuum? What other name could we use instead of Low Franconian-Low German dialect continuum (as Low German is not adequate)? ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 14:11, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

The article literally says "In a broader and purely linguistic sense, the term Low German can also be extended to cover all the West Germanic languages in which the second sound shift did not take place" which is exactly what we want it to mean! We should not care much about the fact that it is also used to indicate plattdeutsch. This article is about linguistics, so we should use linguistic, and not colloquial/vernacular terms.  Rex  14:27, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

No, we only want it to include Low German and Low Franconian, but not Anglo-Frisian. There may be an article that covers all West Germanic languages that haven't taken part in the High Germanic sound shift, but that article (which doesn't exist yet) should be at Ingvaeonic or at North Sea Germanic, which seems to be the linguistic terms for that concept. You're very right that we should use linguistics since this article is about linguistics. Therefore, we shouldn't give much credit to a general-purpose encylopedia like the Columbia Encylopedia. Instead, we should keep to linguistic publications. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 15:03, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course Anglo-Frisian language are now treated as a different group, but that can be explained in no time. I really think this is the best option, and everything beats LF-LG dialect continuum and variations.No offence j. 'mach' wust. Also, you really continue to amaze me with the quest for sources :-) I wonder, will I ever find a source that will live up to your specifications? lol.  Rex  15:15, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Rex, are your SERIOUSLY saying you want English to be classed under the group heading "Low German"? I think the point you have to grasp is that the West Germanic languages which are not High German are VERY difficult to classify. The tree diagrams which appear all over Wikipedia are entirely misleading in their impression of clarity. We cannot simply assume that first the High German consonant shift separates off High German leaving the rest (Platt, Dutch, English, Fresian) as a group which later subdivides. That obscures the fact that other developments separated English from the the rest of the group BEFORE the HGCS took place. There is a reason why the academic literature is not giving you all the term you are looking for, and J. 'mach 'wust has already hinted at it: the term is intended to cover a grouping concept which academic linguistics is not interested in working with.

However, if you do want a word that covers Platt, Dutch and English, the rather dated "Ingvaeonic languages" would do it. --Doric Loon 07:36, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

No I'm not saying that, as that classification is outdated, as I know English and Frisian underwent various soundchanges of their own not found in Low German (though a few are present in dutch) or High German languages. I do think however we should have 3 groups:

  • AngloFrisian.
  • Low German.
  • High German.

Of course we should never pretend that these 3 have fixed linguistic borders.  Rex  09:18, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles should not explain things in the way some contributor thinks they are, but in the way reliable sources describe them. I respect your point of view, but unless it can't be proved to be supported by scientific linguistic publications, that point of view should not be represented in a wikipedia article. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 10:40, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me (and I know I'm just as guilty as the rest of you) but were was the demand for reliable sources when they changes everything to Low and High Germanic? Or when we all went for Low Saxon-Low Franconian? I remember providing a source from an encyclopedia (and if that's not scientific then you 've lost me) I know Dutch and German (wikipedia and linguists) use the same terminology, as AFAIK the term "Low German" is just a literal translation of either one of the terms.I mean if we're talking sources, this has the best records of all things proposed yet.  Rex  10:59, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

