Talk:Low German/Archive 3

Language Criteria
What none of you are answering is the obvious failure of the criteria given on the page (from Goossens?) to handle real languages outside of the political arena. So Sorbian is a dialect of German? So Gaelic is a dialect of English? You can't just sweep these examples aside; they prove the criteria wrong. OldTownAdge (talk) 00:11, 27 February 2008 (UTC)


 * But those linguists were aware of this flaw and added the idea of diasystem to keep their nation based world view. Dutch, German, Yiddish and Low German form one diasystem cause looking at the dialects there are no abrupt borders. There are borders, often clearly noticeable, but you always can adapt your own speech to that one of the neighboring areas without learning the language from scratch. Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian and all those non-nation-state Romance languages for example too are one diasystem. If it's in one diasystem and it's no own standard language, it's only a dialect of the Dachsprache.
 * Well, my personal point of view is this: The linguists do this to delimit their claims. Science was always a thing of national prestige. So German scientists don't want Dutch scientists in their territory and vice versa. Research in Germany has to be conducted in German and research in the Netherlands in Dutch. If Germans would admit, that the dialect of the area around Cologne is more related to Dutch or if the Dutch would admit, that the dialect in the Northeast is more related to the dialect in Northern Germany this could mean, that the "others" would touch "their" research field. So its just the territorial behaviour of the scientists. Staking claims. --:Slomox:: &gt;&lt; 16:41, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Quite true: the linguists are a bunch of territorial bastards, whose opinions don't fit well into Wikipedia. But this is not restricted to linguists, but also to astronomers, if you remember the Pluto controversy, and some similar conflict about the recent definition of Quaternary, where the definition regarded territorial interests of two different genres of scientists. I propose the text of Relation to German and Dutch is rewritten according to the pattern of [|Dialect#"Dialect"_or_"language"]. Otherwise "Dialect" vs. "Language" is something regarding neurology, not linguistics. When an average speaker of two idioms need a certain effort to switch mode, then it is separate languages. ... said: Rursus ( m bork³ ) 06:56, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

-- Off course Low German and Dutch are historically the same language that did not develop into a single modern language with a uniform grammar ..., simply because of political reasons. Why does in the Wilhelmus, the national anthem of the Netherlands, the text say: "Wilhelmus van Nassouwe, ben ik van Duitschen bloed..."? Why are the schools in the 17th century in Brabant called "Duitse scholen" ? The most important political and economic variant of Duits/Duutsch/Deutsch until 1700 was this Low German Language, that was called Duitsch in Brabant. Of course Duits is the same word as Deutsch, meaning language spoken by the people contrary to Latin of French... This language was more important than the language of the people from High Germany who were called Hoogduitschers... After 1700 and after the disentegration of the Hanseatic League and with the spread of Mercantilist, bureaucratic economic policy the High German Language became the official language of Germany and Dutch the official Language in Holland and later the Flemish Region in Belgium after a lot of political turmoil - which is actually continuing to this day in the Brussels region ! This linguistic typology by Goossens is valueless from an historic point of view. In my view I think it is sad that so little is known about the history of the Low German Languages in Holland, Flanders, Northern Germany, South Africa ... Low German was around 1700 a world language and the network of civilians that talked this language made a world power. This network not only founded cities as New York, but also pushed world history in another direction. This is my view from an historian from near Antwerp in Flanders. --Cambrinus (talk) 18:31, 11 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Goossens uses two criteria: one criterion is the presence of a linguistic continuum, the other criterion is presence of a standard language. Goossens does not call Low German a language because there is no Low German standard language and no clear linguistic border (in the South). He would call Sorbian a language (not a German dialect) because there is no linguistic continuum between Sorbian and the surrounding dialects. The same applies to Gaelic in England. --MaEr (talk) 18:22, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Dialect or separate language?
Apparently it is necessary that we discuss the question of whether Low German is considered a dialect of German or a separate language. I changed the wording of the section "Official status" of this article to say:


 * ''Low German is considered a dialect of the German language by some, but a separate language by others.

This was changed so that it now doesn't really mention the "dialect option." dllu contacted me on my talk page, and I'll respond here because I think this is the best place for this discussion. He wrote:


 * ''Just because the definition as a separate language isn't accepted by you, doesn't mean it's not "universally accepted". Any linguist will tell you that it is indeed considered a separate language. If you have any references suggesting otherwise, feel free to share them with the rest of us in the discussion [...]

I shall do this happily, but the sources I can immediately find are all in (High) German; I have to ask for your understanding. A good reference, I believe, is Sachsensprache – Hansesprache – Plattdeutsch by Prof. Willy Sanders, who is a linguist and indeed an established German scholar of Low German, following Gerhard Cordes at the University of Kiel in 1974. The book is scientific, but the tone is not overly scholarly. He writes (I'll give an English summary below):


 * '''Niederdeutsch – Sprache oder Mundart(en)?


 * Gelegentlich ist die Rede gewesen von dem "beliebten Spiel, das da heißt 'Niederdeutsch. Sprache oder Mundart?' – und das immer dann gespielt wird, wenn man Kriterien für ein eprinzipielle Wertung des bedrohten Niederdeutschen zu erlangen hofft" (Schuppenhauer 1969, 3). Allerdings sollte es dabei weniger um einen bloß terminologischen Streit als vielmehr die sachliche Abklärung dieses umstrittenen Tatbestandes gehen.


 * In seinem Versuch einer exakten Definition des Begriffs 'niederdeutsche Sprache' kommt J. Goossens zu folgendem Resümee hinsichtlich der wissenschaftlichen Behandlung des Niederdeutschen: "Innerhalb der Gruppe der germanischen Sprachwissenschaften ist die niederdeutsche eine selbständige Disziplin, insofern sie als das Studium des als niederdeutsche Sprache zu verstehenden Diasystems aufgefaßt wird, das heißt des As. und Mnd. Die Untersuchung der modernen nd. Mundarten dagegen ist keine eigene Disziplin, sondern vielmehr eine nicht genau zu umgrenzende Unterabteilung der deutschen Sprachwissenschaft" (Goossens 1974, 27). Unübersehbar, zumal für den Nichtlinguisten wohl paradox anmutend, trtt hier der klare Bruch in der historischen Kontinuität des Niederdeutschen zutage: daß die Sprachperioden des Alt- und Mittelniederdeutschen sprachtheoretisch einen anderen Status haben sollen als die plattdeutschen Mundarten der Gegenwart. Vor einer ungerechtfertigten Überbewertung dieses Faktums warnen indes durchaus verleichbare Fälle sprachgeschichtlicher Entwicklung, in denen ursprünglich selbständige Sprachen zu Mundarten abgesunken, umgekehrt aber auch Mundarten zu selbständigen Sprachen aufgestiegen sind.


 * '''Sprachdefinitorische Argumente


 * Als Grundlage der Definition dient das linguistische Konzept des 'Diasystems'; darunter versteht man eine Zusammensetzung "aus den Elementen einer Reihe von Kommunikationssystemen …, die alle in einer Formel untergebracht werden können, weil jedes dieser Systeme fundamentale Übereinstimmungen mit jedem einzelnen anderen System aufzeigt, aber in bestimmten Punkten von ihm abweicht" (Goossens 1973, 10). Die prinzipiellen Übereinstimmungen sind notwendig, weil erst sie die Zusammenfasusng mehrerer Systeme rechtfertigen und ermöglichen. Die Unterschiede in Einzelheiten sind ebenfalls erforderlich, weil sich sonst nur ein einzelnes System, kein Diasystem ergäbe.


 * Sprache als Diasystem bedeutet demzufolge das Inbeziehungsetzen diachronischer (zeitgebundener), diatopischer (raumgebundener) und diastratischer (sozialschichtgebundener) Sprachvarietäten. Selbstverständlich können diese Beziehungen nicht beliebig sein, sondern sie bedürfen einer definitorischen Festlegung. Goossens (1973, 11f.) nennt als Abgrenzungskriterien


 * (1) das "Kriterium der Überdachung" durch eine Kultursprache, die zugleich eines der zum Diasystem gehörenden Systeme ist;


 * (2) das "Kriterium der Bruchstelle der Sprachlandschaft".