  1. Back then when the moves to Low/High Germanic, I was younger and stupider. It's a past mistake, I'm sorry for it, but we can and should do better now.
  2. An encyclopedia is not a reliable linguistic publication (it might perhaps be if it were a linguistic encyclopedia).
  3. This is the English wikipedia. Therefore we're using the English terminology.
  4. The encyclopedia article you've cited uses the term Low German in accordance with the topic of this article. It talks about another use which however does not match the concept of 'Low Franconian-Low German whatever' (as Doric Loon and me have pointed out to you), but with the concept of 'Ingvaeonic'. So I really don't remember any source you would have provided for the concept of 'Low Franconian-Low German' being called Low German.
  5. I remember that Doric Loon and Pfold have alluded to sources that Low German is the English name for the concept of 'Low German/Low Saxon'. We still need full bibliographic references, but I don't think they've just invented these sources. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 14:47, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
Source for LG=Saxon + LFrk: I've temporarily put a scan of the relevant figure from Chris Wells German. A linguistic history to 1945 at http://www.spoonbill.org./files/wells.gif. (Please do not copy this to WP - it is not copyright free!) But when talking about post-OHG period he uses LG (or MLG) solely for the Saxon dialects, as can be seen from the fact that he does not use the terms Middle Saxon or Middle Low Saxon, which would seem to be the only alternatives.
Chambers & Wilkie (p.21) show a similar period differentiation: the Saxon dialect (known as Old Saxon, to distinguish it from the Saxon of England, and later as Low German or Low Saxon)... --Pfold 15:56, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Although I doubt that encyclopedia doesn't have reliable sources of its own, still I wonder: Which term did wikipedia use before it changed to Low and High Germanic?  Rex  15:20, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course encyclopedias need to have reliable sources; that's why we're trying to find reliable sources. As to the prior naming, it's a complicated history, though that doesn't have any relevancy. In any case, see above. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 15:51, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

No, that's not exactly what I meant. I meant to say that encyclopedias need to have reliable sources, so what makes you think the encyclopedia I provided doesn't have them?  Rex  10:23, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

And now for something totally different ...

Maybe, we should drop the whole idea of a class between "west Germanic" - [...] - "Old Saxon/Low German" "west Germanic" - [...] - "Old Dutch/Old Low Franconian" (etc) and simple note they did not experience various soundshifts ... somewhat like this map.

Remember just an idea, throwing it out there so we make sure we take into acount every possible option.  Rex  10:58, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

You know...I honestly had no idea that I'd be opening such a can of worms. It seems to me that this debate isn't entirely about linguistics, but rather about different schools of thought demanding it entirely their way. I think I'll probably drop out of this debate...it's getting far too complicated for my usual Wikipedia/Ethnologue/linguistics academic hobbies. - Gilgamesh 09:25, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

It's getting pretty confusing yes, but I hope we're going to reach some common ground soon (and that the change we're going to made is going to last)
 Rex  09:52, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
One thing that strikes me as very surprising: there is nothing here or in WP:DE about Maurer's tri-partite grouping of WGmc - suprising because, however problematic it may be, it is widely cited in both the Eng & the German handbooks, and no one has come up with anything that has been more generally accepted. --Pfold

Well we could try ;-) but I think original research wouldn't like that.  Rex  12:44, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

To me, it seems as if this debate were rather about the principles of wikipedia, that is, about the need for sources, and therefore not quite appropiate to this talk page.
However, it seems to me that common ground can't be too far off now, since this and now for something completely different isn't that completely different from the position of Doric Loon and Pfold, if I'm not mistaken, which is the position I also support. I still think however we need to keep a well documented disambiguation page where we now have the Low Saxon-Low Franconian languages article. I think if we do not, that page will reappear in a year or two. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 17:26, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
Ugh...but what about Ethnologue? I've been using it as an authoritative reference for years. Are we saying suddenly that it is wholly not credible enough to cite? - Gilgamesh 18:21, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

I've used ethnologue for years as well ... eventhough it's not that good but at least its something and although I think it is credible, I'd still prefer a term like the Dutch and German linguists use though ... but this might cause problems because that term is mainly used for Platt in English, eventhough a source I found said that it had the same meaning in English in a linguistics sense.

 Rex  18:37, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Fries and Ostfries

I rewrote the following text because I found it to be gratuitously plaintive POV:

Many people in Northern Germany are unaware that Low German does not abruptly stop at the German-Dutch border but continues on into the Eastern Netherlands. Among those who are aware of it, a measure of estrangement (especially Dutch versus German influences and Dutch versus German based spelling), besides alleged sensitivities remaining from the German occupation in World War II, is often used as an argument in favor of ignoring the dialects of the Netherlands. The general attitude among Low German speakers in the Netherlands, however, is that the Dutch Low Saxon varieties belong to a continuum with the Low German varieties of Northern Germany, many Low German speakers in the Netherlands are willing and happy to participate in activities organized on the German side of the border, and Dutchmen have won prizes in Low German literature contests in Germany.

Having intimate experience with Frieslanders on both sides of the Ems, I never sensed any real animosity across that border (one which, by European standards has remained remarkably stable over the centuries). To imply that such animosity exists is misleading to the casual reader. In fact (Ost)Frieslanders are quite peaceful and introspective; if one side felt "ignored" by outsiders, they are probably happier for it and quite willing to return the favour. Istvan 20:56, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Frisians, in the Netherlands, do not speak Low Saxon, they speak (West) Frisian. Also, there are no Frisians directly on the West of the Ems river, what you mean are people from Groningen; who speak Low Saxon and thus should have little problem with talking to the Germans on the other side of the river. I can understand the confusion though, given East Frisian Low Saxon in Germany, but please remember that in the Netherlands the Frisian language is flourishing rather than dieing (as I understand is the case of East Frisian).
Rex 21:05, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

The rewrite did not address (nor alter) the nomenclature question, i.e. "Low German" vs. "Low Saxon" but were purely to remove POV. As edited (pre-revert) it correctly illustrated the linguistic affinity on either side of the German-Dutch border. As it stands (reverted), the passage misleads a visiting reader into inferring some type of animosity that hasnt really existed for a couple of decades (outside of sport and beer rivalries). If someone else agrees then please edit or change it back - I will leave it alone. Istvan 22:01, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Frisians in the Netherlands don't speak Low Saxon/Low German (synonyms in English) they speak Frisian, if East Frisians speak Low German then, there is no dialect continuum and they cannot understand eachother.Period.
Rex 14:36, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

But they can. Istvan 03:31, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Your definition of "they" is flawed. "They" are people from Groningen, not Frisians.
Rex 10:25, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Is it certain that Frisian (not East Frisian Low German) is so markedly different from its neighbour varieties? Just wondering. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 13:46, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
It's different enough that, tho I can read Neddersassisch no matter where along the coast it comes from, I struggle in vain to read Frisian. Like Niederfrankisch, Fries/Frysk is a separate language. Related, yes, but different.
What I seem to see in this discussion is people apparently assuming that customary or political geographic names (Ostfriesland, Land Niedersachsen) somehow map onto the languages with similar names. But I question whether it ever worked that way; it certainly doesn't now. (I find it particularly ironic that Land Niedersachsen came into being only in 1946, a time when the Neddersassische language was officially deprecated as well as misnamed.) Katzenjammer 12:08, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, it (West Frisian) bears some resemblance to Dutch, but that's mostly because they've based new words/terms (+mid 19th century) on the Dutch versions. I know from my own experience that when listening to Frisian radio I could pick up most nouns (many based on Dutch) but that it generally was wasted on me. I've heard of a dialect continuum between Dutch (specifically hollandic) and West Frisian during until about the 1550 but that it was gone by the 18th century (probably because of the influences of southern Dutch speakers) I also know from my -distant/older- family in Groningen (Original research I know) that they can (although they claim it gets more difficult every year) communicate rather easily with the Germans across the border ... they don't understand frisians though. Rex 15:56, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

False edits by User:Ulritz.

User:Ulritz has recently removed information from this article, this information will shortly be restorted. Edit summaries by user:Ulritz are total nonsense. In his last summary he refers to the Dutch wikipedia proving his point, while it does the exact opposite. Rex 15:08, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Het Nederduits bestaat uit de Noord-Westgermaanse dialecten die niet hebben deelgenomen aan de Hoogduitse klankverschuiving en de ingveoonse klankverschuivingen.

De verzamelnaam Nederduits verwijst naar een aantal dialectgroepen:

How long are you going to force people to do your cheap bidding? Ulritz 15:46, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

HERE! FROM THE DUTCH WIKIPEDIA FROM THE SAME PAGE, (YOUR QUOTATION PROVES NOTHING) :

Het begrip Nederduits als benaming voor een moderne taal of talen heeft nogal uiteenlopende betekenissen. De belgische taalwetenschapper Jan Goossens telt zo'n tien verschillende betekenissen.