 * Wie das erste Kriterium die Existenz einer regulären Hoch- und Schriftsprache voraussetzt, so beruht das zweite – positiv formuliert – auf der Bedingung der Verwandtschaft, insofern sich eben nur verwandte und darum weitgehend übereinstimmende Sprachsysteme in einem Diasystem vereinigen lassen.


 * Hinsichtlich der Beurteilung des Niederdeutschen führen diese Gesichtspunkte zu folgendem Ergebnis: Kriterium (1) ist auf das Niederdeutsche nicht anwendbar, da es eine niederdeutsche Hochsprache der Gegenwart nicht gibt; wohl aber hat es "eine mnd. Schreibsprache gegeben, die als überdachendes Moment fungierte", und auch das "Konglomerat der as. Dialekte enthielt exklusiv nd. Merkmale". Kriterium (2) ist auf das Alt- und Mittelniederdeutsche nicht sinnvoll anwendbar, dagegen im Hinblick auf das Neuniederdeutsche unverzichtbar; es "erlaubt jedoch keine Defintion des Nnd. als Sprache, sondern nur als Sprachlandschaft im deutschen Sprachgebiet" (Goossens 1973, 13ff., 21ff.). Erläuternd wäre dem hinzuzufügen, daß zwar das Alt- und Mittelniederdeutsche sicher nicht als Hoch- und Schriftsprachen im modernen Sinne gelten können, doch hat die sprachraumbildende Kraft des Sachsentums im einen, der Hanse im anderen Falle zweifellos eine ähnlich integrierende Wirkung ausgeübt. Viel schwieriger erscheint eine angemessene Beurteilung des Neuniederdeutschen.


 * […]


 * '''Sprachfunktionale Gesichtspunkte


 * Als vollgültige, zweifelsfrei anerkannte Sprachen können im Bereich der uns naheliegenden westeuropäischen Kultursprachen nach allgemein akzeptierter Auffassung etwa das Englische, Französische, Dänische usw. gelten. Fragt man, warum das so ist, lassen sich übereinstimmend als ihre wichtigsten Eigenschaften angeben, die zu den sprachdefinitorischen Kriterien (1) und (2) hinzutreten:


 * (3) offizizelle und generelle Gültigkeit;
 * (4) Einheitlichkeit im Sinne einer Normierung;
 * (5) kommunikative Komplettheit.


 * Damit sind eine Reihe weiterer Aspekte sprachfunktioneller Art genannt, die für oder gegen echten Sprachcharakter des Niederdeutschen geltend gemacht werden können.


 * Das Niederdeutsche in seiner heutigen Gebrauchsweise erfüllt keine der drei Bedingungen. Es ist weder die offizielle Sprache in Behörden- und Geschäftsverkehr, Schule, Kirche usw. noch in Presse, Rundfunk und Fernsehen. Es gilt auch keineswegs generell in Norddeutschland, sondern wird dort nur von einem regional sehr unterschiedlich großen Prozentsatz der Bevölkerung gesprochen und verstanden. Ganz abgesehen vom Fehlen jeglicher Normierung, die über wenig erfolreiche Versuche zur Einführung einer geregelten Rechtschreibung nie hinausgekommen ist, erschöpft sich die Einheitlichkeit des Niederdeutschen bisweilen an der jeweiligen Ortsgrenze. Für die Mundartsprecher kann hüben und drüben schon ein "anderes" Platt gelten, und daß die weiträumigeren Unterschiede etwa zwischen Westfälisch, Ostfriesisch, Holsteinisch usw. gravierend sind, weiß man ohnehin. Schließlich weist auch die "kommunikative Komplettheit", nämlich die Fähigkeit, von der Thematik her mit den eigenen sprachlichen Mitteln alles auszudrücken, im Niederdeutschen ein beträchtliches Defizit auf; das ist eine ständige Erfahrung jedes Mundartsprechers, der sich nur allzu oft gezwungen sieht, vor allem bei intellektuell oder technisch anspruchsvollen Sachverhalten das Hochdeutsche zu Hilfe zu nehmen. All diese Restriktionen betreffen ganz besonders den schriftlichen Gebrauch; denn das heutige Niederdeutsch lebt, außerhalb des Sonderbereichs literarischer Verwendung, eben nur in gesprochener Form.


 * Die Sprachwissenschaft hat längst ihre Schlußfolgerungen aus den bekannten Fakten gezogen. Dem historischen Niederdeutschen – in einer runden Jahreszahl: vor 1600 – kommt ein durchaus eigenständiger, auf sächsischer Stammesgrundlage erwachsener Sprachcharakter zu, der es in eine Reihe mit anderen germanischen Sprachen wie dem älteren Englischen, Friesischen, Niederländischen usw. stellt. Gleich diesen sind das Alt- und Mittelniederdeutsche folglich legitimer Gegenstand der Sprachgeschichtsforschung; wir verfügen also über eine eigene, niederdeutsche Sprachgeschichte. Die ursprüngliche Unabhängigkeit geht indes mit dem Untergang der mittelniederdeutschen Schreibsprache und der Übernahme des Hochdeutschen verloren. Damit kommt es in Norddeutschland zu dem großen Bruch: Sprache - Mundarten, insofern dort seither Niederdeutsch nurmehr in der Form der modernen Mundarten existiert. Ihre Behandlung fällt demgemäß in das Sachgebiet der Dialektologie, wo sie – neben den hochdeutschen Dialekten – ein Spezialgebit innerhalb der deutschen Dialekte darstellen.

The quoted works are:


 * J. Goossens: Niederdeutsche Sprache. Versuch einer Defintion, in: Ders. (Hg.), Niederdeutsch. Sprache und Literatur, I, Neumünster 1973, S. 9-27
 * C. Schuppenhauer, Niederdeutsche Literatur und niederdeutsche Literaturgeschichte, Quickborn 59 (1969), 1-21.

And the citation for Sanders is:


 * W. Sanders: Sachsensprache – Hansesprache – Plattdeutsch. Sprachgeschichtliche Grundzüge des Niederdeutschen, Göttingen 1982

To summarise in English: Old and Middle Low German may be considered independent languages, but New Low German does not fit the criteria that can be established for determining whether a "diasystem" is an independent language or not. Sanders mostly follows the arguments of Prof. Goossens here, but the stance is not a private theory of him and Goossens, but rather accepted by linguists in general (or so he asserts).

I should also quote from Goossens directly, but my time was limited, so I was only able to jot down a few excerpts, which I chose because they were so unambiguous:


 * Das Nnd. ist also nicht als eine Sprache, sondern als eine Gruppe von Dialekten im dt. Sprachgebiet zu verstehen, wobei unklar bleibt, wie dieses Dialektgebiet im einzelnen abzugrenzen ist.

In English:


 * ''Thus, New Low German cannot be understood as a language, but as a group of dialects in the area of the German language, though it remains unclear how to delimit this area of dialects precisely.

Furthermore:


 * Wenn wir die Gesamtheit der heutigen nd. Dialekte nicht als eine Sprache betrachten können, so müssen wir doch feststellen, daß man in bestimmten Kreisen immer noch glaubt, das Nd. sei eine Sprache. Dieser Glaube beruht auf der Erinnerung an die alte "Eigensprachlichkeit". Heeroma hat ihn als "niederdeutschen Sprachmythos" charakterisiert. Dieser Mythos, so schreibt er, möge das Nd. "sprachsoziologisch" zu etwa mehr als einer "deutschen Mundart" machen, dieses "mehr" ist nicht so einfach zu formulieren und scheint auf jeden Fall nicht genug zu sein, um es zu einer Sprache, zu der östlichen Nachbarsprache des Niederländischen zu machen. […] Wir können also sagen, daß der Sprachwille in Norddeutschland seit der Romantik nicht groß genug gewesen ist, um eine Norm entstehen zu lassen mit einer Funktion, durch die das Nd. über die gesprochenen Dialekte hinaus zu mehr als einer Sammlung von "Literaturmundarten", nämlich zu einer Sprache wurde.