Rex 16:04, 11 October 2006 (UTC)


Alright, cool it guys. Ulritz: "Cheap bidding"??? C'mon! --Doric Loon 20:13, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I do not quite understand what seems to be the problem here, except from obvious personal dislikes. Could someone kindly explain? However, I've been told that it is possible to discuss linguistic matters in a civilised manner. Unoffensive text or character 08:44, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

The problem is whether to call that thing Low German or Low Saxon and what to include in this concept. By the way, on the German wikipedia at de:Diskussion:Niederländische Sprache, there is a discussion concerning the scope of the concept Niederdeutsch or – more generally speaking – the entire genealogical classification of the (West-)Germanic languages. It is criticized that it's a remnant of 19th century linguistics that there was a Westgermanic branch that split off into Protogerman and Anglosaxon, and that subsequently Protogerman split off into High German and Low German. It is said that view has been no longer supported for more than fifty years – except on Wikipedia which in this respect takes a strangely anachronistic point of view. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 09:14, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

The point here is that a German nationalist, who at the same time is a linguistic layman ,is ruining (good) articles.

He (of course) emphasises the "closeness" (WP:WEASEL) of the continental Non-High German languages. Although I doubt he's ever heard either Low Saxon or Dutch let alone Frisian> And he also denies that in the broadest sense Low German includes/ded the Anglo-Frisian languages as well. Rex 12:30, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Please enlighten me as to the root of the problem:
  • Are they not close?
  • Anglo-Frisian is distinguished from Low German by the Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law and a palatization of k into ch, true?
  • Jmach, the discussion you brought up is between you and a large opposition, you going as far as to accuse your opponents of "sabotage" and "patent vandalism" (for the record).
  • Not supported for more than 50 years? By mainstream linguits? Provide but one English source so we can verify your views.
  • "He (of course) emphasizes the "closeness" (WP:WEASEL) of the continental Non-High German languages." Again, misrepresentation of my arguments to set up a cheap strawman. Frisian in fact is not closely related.
  • I wont even respond to the surge of ad hominem attacks Ive been forced to bear for the past few days.

As far as I see it, all this mumbo jumbo about historical linguistics is revolving around the fact that the Dutch resent the term "Low German languages", which might be unfortunate, but stems from the fact of their close affinity (Dutch/Deutsch dilemma).

Ulritz 13:18, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

You know why you see it like that? Because you're hate for everything that is Dutch, and me in particular, blinds you for the truth. Go home with your sick theories and come back with references and sources to support your views. This is a encyclopedia ffs.
Rex 13:42, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
Wow, cool down, please, and have a look at Wikipedia:Wikiquette. I agree with Ulritz that Frisian should not be included within Low German. That is the normal point of view in linguistics, compare for instance: "Was das Friesische angeht, so wird dieses in der Forschung auf Grund der sprachgeschichtlichen Entwicklungen stets als eigenständige Sprache außerhalb des Deutschen und des Niederländischen behandelt." (My translation: 'With respect to Frisian: Because of historical linguistical developments, it is always treated as a separate language outside of German and Netherlands.') From: Hermann Niebaum/Jürgen Macha (2006): Einführung in die Dialektologie des Deutschen, 2., neubearbeitete Auflage, Tübingen: Niemeyer, p. 219. If there is the point of view that Frisian may be included with Low German or Netherlands, then we should be careful to quote sources for it because it seems to be a very unusual point of view. As long as we lack such sources, we should not mention it. That's how I see it.
I certainly agree that we should use the term Low German and not Low Saxon (except maybe in relation with Dutch Low Saxon), as Doric Loon and pfold have shown that this is the normal term in English linguistics. I have seen that the term Low Saxon is still used to some extent, so I have begun to replace it by Low German.
The discussion I alluded that is taking place in the German wikipedia has no immediate connection whatsoever with this discussion, so I shouldn't have mentioned it. As for English sources for the position that the genetic classification "West Germanic --> Protogerman + Anglofrisian, Protogerman --> Low German + High German" is outdated, I'm sorry I can't provide any, though the source adduced by pfold above (in edit [9]) uses exactly the same more recent classification like the sources that have been adduced in the discussion on the German wikipedia. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 15:14, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
I'd suggest that the status of "Low German" as "the normal term in English" has the same political basis is the (now discredited) notion that Scots is a dialect of English (and that Ukrainian is a dialect of Russian). The fact is that both Scots and English arose from a common root. That southern English won the political sweepie should have nothing at all to do with recognising that Scots and English have equal standing as languages. The acceptance of "Low German" has a similarly political origin, and should be similarly discarded. "Low Germanic to group the various related languages, if you like, but not "Low German". That's politics. Katzenjammer 12:53, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Of course the term is somewhat outdated, I believe it was greatly used by the Germanophiles during the Viking revival but I have seen the term used this way (note: Never without an outdated notice in modern works)Rex 15:39, 13 October 2006 (UTC)


Introduction: Until 50 years ago, the following theory was common in historical linguistics: Proto Germanic split into North, East, and West Germanic. Then West Germanic split into "Anglo-Frisian" and "Proto German" (sometimes even called "German"). When the High German sound shift occured, "Proto German" fell apart into High German and Low German, and those split into dialects again.

Herbert L. Kufner writes about this subject:

Around the turn of the century a reasonable degree of agreement seemed to have been reached. WGmc., comprising later English, Frisian, Netherlandic (Dutch-Flemish), and German was assumed to have as its counterparts a NGmc. and EGmc., and the main areas of disagreement centered around the closeness of relationship between the latter two. Shortly thereafter doubts about the validity of the WGmc. theory began to emerge which culminated in the total rejection of a WGmc. unity. The scholarship of the forties and fifties has proposed various alternate possibilities for grouping the Gmc. languages. (p. 72)
It has become obvious that the dual assumptions of a rectilinear Stammbaum-scheme and a clean tripartite split have been unable to cope with the existence of mutually exclusive isoglosses, e.g. the Verschärfung connecting NGmc. and EGmc., the rhotacism connecting NGmc. and WGmc., the 3 sg. masc. pronoun (Go. is, ina; OHG er, inan) connecting EGmc. and WGmc. The abstract visualisation of a uniform proto-language which neatly divided into three daughter languages without further contact and mutual influences had to be abandoned.
Leaving Maurer’s view of a special relationship between Nordic and Alemannic, present scholarship can be summarized under four headings:
(1) Scholars adhering to the traditional tripartite division: Examples: Krause 1953; 21956; Mossé 1956
(2) Scholars who assume a first division into North(east) and South(west). Examples: Karsten 1928; Schwarz 1951 and 1956; Rosenfeld 1956; Zhirmunskij 1964 and 1965; Lehmann 1966. Rösel (1962) belongs to this group although he includes the precursor of OE with North(east) Gmc.
(3) Scholars who assume a first division into EGmc. and NWGmc. Examples: Kuhn 1955 and 1965; Adamus 1962; Antonsen 1962; Makaev 1965.
(4) Scholars who find that our present knowledge and methods do not suffice to solve the problems of the Gmc. Ausgliederung. Examples: van Coetsem 1970; Marchand 1970. (p. 94)

Herbert L. Kufner, The Grouping and Separation of the Germanic Languages, pages 72 and 94; in: Toward a Grammar of Proto-Germanic, edited by Frans van Coetsem and Herbert L. Kufner, Tübingen 1972, Max Niemeyer Verlag, pages 71 - 97

I have some more sources that reject this tripartite division but they are in Dutch or German. Nevertheless, I hope that helps. --MaEr 17:56, 14 October 2006 (UTC)