In English:


 * Even as we cannot view the entirety of contemporary Low German dialects as a language, we still have to observe that in certain circles the belief still exists that Low German is a language. This belief is caused by memories of the old "language independence" Heeroma characterised it as the "Low German language myth." This myth, he writes, may make Low German something more than a "German dialect" by way of "language sociology"; this "more" isn't easy to phrase and in any case appears to be insufficient to make it a language, to make it the'' Eastern neighbouring language of Dutch. […] So we can state that the will to language in Northern Germany since the age of Romanticism has not been great enough to let a standard arise that would make Low German, rising above the spoken dialects, more than a collection of "literature dialects," that is to say, a language.

I think in light of this we can easily dismiss the claim that "any linguist will tell me that it is indeed considered a separate language." On the contrary, it would appear linguistics come out in clear support of the "dialect" position. I feel my original phrasing was justified, and can be restored, but it might be worthwhile to elaborate on the point. Specifically, it should be made clear that Old and Middle Low German had a greater independence from German and can be considered separate languages even by people who would not ascribe the same status to New Low German. Furthermore I noticed that Goossens made a clear distinction between the Low German variants spoken in Germany and those spoken in the Netherlands, and I'm not sure at the moment how that should affect my understanding of his position. I don't have an immediate idea for a proper wording, but then I don't have to do all the work, do I? ;) --SKopp 21:42, 7 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I've now changed the article. --SKopp 09:28, 8 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Many thanks, SKopp, for this very interesting and useful citation. As a general comment, I would say that linguists usually don't get too worked up about this question, and I am not sure linguistic science takes it seriously to have worked out a univerally accepted definition of the distinction between language and dialect.  It is more a political and an identity question which gets very emotional and often becomes rather silly, and linguists are usually watching bemused from the sidelines.  As a Scot in Bavaria I see the same arguments about Scots and Bavarian, and I have to smile.  All these language varieties are precious, but that doesn't make me want to categorise Allemanic or Yorkshire English as languages just to make the point. --Doric Loon 12:14, 8 May 2007 (UTC)


 * That's my impression as well. The first book I looked up was Cordes' and Möhn's Handbuch zur niederdeutschen Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft (Berlin 1983), but browsing through its pages I didn't find any explicit mention of this issue; the terms "Sprache," "Mundart," and "Dialekt" get thrown around a lot, but apparently without any need to establish a clear distinction. It doesn't affect the study of the language or the literature. --SKopp 16:39, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, I don't want to begin a discussion about the status of Low German, but I also read these books and the arguments given by Goossens and Sanders are also very unclear. First of all, Sanders refers to Goossens' work so I won't mention him further. If you read Goossens' definition you will find that it can only be used for Low German/High German. It's somewhat to specific. Furthermore it neglects historical and some linguistic critera. Just let me give you an example: if you take this definition by heart you might want to classify Frisian as a German dialect. You could also say the German dialects spoken in France could be French dialects. Goosens only refers to sociological aspects:


 * (3) offizielle und generelle Gültigkeit;
 * (4) Einheitlichkeit im Sinne einer Normierung;
 * (5) kommunikative Komplettheit.

I try to translate these points into English (hope, it's not too bad though): (3) official and general validity, (4) standardization (5) communicative completeness (i. e. one can use it for almost every topic in science, culture etc.). Goossens argues that Low German does not fulfil any of these criteria. Let's go back to history. In the Middle Ages none of our western languages fulfilled all these criteria but they are considered to be languages. But if you read de Saussure you can neglect that, so do I. There are at least two other languages that are spoken in Germany today: Frisian and Sorbian. Both have no general or official validity, standardization or communicative completeness. But even Goossens wouldn't say that these are German dialects. There are other languages, too that don't fit into that scheme. On the other hand Low German has some disctinct characteristics that Goossens and Sanders simply neglect: Low German hasn't undergone the Second consonant shift that only German dialects have (that includes Swiss German, too). The vocabulary of Low German is somewhat different from other German dialects, e g. he (HG er, E: he], töven (HG warten, E: to wait), böten (HG: heizen, E: to heat) or it differs in its meaning such as falsch (bad, HG wrong) or Deern (girl, HG Dirne: whore). Many words are more similar to their Dutch counterparts than to their High German ones. You can say Low German has some similarities to German but also to Dutch, Frisian and English. If you have a close look at Goosens' and Sanders' arguments you won't find references to these points I made. It is certainly unclear how to deal with them. Today Low Germany philology is still arguing about the status of Low German. I just quote some titles: Goossens, Jan (ed.): Niederdeutsch. Sprache und Literatur. Eine Einführung. (literal translation: Low German. Language and Literature. An Introduction.), Stellmacher, Dieter: Niederdeutsche Sprache. (Low German Language). I recommend this page for you: (It's in German, I'm afraid.) It uses the term language (niederdeutsche Sprache) but also quotes Sanders. --89.53.14.103 23:40, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

PS: I just want to answer that question (I forgot, sorry): The first book I looked up was Cordes' and Möhn's Handbuch zur niederdeutschen Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft (Berlin 1983), but browsing through its pages I didn't find any explicit mention of this issue; the terms "Sprache," "Mundart," and "Dialekt" get thrown around a lot, but apparently without any need to establish a clear distinction. There is actually a clear distinction. Low German consists of many dialects, these are named Low German dialects. Low German language refers to all these dialects in general, you can talk about Low German dialects that means you refer to the characteristics of these dialect in detail e. g. "Mecklenburgisch-Vorpommersch", "Northern Low Saxon" etc. If you refer to Low German language you are talking about general charactics that most of these dialects have in common. I just give you an example. The words given above (he, töven etc.) refer to the language Low German. If I talked about the dialects I would have written: he, töven (Northern Low German), hei, täuben (Mecklenburgisch-Vorpommersch). Then I would have compared parts of the Low German language, i. e. two of its dialects. You can also find this distinction here. --89.53.14.103 00:01, 12 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Well of course, we don't actually need to settle this. There are clearly two views, and the job of our article must be to reflect those two views.  What started this debate was that someone wanted to purge one of them and say only the other exits.  That is just not on.
 * I remain a bit sceptical about the separate language business. The argument about some separate vocabulary would apply equally to Swabian and Allemannic and Bavarian, and before you know it, German becomes a series of twenty "languages", which really doesn't help anyone.  These language forms are close and yet different.  From my perspective, the phrase "one language" expresses the closeness, and "many dialects" expresses the differentness.  I don't mind other categorisations, but I don't see really the point in them, and I am especially suspicious of the emotionality behind the argument.
 * The High German Consonant Shift is unhelpful as an argument for a distinct language. The implication is that it marks a sharp boundery which is more than a dialect boundary. The problem, is that it is NOT a sharp boundary.  It is a spectrum, a series of many isoglosses running roughly east to west, some in the north, some in the south, totally fragmenting the language area.  The effect of this shift is precisely what we know as dialect continuum.  --Doric Loon 12:37, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree, both views must be presented but let say something about your arguments. I hope you won't get tired of all that linguistic stuuf I will show here and by the way, sorry for my poor, poor English. SKopp et. al. have brought us some wonderful arguments that vote in favour of dialect. Let me show you some that could be used to vote in favour of language. First of all I want to make absolutely clear that these arguments should only show the other side of view, it's not a vote. In the end I will give a conclusion. It is a spectrum, a series of many isoglosses running roughly east to west, some in the north, some in the south, totally fragmenting the language area. This is simply untrue. There are sharp boundaries, one called the "Benrather Linie" in German. All dialects north of it can be classified as Low German all others are High German dialects. There is no "maken" south of this frontier. Just have look at www.diwa.info and you will find that there is no fragmenting. ''The High German Consonant Shift is unhelpful as an argument for a distinct language. The implication is that it marks a sharp boundery which is more than a dialect boundary.'' But that is the point. Because of this boundaries linguists separate High German from Low German, Dutch, Frisian, and English. I just want to make this absoulutely clear: almost no one in linguistics believes that Low German belongs to the High German dialects because it would be wrong from a more historical view: "Bes. mit der zweiten Lautverschiebung [...] entfernt sich das Hochdeutsche vom Westgermanischen und damit auch vom Niederdeutschen. Kennzeichnend für das Deutsche wird dessen Zweiteilung in Hochdeutsch und Niederdeutsch (Hilkert Weddige: Mittelhochdeutsch. Eine Einführung. I try to translate these sentences into English though is't really bad I guess: Especially through the Second consonant shift High German gets separated from West Germanic and thus from Low German. The separation into High German and Low German becomes characteristical for German.) The main question is whether Low German can be seen as language or just as an independent group of dialects. Then these dialects can be seen as part of the German dialects. In this case German does not mean High German but German in a more general way (cf. Low German and High German). My English is very bad maybe you misunderstood me: I didn't want to vote for one side I just wanted to show that Goossens' arguments are not undisputable. The quoted works are rather old. Wirrer states that Low German is a language because of its linguistic characteristics and the territory. (Jan Wirrer [ed.]: Minderheiten- und Regionalsprachen in Europa). My arguments are not emotional but just linguistic facts and nothing more. I just showed you that Goossens' definfition just focuses on sociolingustic facts. There is one arguement that's left: similarity. It's very popular to separate between dialect and languages by simislartiy but is also very unclear. It is a spectrum, a series of many isoglosses running roughly east to west, some in the north, some in the south, totally fragmenting the language area. Swedish, Danish and Norwegian are very similar. The have lots of isoglosses. But no one would say these are just dialects. The dialect continuum you are talking about is just about north and south but also about east and west. There are many Isoglosses between Dutch and High German, even more between Low German and Dutch: Nummerals personal pronouns