Hey, that is a REALLY USEFUL passage, MaEr. Thanks so much. I have argued many times that the division High/Low German is much less distinctive than people looking for easy solutions make it out to be, and that the continuities over that boundary mean that a stemma showing the High German consonant shift (important as it is) as the splitting-off point of separate branches does not do justice to the complexity of the situation. Wikipedia language articles seem obsessed sometimes with tree diagrams as a means of classification, but serious linguists are highly sceptical about these. We need to hear more of this sort of scholarship, and Kufner's history of it is very useful. Do give us more, and BTW, do not hesitate to cite in Dutch or German: anyone working on this article ought to be able to read those. --Doric Loon 21:28, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
I wholeheartedly agree: Please don't hesitate to add Netherlands or German sources to any article. For sure, an article with an English source is better than an article with a foreign source, but then, an article with a foreign source is certainly still better than an article with no source at all! ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 07:21, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
I think there's a good case for having a separate page on the grouping of the Gmc languages where this stuff can be dealt with in more detail. --Pfold 11:26, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
I just created a sub-page User:MaEr/Germanic languages with some citations about the grouping question. Maybe this is what you wanted. I left the Ingvaeonic question aside because I don't know much about it and I don't know how important it is nowadays. But I do have a book lying around, by C.B. van Haeringen, Netherlandic Language Research, Leiden 1960. This has a chapter about the Ingvaeonic discussion until 1960. And there are some remarks by Bach.
I picked the Kufner article because a user explicitely asked for a source in English. I don't know why he did so. --MaEr 14:46, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Politics, Politics

I'm sure I shouldn't be, but I'm astonished at the amount of politics and misunderstanding around this issue.

The Neddersassishe language is called "Low German" in English on exactly the same basis that the language of Lancaster County Pennsylvania is called "Dutch". Namely: ignorance and meta-ignorance. People call it "Low German" because it never occurs to them that it might not be the best term, nor would most of them care if the point were made to them. "It's good enough. Everybody knows what I mean."

It seems to me that perpetuating slovenliness is not something an encyclopedia should aim at, however.

So I suggest that the article should be "Low Saxon (Neddersassisch, Platt)", with "Low German", "Plattdeutsch", "Plautdietsch", "Missingsch", et al. pointing to it.

Low Franconian/Niederfrankisch is a different language and should have a separate entry. To me, the two languages are as far apart as German and Dutch (I can just about puzzle out the Solingen flavor of Niederfrankisch, but only if I'm given a running start and a following wind). Katzenjammer 21:53, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

I suggested it, but it doesn't get that much support. In Dutch linguistics, Low German is a pure linguistic term for the languages unaffected by the High German consonant shift. What's listed as Low German here is called Low Saxon.Rex 21:59, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
Our personal opinion of the article or its name does not matter at all. What matters is how it's described in the relevant literature, in this case, in English linguistics. As you can easily observe in the relevant literature cited in this article and on this talk page, the usual point of view in English linguistics is to speak of Low German (that doesn't include Low Franconian). If you know relevant sources that have another point of view, please provide them – it can only improve the article. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 15:00, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Names for things aren't cast in stone, you know. Defending a clearly-incorrect status quo merely because it's the status quo is neither praiseworthy nor good scholarship. Consider, for a moment, the poor science exposed in The Mismeasure of Man. Simply because nobody had contradicted it while it enjoyed a classist currency didn't mean it was good science. Should every encyclopedia compiler have put their brains on the shelf and jumped off the bad-science cliff merely because others were doing it? Katzenjammer 15:41, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not the place to promote a point of view that disagrees with the relevant sources. A promotion of such a point of view is called original research and Wikipedia's official policy is Wikipedia:No original research. Of course, if your point is supported by relevant sources (see Wikipedia:Reliable sources), then it isn't original research. So where are your relevant sources? ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 16:18, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Now now now, I believe it's accepted that Low Saxon and Low German are synonyms in linguistics.Rex 18:35, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

You're free to believe whatever you want. You're not free to put whatever you believe in a wikipedia article. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 01:15, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