You can see the reference between Dutch, Low German and Englsih. If you take a closer look you will find that Dutch an Low German are very close related to English. But these are just basic words. However the 3rd. person singular is another difference between High German dialects and the other West Germanic languages/dialects. Only High German uses "er". (I could explain why but that would take to much time and doesn't matter.) So let's take a closer look: Phonology If you have a look at five you will find that English, Low German and Dutch have lost the "n" and the vowel (which has changed though) was stretched (sometimes). You can find that in lots of words: zachtjes - sacht - sanft - soft or zeis - Sees (Seis), Sense, scythe or gans - Goos - Gans - goose or süss (LG) - sonst (HG) - else. In High German you have "chs" (pronounced just like "x" in "box"), in LG you don't: wachsen - wassen - to grow, wechseln - wesseln - to change (D: wisselen), Wachs - Wass - wax (D: was) etc. You also have a shift between "f" and "ch" in Dutch, LG an HG, I just take the example from above: zachtje - sacht - sanft - soft. You can see that if you look at "after": achter - achter - hinter (Old High German: after) - after. Another example would be Schacht (LG) and Schaft (HG). Schacht was later brought into High German. Now let me describe some historical developments. The Second German consonant shift is only one example. In the consonant system "d" sometimes changed into "t" in the beginning and the middle of a word in HG, cf.: Tochter (LG: Dochter, D: dochter, E: daughter) or Zeiten (LG Tieden, D: tijden, E: times, but cf. tide). There were also changes in the High German vowel system that the other West Germanic languages/dialects didn't undergo: Germanic "e": LG unchanged, Old HG splits it into two different diphthongs: 1.: ia, ie, etc, Middle HG: ie (diphthong), New HG: ie (long i). In most of the LG dialects the e remained unchanged, hence: Leev - Liebe - love, scheev - schief - wrong, crooked, leaning etc., deep - tief - deep. In Middle Dutch some long "e" became "ie" but that must be separated from the HG development: liefde (love), diep (deep). There are only a few LG dialects that changed the "e" into the diphthong ei (pronounced as in "bike"), mainly after 1600: deep -> deip, etc. 2.: MHG ei (pronounced as in "hey" or similiar to that), NHG ei (pronounced as in "bike"): Kleed - Kleid - dress (cf. cloth), Been - Bein - leg (cf. bone), een - eins - one. In Dutch it is similiar: been (leg), een (one). Some LG dialects changed "e" into the vowel "ei": ein, Bein. However this all happened separately after 1600 and had nothing to to with this changed mentioned here. Germanic "o": LG unchanged, OHG splits it into two different diphtongs: 1.: ua, uo, etc, MHG uo, HG u: good - gut - good, Broder - Bruder - brother, Pool - Pfuhl - puddle (cf. pool), etc. Some LG dialects have an "au" now: Broder -> Brauder. 2.: MHG ou, NHG au: Boom - Baum - tree, ook - ouch - also, too, etc, Og - Auge - eye etc. There were also some change in LG that time but I think it's enough. Now let me show you some differences between MHG and NHG: Diphtongs became monophthongs: ie -> ie (see above), uo -> u (see above). Monophthongs became diphthongs : i -> ei (mîn -> mein [E: my]), u -> au (hûs -> Haus [E: house]) Short vowels were streched into long vowels in syllables with coda: sagen [zagɘn] -> sagen [zɑ:gɘn]. sw, sp, st, sn, sm, sl -> schw, sp [ʃp], st [ʃt], schn, schm, schl: Schwein, spielen, Stiefel, schneiden, schmieren, schlagen. There were some more changes I will just refer to these because LG didn't undergo none of these phenomena, these are changes that only affected HG: mein - mien, Haus - Hus. sagen - seggen. Some HG dialects have preserve some of the old characteristics: Swiss Dutch dialcts: Hus instead of Haus, etc., Bavarian dialects: Bruoder instead of Bruder. In LG the tendency to speak [ʃ] instead of [s] has just begun, many speakers still say: Swien (pig, swine), spelen (play), Stevel (boot), snieden (to cut), smeren (to grease), slagen (beat). Some of these examples contain characteristics that I mentioned above (e. g. e vs. ie). There were some changes in MLG that can be found in the LG dialects: sometimes i became e: swemmen - schwimmen - swim, Spenn - Spinne - spider etc. LG has preserved many phonological characteristics that HG didn't: [f] instead of [p] at the coda of a syllable: leev - lieb (beloved), geev - gab (gave), and also gifft - gibt (gives). It's no coincidence that these examples are similiar to their English translation. In the middle of a word you can often find [v] instead of [f]: Deiwel - Teufel [devil], Stevel - Stiefel [boot] etc. I think that's enough. Let's go on: Vocabulary I could say a lot of about this but I will shorten it a bit. LG Vocabulary contains some words that do not exist in HG but sometimes in other West Germanic languages:

There are more words but I think it's enough. If you look closely at LG vocabulary you will find it is somewhat closer to Dutch than to HG (as a result of the phonological differences mentioned above:

These are just few examples. Have a look now at grammar: Morphology In German you have four cases: nominative, genetive, dative and accusative. In New LG only two remained: nominative and a so to say non-nominative which was derived from the dative case. In HG "Mann" is declinated as follows: 1. der Mann, 2. des Mannes. 3. dem Mann(e), den Mann etc. Now let's have a look at LG: 1. de Mann 2. den Mann. I just give you examples: Der Mann ist klein. De Mann is lütt. The man is small. Das Haus des Mannes ist groß. Den Mann sien Hus is groot. The man's house is big. Ick gebe dem Mann(e) etwas. Ik geev den Mann wat. I give something to the man. Er sieht den Mann. He süht den Mann. He sees the man. You see, the genetive case doesn't exist and the accusative case, too. So let's look at the conjugation of Verbs. It's very similar to HG but the plural is somewhat different:

In LG the plural endings of verbs do not differ, in HG they do. LG has a lot of verbs that are irregular while in German their conjugation is regular: LG: ick frag, du frögst, he/se/dat frögt, wi, ji, se fragt/fragen HG: ich frage, du fragst, er/sie/es fragt, wir fragen, ihr fragt, sie fragen. Especially the past tense and the participle differ in some ways: fragen - fröög - fragt vs. fragen - fragte - gefragt (E: ask - asked - [have] asked) seggen - sää - seggt vs. sagen, sagte, gesagt (say - said -said, similar to LG, D, too.) steken - stöök - steken vs. stecken - steckte - gesteckt (cf. stick - stuck - stuck) kriegen - kreeg - kregen vs. kriegen - kriegte - gekriegt (get) etc. The conjugation of irregular verbs differs from HG: stahn - stünn - stahn vs. stehen, stand, gestunden (stand): LG preserved the old form (cf. MHG: stuont). sien (or wesen) - weer (was) - west vs. sein - war - gewesen lesen - lees - lest vs. lesen - las - gelesen kamen - keem - kamen vs. kommen - kam - gekommen fangen - füng - fungen vs. fangen - fing - gefangen geven - geev - geven vs. geben - gab - gegeben ropen - reep - ropen vs. rufen - rief - gerufen etc. Some of these form differ due the changes described above (e. g. ropen) some have changed since MLG: In NLG there is no conjunctive mood (cf. HG traf - träfe : met - would meet). Some of the old conjunctive forms became indicative: MLG kwamm - kwem (came - would come) -> k(w)eem (came). In some cases HG "lost" the unregular forms (e. g. kriegen). As you can see the particple of most LG dialects has no ge- (today only some Westphalian regions use e- or ge-). All these arguments can be used to show the close relations to Dutch and other West Germanic languages. You can see there aren't just some isoglosses. The differences shown above separate LG from HG. Swiss German for example underwent most of the phonolgical changes I described, LG didn't. Every dialect has his own vocabulary but unlike Swiss German or other High German dialects LG has much in common with the vocabulary that you can find in other West Germanic languages. You can find the word "Brink/brink" in LG as well as in English (although its meaning has changed in LG). You can also say that if you look at grammatical structures. Though LG is mostly influenced by HG today you can find structures that would be wrong in HG, e.g.: so groot as he - so groß wie er - as tall as him. That's why LG dialects are not High German dialects. I could provide more differences but I think it's enough. Main problems of those views This view only contains linguistic arguments. If you take a close look at them and might say Swedish is a dialect of Danish or viceversa. It also lacks of some points such as those sociolinguistic ones provided by Goosens et al. I already mentioned Frisian which couldn't be defined as a language by Goossens definition. In the end there is just an emotional view in those cases where sociolinguistic views fail: similarity. And that is the point. Frisian differs in many ways from HG. LG isn't that different. The arguments I provided above could be used to determine: 1. LG dialects are no High German dialects. That doesn't neccessarily mean that they form a language. They can be seen as a group of dialects. or 2. LG is a language formed by its dialects. The decision for 1. or 2. is emotional: I remain a bit sceptical about the separate language business. Others might say, I think it's a language then. That's why even LG philology is not certain about the status of LG. But one thing is absolutely clear: LG dialects don not belong to High German dialects. Swabian, Alemannic, Bavarian etc. ,may differ but they these things in common: Second consonant shift, changes in the vowel systems (Germanic "e" and "o") and their vocabulary is somewhat different from English/Dutch/LG. These are just linguistic facts. Low German is a special subject in German philology in spite of its status.--89.53.61.232 19:06, 12 May 2007 (UTC)


 * What this line of reasoning comes down to is that the differences between Low and High German are great. But we don't have much of an idea of how much a dialect is allowed to differ from other dialects of its "mother language." One would have to establish a line first, beyond which the separate language lies, and then ask: Does Low German cross that line? As far as I know, linguistics adamantly refuses to draw such a line.


 * Another property of your reasoning is that it is specifically geared towards showing that Low German is different from German, but it doesn't explain why it can't be a dialect of Dutch.


 * As for the status, it's my understanding that the thing called "Low German" is a group of dialects alongside the Central German and High German dialects, which also differ in the extent to which they are affected by the High German sound shift. --SKopp 19:35, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

I try to answer some of your questions: 'But we don't have much of an idea of how much a dialect is allowed to differ from other dialects of its "mother language."' There is no "mothertongue": "Die sprachlichen Übereinstimmungen in der westgermanischen (wgerm.) Sprachen gehen nicht auf eine urspr. Einheit zurück, sondern sind wohl Produkte späterer Ausgleichsentwicklungen." (Hermann Paul et al.: Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik. You can speak German and your English is much better than mine, so I do not try to translate this sentence. If you like you can translate it into English.) Low German was different from High German in the very beginning. There is no original mother toungue. Some things I mentioned above can also be found in: Stefan Sonderegger: Althochdeutsche Sprache und Literatur and in Paul's Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik. Another property of your reasoning is that it is specifically geared towards showing that Low German is different from German, but it doesn't explain why it can't be a dialect of Dutch. LG also differs from Dutch: du - jij (you), e -> ie (D.: diep, LG deep) or het - dat (it). D: preserved some words that died out in LG, e. g.: orloog - Krieg (war). The syntax of Low Germans is more likely to High German now (though there are differences, too). These are just a few examples. Dutch has its own cultural tradition in writing that was also different from Low German in Medivial times: huis - Hus, tijd - Tiet. Written New Low German often uses High German conventions because speakers of Low German see themselves as Germans and not Dutch (this is a more sociological argument, I know). As for the status, it's my understanding that the thing called "Low German" is a group of dialects alongside the Central German and High German dialects, which also differ in the extent to which they are affected by the High German sound shift. Central German dialects are High German dialects (I just write this in German because I don't know the proper names in English: Hochdeutsch consists of: Mitteldeutsch and Oberdeutsch.). I just mentioned that there are more phonological characteristics that separate Low German form High German dialects. This line simply devides High German from other West Germanic dialects on the Continent. There are other lines, too, that separate Mitteldeutsch from Oberdeutsch. But these lines only separate High German dialects from each other. As I said above, I do not vote for one side, all these categorisations are problematic. However my claim that Low German dialects are no High German dialects is true: Middle High German only contains Mittel- and Oberdeutsch. The works quoted above only contain these dialects. Sonderegger (Althochdeutsche Grammatik) clearly distinguishes between Low and High German. This distinction is also made between New High and Low German (cf. Weddige, p. 20). He also talks about "Zweiteilung der deutschen Sprache in Hochdeutsch und Niederdeutsch." (dichtomy of the German language in High German and Low German). You are talking about German. Well, Low and High German consist of course of German dialects (Look at their names.) Today people speak of German and mean High German, in dialectology German simply means German which is separated into High German and Low German dialect groups. The separation into these two groups can be seen in linguistic literature (see above) but also how departments of the German language are organized and namend in Northern Germany (in Southern Germany Low German isn't researched):
 * University of Münster: "Abteilung Niederdeutsche Sprache und Literatur"
 * University of Göttingen "Niederdeutsche Sprache und Literatur"
 * University of Hamburg: "Niederdeutsche Sprache und Literatur"
 * University of Kiel "Lehrstuhl Deutsche Sprachwissenschaft, insbesondere Niederdeutsche Sprache und Literatur"
 * University of Rostock "Niederdeutsche Philologie"
 * University of Greifswald "Niederdeutsche Philologie"

I mentioned only a few but you can see that they form a special branch in German research. You can't find such a focus on High German dialects cf. the organisation of department of the university of Munich. So you might get an impression that Low German is something different. --89.53.61.232 21:09, 12 May 2007 (UTC)