So you disagree that Low Saxon and Low German (in the sense of the article here) are not synonyms? Rex 09:26, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand your question. Whether I agree or not doesn't have any imporance. This is not a matter of personal opinion, but of verifiable linguistic publications. In these publications, Low German seems to be more common than Low Saxon. Low Saxon is sometimes used synonymously to Low German, sometimes to West Low German, sometimes to Northern Low Saxon. ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 15:02, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Look all I'm seeing is a "problem" which has been going on for months now, currently we lack a separate article on Low German in the sense of "Germanic languages lacking the SGCS/HGCS" and I think it could be solved easily by moving this article to Low Saxon. I really don't see considering all the things that have been tried (From Low Germanic to Low Saxon-Low Franconian) why this should be such a problem. I think we should really reconsider what our publications say (since most are in German/Dutch anyway) because I have never encountered any publication (well, with the possible exception of T.Venneman) who do not treat Low German in the sense described above, heck even the Dutch and German wikipedias don't. Rex 16:04, 22 October 2006 (UTC)


But I don't think we WANT an article on Low German in the sense of "Germanic languages lacking the SGCS/HGCS". That presupposes a classification of the languages which is controversial and I suspect completely outdated. What WOULD be good, and somebody suggested it further up, is an article on different theories for classifying Germanic languages. There you could write to your heart's content about how "Germanic languages lacking the SGCS/HGCS" MIGHT be a classification which some people may find useful, and how "Low German" MIGHT be a good term for it - though "Low German(ic) Languages" would be better. But I doubt if there is any such thing and I rather resent the way what I call the "Wikipedia tree mentality" is trying to force us into thinking in this category. --Doric Loon 17:19, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Please don't hide these publications from you fellow wikipedians, but point them out, author, title, place, publisher, year and page. Only like this, wikipedia articles can benefit from them. The reason why there is no longer an article about ‘West Germanic languages that have not taken part in the High German consonant shift except for þ → d and that have not taken part in the Anglofrisian consonant shifts’ is that according to the relevant sources that have been pointed out, this concept is no longer used in current linguistics. Please don't hesitate to point out your other sources. On the German wikipedia, by the way, we're trying to take into account the current linguistics by abolishing the classification of Dutch/Low Franconian as 'Low German' (if you're interested in German linguistic sources on the matter, I'd strongly recommend to have a look at de:Diskussion:Niederdeutsche Sprachen#Zusammenlegung von "Niederdeutsche Sprachen" und "Plattdeutsch" unter dem Titel "Niederdeutsche Sprache"). ― j. 'mach' wust | ⚖ 17:58, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me? No longer used in current linguistics?! When did this happen? Yesterday? :-) Rex 19:02, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Well then maybe we ought to expand the High German consonant shift article?Rex 20:31, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Don't think so. High German consonant shift is about a historical linguistic event, and it's a great article precisely because it deals with that one event better than any other single publication I know. It would be a terrible shame to clutter it with theories like these. No, the place for this is in an article about classification hypotheses. --Doric Loon 20:35, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

But surely we have to have something on the matter ...

Rex 20:37, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Hanseatic League - Plattdeutsch

This is merely a comment from living experience. My grandfather was born in Lübeck 1878, and lived in Travemünde on the Baltic coast downstream from Lübeck most of his life. He did not learn any other language than his native German, but spoke the local Plattdeutsch. He told me, that he could speak to any sailor of other Baltic sea countries in a kind of Plattdeutsch and understand what they said. It appears that sailors of these countries still used this way of communicating between the World Wars. As an aside, his wife, my grandmother was born in Schlutup near Lübeck in 1881, with her forbears being fishermen. I would listen to her speaking Plattdeutsch with local Fishermen, and being from Berlin, I couldn't understand a word. She could distinguish the Dialect of people from one village from those in a neighbouring village. That distinction is now completely eroded.

Please explain what "low" means in "Low German"

how about an explanation of why it is called "low" german, and what low refers to. that was why i looked at this article, and i was not given any love here.

It's explained in the first paragraph. Do you think it needs further explanation? -- j. 'mach' wust ☞ ☏ 09:08, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Oh, it was you who added that information; thanks! -- j. 'mach' wust ☞ ☏ 09:09, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Why were the names Nedderdüütsch and Nedersaksisch removed?

I don't see any reason why it can't list more than one name.. I'm sure it differs by region

--Godtvisken 01:07, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

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