 * WOW!! I can't believe the effort you have put into making this case.  Congratulations!  First a disclaimer: I did not say that everyone who believes LG is a separate language is being emotional following a political agenda based on local patriotism - I just said a lot of them are, and that makes me sceptical.
 * Nobody is suggesting that Low German is a subcategory of High German. The traditional view, however, is that LG and HG are dialects of a single continuum.  (I know you are aware of the ambiguity of the term "High German", but for anyone else reading here, HG in this context means the southern dialects, where the mountains are, it doesn't mean the standard language!)
 * You still haven't got the point about the HG shift. Yes, the Benrath line is a fixed isogloss, and you don't get machen north of it.  If you define LG as the dialects which have maken then the Benrath line is the boundary of LG.  But why should we make that arbitrary judgment?  Why shouldn't we say that LG begins at the Uerdingen Line, the ik/ich line, which is further north than Benrath.  Or, if we are going to divide the continuum into two languages, why don't we make the Speyer line (appel/Apfel) the boundary.  That would be grouping Central German together with Low German, instead of with Upper German, which is not the traditional category, but if you declare LG to be a separate langauge, you are rejecting traditional categories anyway, so why not?  Look at the table of the Rheinischer Fächer on High German consonant shift; THAT is what I mean by fragmentation - the shift does NOT give a clean, surgical incision.
 * You have given lots of nice examples of how LG is different from other German dialects. These are fun, and I am grateful for some of them (though I already speak German and Dutch fluently, so most of it was not new to me).  What you have not done is to make a comparison with, say, Bavarian.  I contend that the new Bayerisches Wörterbuch contains just as many regional varitions in vocabulary as you can find for LG.  And there are just as many grammatical differences, too.  For example, in Bavarian they also say "Dem Mann sein Haus ist groß".  LG has many glorious ideosynracies, but to make a claim for a separate language on purely linguistic grounds you would have to show that those unique features are more than the concept of a dialect can tolerate.  And you haven't begun to address that.  To do it would involve a massive comparative study, and I doubt if it is worth the effort. --Doric Loon 08:16, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

First of all, thank you for your effort to provide a good discussion here. It's nice to talk to people who just argument by facts and not by emotions. I just answer your questions first: Why shouldn't we say that LG begins at the Uerdingen Line, the ik/ich line, which is further north than Benrath. This line is somewhat newer, literature still talks about the Benrather line ("Das Niederdeutsche hat nicht teil an der zweiten oder hochdeutschen Lautverschiebung der Konsonanten [vgl. auf Abb. 3 die sog.Benrather Linie]). Weddige who I quoted here obviously makes no difference between ick and maken, in fact the ick-line was the Benrather line then. The lines were only different in the east since the ick line ended south of Berlin and the maken line north of the town. You can see that on Weddiges map on p. 20. The Wenker-Atlas then made a difference between ick and maken (see www.diwa.info). I can't say when these differences had happened and obviousily "ech" was neglectable for some dialectologists because it was just one word while south of Benrath the shift of k to ch was completed. Furthermore these dialects are neighbouring High German dialects it could be that they borrowed that word from them. Actually you can see what the main problem of dialectography is: lines must be found which are often changed because languages and dialects are always in flux. But I think I've already told you why this line is more than just a dialect line. So I will show you another point of view. First of all I just want to make somtehing very clear: I haven't written that whole stuff to prove that LG is a language (I've already written that it is more an emotional thing) but has nothing to do with High German dialects. Low German dialects are dialects of their own. Maybe you can say they all form a language or you can say the are just a group of dialects, but they are not High German dialects. A dialect continuum can bear dialects that have no common origin, I've already said that there is a dialect continuum from east to west, too (including Dutch dialects which are also no High German dialects). I think the most confusing thing is the name "German" which assumes that there must be a historical relationship between Low and High German (I mean in a linguistical way, not in a political). So let's have a closer look at that. I just take the German names because it's easier to explain: Niederdeutsch (Low German) and Hochdeutsch (High German). I could talk about much historical stuff here but I just want to quote the "Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik" instead because it's much shorter: "Der Terminus 'diutsch' [i. e. German] ist Sammelbegriff für die im 'deutschen Land' vereinten wgerm. Stammessprachen und Mundarten und wird erst in nhd. [i. e. New High German] Zeit zur Bezeichnung für die überregionale Einheitssprache." (The name 'duitsch' [German] is a collectivum for all those West Germanic clan languages and dialects that were spoken in 'Germany' and it became the name of the supra-regional language not until New High German was established.) I just want to explain what 'deutschen Land' ('Germany') means in that case. It does not mean the frontiers of recent Germany but those of the Frankish Empire where Germanic languages were spoken. These languages were called "theodiscus". So German consisted of many different languages such as Dutch, Low German (at that time it was definitely a language) and High German. Low German consisted of those languages that have not undergone the Second consonant shift (the boundary was the Benrather line and due to linguists is still today). The definition of Low German that is used in this article and by linguists today was made in the 19th century. I just give you two examples: Dutch lingists and Dutch people called their language "Nederdiutsch" then (i. e. Low German literally translated). They changed the name at the end or at the beginning of the 20th century into "Nederlands" because Dutch has its own literature and culture. Some Germans argumented at that time Dutch were of course German (what is nonsense in deed). That might also be part of the reason why the name was changed. In Grimm's "Deutsches Wörterbuch" which is one of the most important dicitionaries for German "Niederdeutsch" is defined as follows: "die niederteutsche oder niedersächsische sprache hat .. mancherlei mundarten, als die holländische, brabandische, friesländische, westphalische, braunschweigische, hollsteinische, mekelburgische, pommerische etc." (the Low German or Low Saxon language consists of many dialects such as Hollandic, Brabantic, Frisian, Westphalian, Braunschweigisch, Holsteinisch, Mecklenburgisch, Pommeranian etc.). Obviousily Low German is definend as West Germanic languages that have not undergone the Second consonant shift. That also includes Dutch (Deutsch!). This definition was also used by the Low German writer Fritz Reuter, who wrote:
 * Ik weit einen Eikbom, de steit an de See,
 * De Nurdstorm, de brus't in sin Knäst,
 * Stolz reckt hei de mächtige Kron in de Höh';
 * So is dat all dusend Johr west;
 * Kein Minschenhand,
 * De hett em plant't;
 * Hei reckt sik von Pommern bet Nedderland.
 * Hei reckt sik von Pommern bet Nedderland.

(My humble translation would be: I know an oak that stands at the sea, the north storm booms in his knots, it has proudly drawn out its crown for thousand years. No human hand has planted it, it is streching from Pommeriana till the Netherlands.) Today the definition Low German only contains those dialects that are situated mostly in Germany, Dutch isn't part of that. But now you can imagine that German or Deutsch was not a qualification for a language but for a certain territory. The German in Low German says nothing about its connection to High German, it just refers to those dialects that are spoken in Northern Germany it is just a geographical term. There is no linguistical connection I tried to show and prove that. But now I try to answer your questions: ''That would be grouping Central German together with Low German, instead of with Upper German, which is not the traditional category, but if you declare LG to be a separate langauge, you are rejecting traditional categories anyway, so why not? Look at the table of the Rheinischer Fächer on High German consonant shift; THAT is what I mean by fragmentation - the shift does NOT give a clean, surgical incision. First of all I did not'' claim LG is a language I only said it colud be seen as a language or a group of dialect. I've already showed that the status of Low German is not clear in linguistics (that's why I argued about Goossens' definition). The "Rheinischer Fächer" is no fragmentation. It divides certain Central German dialects from each other who are part of the High German dialect group. This "Fächer" is something special in German and very interesting. But it is no fragmentation because there are clear lines that separates those dialects from each other. All have on thing in common: the shift from k to 'ch' is complete while the shift from p to ff and t s are rather incomplete. That's the difference between these dialects. I just give you some examples (I take the German names, sorry for that):

You can find all these words at www.diwa.info, including audio material and some sheets where you can see the words in written form (in Kurrent though). As for LG I just took a more "general" form because there are many dialects but all have k, t and p. Now hopely you can see what I mean: while Low German only contains words that are unshifted the Central German words are somewhat different. The 'k' went to 'ch' while 'p' is stronger. In Ripuarisch you can also find "Dorp", in Moselfränkisch it's "Dorf". However some words have even changed, cf. Kochlöffel. 't' is also not that strong, you have "dat" but even in Ripuarisch it's us, gruus, hess, etc. The "Rheinische Fächer" only shows the degree how these dialects are involved in the Second Consonant shift. And that's the important thing, they are involved, LG isn't (like Dutch and Frisian). You can also see why it is called a dialect continuum because the degree of completeness of the Second consonant shift increases if you go south: kaken (LG), kochen (Central German and most parts of High German in general), kchochen (some Swiss dialects). But you can see that there are a lot of words even in Ripuarisch that underwent the shift (I listed only a few). In every High German dialect it's Löffel, in every LG dialect it's Lepel (I could bring more examples but I think, it's enough). That's why the "Rheinische Fächer" is part of High German and the dialects north of it are not. What you have not done is to make a comparison with, say, Bavarian. Actually I don not speak Bavarian but I'll try. You did not specify which Bavarian you mean (Nord-, Mittel- or Südbairisch), so I take Mittelbairisch (around Muinch, Vienna) The division between High German, Low German, and Dutch are more phonological. I will just give you some examples:


 * Second consonant shift:
 * aap (D) - Aap (LG) - Aff (Bavarian)
 * heet (D) - heet (LG) - hoas (B)
 * peper (D) - Peper (LG) - Pfeffer (B)
 * koek (D) - Koken (LG) - kuacher (B, Wenker-Bogen, Muinch )

And then you have of course changes from OHG to MHG and NHG (monophtong -> diphthong):
 * zijn (D) - sien (LG) - sein (B) (E: his)
 * boer (D) - Buer (LG) - Bauer (B)
 * lui (D) - Lüü(d) (LG) - Leit (B)
 * broer (D) - Broder (LG) - bruader (B, Muinch, cf. above)
 * lief (D) - leev (LG) - liab (B)

You can see that Bavarian has more diphthong than written High German. That's why in Bavarian the "Neuhochdeutsche Diphthongierung" (monophtongs became diphtongs such as î to ei or u to au, ui [i.e a long ü in MHD] to eu [B: ei], cf. examples) could first be viewed at that dialect (This change went from south to north. In Bavarian it begun around the 12th century.). Some dialects are more monophtongish and didn't undergo that change e. g. some Alemannic dialects. LG wasn't affected at all. On the other hand Bavarian preserved old MHG diphthongs as you can see at "Bruader" ([OHG/]MHG bruoder, NHG Bruder) or "liab" (MHG liëp, NHG lieb [long vowel]). LG didn't have these diphthongs it preserved the Germanic "o" (which became "au" in some dialects).


 * zeggen (D) - seggen (LG) - sogen (sagen) (B)

While in D and LG have a short vowel here, B has a long one. This phenomena is called "Neuhochdeutsche Vokaldehung in offenen Tonsilben" (NHG vowel strechting in syllables that have no coda). On the other hand there were long vowels in syllables with a coda which were shortened:


 * hamer (D) - Hamer (LG) - Hammer (HG, can't say if it's in B., too).

Then some MHG diphthongs changed such as ou into au (boum -> Baum), originally derived from Germanic "o", see above. LG still has this Germanic "o", cf.:


 * MHG boum, NHG Baum
 * MLG bom, NHG Boom (I could also write Bom, it doesn't matter because the "o" has always been a long vowel.)

You see, there are differences between Bavarian and LG and they are very old. High German dialects differ a lot but they have at least some of these characteristics in common (not all of them though). I just want to quote the Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik because it underlines what I showed here (You can find it under "Zeitliche Gliederung des Deutschen"): "Hinzu kommt die Aufteilung in die großräumigen Varietäten Niederdeutsch und Hochdeutsch und u. U. Niederfränkisch/Niederländisch, die wegen je eigener Sprachentwicklungen in ihrer Periodisierung meist getrennt betrachtet werden. (Moreover there is a separation into the spacious varieties [i. e. of German] Low German and High German and possibly Low Frankish/Dutch, which are often viewed sparatedly in their periodisation due to their own development.). Then you can find another interesting sentence: "Das Neuniederdeutsche (1600 - Gegenwart) büßte, bedingt durch den Niedergang der Hanse und das Vordringen des Hochdt., diese Bedeutung ein und bleib nur als (meist ländliche) Umgangssprache auf Dialektebene ('Plattdeutsch') erhalten." (New Low German (1600 - present) lost that importance [i. e. as a lingua franca in the Baltic Sea] due to the fall of the Hanseatic League and the the expansation of High German and it remained as a (rural) common speech on a dialectical level ['Plattdeutsch'].) I don't want to talk about whether LG is a language or a group of dialects (though this book claims, it is a language, but that's really unimportant), but about how LG is treated here. It is definitely treated separately from High German. The book says there is a different periodisation, I will show it to you (because you will only find information about MHG in there): High German: There are other periodisations as well but this one is the most used today. LG differs from that: Low German: The classical period of LG begins in Early NHG time, that means Middle Low German and Middle High German have similar names but their chronology is different (I know such periodisation are somewhat odd, that's at least you can say about LG and HG). Most of the text written in MLG do not correspond to MHG but to Early NHG. Luther translated the bible into Early New High German while his co-worker Bugenhagen translated it into Middle Low German (they worked together and Bugenhagen took Luthers High German translation to translate it into LG). You can see LG has another development than HG. It’s the same with Dutch. LG and Dutch have had similar developments until 1650. They were really close related though Dutch has its own tradition. If you look at texts written in MLG and MD you will find out that they have a lot in common in writing conventions, grammar, and vocabulary. So they had a common culture (cf. the translation of Reyneke de vos from MD into MLG, North German seamen used texts written in MD for navigation, etc.). However, Dutch preserved its status as written language, LG didn’t. So both took different directions (linguistically and culturally). Modern Dutch still has much in common with MLG (vocabulary, syntax). LG has been influenced by HG since then. It has its own development und came closer to HG (syntax, vocabulary) but it is still not HG because it preserved all these phonological characteristics that I showed here. So Bavarian and other High German dialects must be separated from Low German dialects.--89.53.41.91 16:20, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Old High German (750-1050)
 * Middle High German (1050-1350):
 * Early MHG (1050-1170)
 * Classic MHG (1170-1250)
 * Late MHG (1250-1350)
 * Early New High German (1350-1650)
 * New High German (1650 - present)
 * Old Saxon (Old Low German) (800-1200)
 * Middle Low German (1150/1200-1600/1650):
 * Early MLG (1150-1370)
 * Classic MLG (1370-1560)
 * Late MLG (1560-1650)
 * New Low German (1650 - present)


 * Oh dear! You've spent a lot of time writing out the familiar history of German, but unfortunately I think you have missed the point I was making about Bavarian.  By demonstrating how different it is from other HG varieties you confirm my point; if you wanted to argue against me, you would have to try to show that Bavarian (and Swabian and any other dialect one might mention) is NOT dissimilar from the rest of the continuum, or at least not in the crucial sense that LG is.  Again, you have obviously not understood what I meant by fragmentation.  Your beautiful little table showing how some dialects have more of the HG shift than others confirms my point; if you wanted to argue against me, you would have to give some reason why maken/machen is a more decisive incision into the continuum than appel/apfel. However, since you say you DON'T view LG as a separate language, I am not quite sure what you ARE arguing for.
 * I am rather unhappy with your contention that LG and HG have no common historical roots. I know there are different theories about how and when and in what order the Germanic languages diverged, but most of them see HG and LG as being very close until the shift. --Doric Loon 21:31, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Well what else can I say? Did you read my texts, my quotations? I am rather unhappy with your contention that LG and HG have no common historical roots. I just repeat that again: "Die sprachlichen Übereinstimmungen in der westgermanischen (wgerm.) Sprachen gehen nicht auf eine urspr. Einheit zurück, sondern sind wohl Produkte späterer Ausgleichsentwicklungen." (Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik, a standard work in German linguistics by the way) That's it, simply and today's most accepted theory. That's what I wanted to show. If you hear something about Germanic, well that's a construction, nothing more. All linguistics forms older than Old Saxon, Old High German, Old Nordic, etc. are whether Gothic or theoretical forms (shown by an asteric in linguistics). There is no proof that there was something like a Germanic language from which all Germanic languages are derived from. And that's the reason why this "Rheinischer Fächer" is so different, that's why you call it a dialect continuum. Otherwise it wouldn't be one. I showed you that there is not just "maken" but other words, how many do you want? If you visit a lecture on the history of German you will hear exactly what I've written here (Not exactly, there's a little mistake I made, happens if you are in a hustle: Germanic au [Gothic] became ou in OHG, o in the other West Germanic languages: *baum -> boum [OHG/MHG]-> Baum [NHG] vs. *baum -> bom [OSaxon etc.] -> Boom [NLG]). If you are interested in these facts please read the books I quoted above. Look at the examples that they provide. I know there are different theories about how and when and in what order the Germanic languages diverged, but most of them see HG and LG as being very close until the shift. I never said that they couldn't be close related before all that happend. But that's also true for Dutch, Frisian, English, and - well, let's say all Germanic languages. So what's your point? Then we can also say Dutch is simply German, but it isn't. We could say, well Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, they are so similar, it's all the same. There are differences, I showed you that LG is close related to Dutch, that they have had a common culture, that their development was different from HG. I show you, that Bavarian has undergone all these things I said about HG, I showed you that Dutch and LG have a similar vocabulary that differs from HG including Bavarian (look at the examples), I showed you, that only a few groups of words did not undergo the Second consonant shift in the Central German dialects (mainly words with a 'p' but some of them did), I could say a lot about the development of these dialects and why certain words have a 'p' instead of "ff" or "pf" (see again the quote in German, it explains that without all the historical stuff) but it won't help, I'm afraid. If the Central German dialects completely underwent the shift then there won't be a dialect continuum, that is why it is a continuum. In Bavarian p, t, k, are completely shifted that's why it is a Oberdeutscher dialect. What facts do you need? I showed you that Bavarian also changed its vowel system in the manner HG did. LG didn't. ''Your beautiful little table showing how some dialects have more of the HG shift than others confirms my point; if you wanted to argue against me, you would have to give some reason why maken/machen is a more decisive incision into the continuum than appel/apfel. However, since you say you DON'T view LG as a separate language, I am not quite sure what you ARE arguing for.'' Well, as I said, Dutch dialects also belong to that continuum. If I follow your argumentation then all Dutch dialects are German dialects. You didn't understand what this dialect continuum is about. It's not simply a German dialect continuum, it's a continuum of continental West Germanic. Where would you draw the line then? You couldn't draw a line between LG and Dutch dialects and you couldn't draw a line between LG and HG. This discussion leads to nowhere. The arguments you are talking about are very old. The were used by Germans for almost every Germanic language that are neighbouring German territory. Just look the other way round: you certainly agree that Dutch dialects have nothing to do with High German. They are also separated by the Benrather line. Why should LG then become something special in this observation? My only point is just, I don't know how often I repeated it: LG dialects can't be seen as High German dialects. That's it, nothing more. You said arguments towards language were emotional. So are arguments toward dialect, too. But I mean emotional in another way: feeling. Some feel that these differences are very strong, some feel that they are neglectable. Obviously you belong to group No. 2. That's why I don't vote for any side, it has nothing to do with linguistic terms. I just provide historical background why LG dialects don't belong to High German. And that has nothing to do with feelings but with linguistic facts. By demonstrating how different it is from other HG varieties you confirm my point [...] What exactly did I confirm? All High German dialects have undergone the Second consonant shift. That is the point in German linguistics, nothing more. That's what you learn if you study German. You also learn that High German dialects are also different from each other (I never claimed something else, did I?), but that's what separates them all (no matter how different they are) from LG and Dutch. That's it, nothing more. That's why LG has a another status in German linguistics than Central German dialects have (look at the websites of universities I quoted above). It is separated whether you say it's a language or just a group of dialects (cf. the quotations from above, e. g. Weddige). So just in case I will repeat it again: I wrote to whole stuff to proof one thing: LG does not belong to High German (like Central German does, like Bavarian does, etc.), nothing more.--89.53.41.91 00:49, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, nobody has ever said LG belongs to HG. So if that is all you wanted to prove, you deserve a prize for using so many words to say so little.  Sorry if that seems a little blunt, but it is very hard to know what to say to you. You write vast paragraphs, full of details which are mostly correct, but which don't actually lead anywhere, possibly because you don't know yourself where you stand.
 * PS: I don't need to take a course on German language history, thank you - I teach such courses. --Doric Loon 10:02, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, then we can go further. You just asked me what the difference was between "Rheinischer Fächer" and Bavarian and why the Benrather line was so important, that's why I wrote all that stuff. But now I think we can go further because we have the same opinion about LG (I just wanted to confirm, sorry if it got on your nerves.). And I deeply excuse, if I hurt any of your feelings, reputation, etc. I didn't want to offend you. The whole discussion began because of Goossens arguments. I just want to show why LG can be seen as a group of dialects or as a language (I do have an opinion about that, but I think, it doesn't really matter) because I think the paragraph about that topic is somewhat poor. The stuff I provided above is surely important for that. It is used by some linguists to claim that NLG is a language. NLG still has all these characteristics. Goossens' view is only sociolinguistic because all of the arguments given in the article against language are also true for North Frisian. But it is defintely a language, no one argues about that. So there must be criteria that go beyond these few. The Goossens' and Sanders' definition also includes some arguments dealing with the characterics of the LG dialects but they are rather unclear. So you can easily argue against that definition that it only works for LG/HG relations but fails for other languages/dialects. These arguments are not very emotional but show the lack of this definition. That was where I stopped. On the other hand there are arguments that vote for dialect that are also mentioned here: the differences of all these LG dialects. Some linguists just argue that these dialects are so different from each other (that's why I took a "common" LG form in my examples) that they can't form a language anymore. That was also true in the Middle Ages (there was no common MLG or MHG or Early NHG). Actually there are no technical texts in Old Saxon, they were written in Latin, there was no grammar, no standardization, too. It was spoken on a daily basis (So I would take out OS from the discussion.). Today, it's also true for Frisian or Sorbian. Again, these are just facts that do not refer to the differences between LG and HG. So it isn't that easy to say. So I would disagree to that claim: ''They are often motivated by efforts to paint an uplifiting, positive picture to combat the perceived image of Low German as a dying and irrelevant idiom, and show comparatively little interest in establishing objective criteria and measuring Low German by these. Instead, they focus on different points such as.'' These are objective arguments, aren't they? It is not that simple that arguments in favour of dialect are objective and arguments in favour of language only emotional. If we look more closely to the subject we can only say that: The status of LG is rather unclear. Well, I know it's not the right place here and I don't mean to offend you but have a look at the article about Second consonant shift. I just went trough it. There mihgt be a mistake in it (maybe you overlooked that): þ is not necessarily part of that development, it's something different. The shift only refers to p, t, and k and separated High German from the other West Germanic languages (that's why the Benrath line [and today also the Uerdingen line] is so important) --89.53.22.195 11:29, 14 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh don't worry, no offence taken. Yes, I think that article does say that the þ>d shift is not always seen as part of the HGCS.  It's a question of categories, like the dialect question, it's all just constructs to help us find our way in complex fields, and categories are always negotiable.  --Doric Loon 20:51, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Puh, then I'm really happy, because I'm no one who just insults people. Second consonant shift: Well, then I must overlooked that. There's no problem that the þ>d shift is mentioned there, however there seems be uncertainty about that (this would be an addition to that article then.) I will just quote four books, two Introductions (OHG and MHG) and two handbooks. Weddige (Mittelhochdeutsch. Eine Einführung, 4th ed., p. 28.) says that this shift belongs to the shift: "Im Germ. begegnen also nach ursprünglich betontem Vokal sowie im Anlaut die stimmlosen Sprianten f, þ, h und s, die sich im Zuge der zweiten Lautverschiebung zu hd. f, d, h und s entwickeln." The "Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik" by Paul et al. (24th ed., the 23rd is also mentioned in the article but I can' say if there differences in that point) is somewhat uncertain. This shift has its own paragraph (§91, p. 121) and states: "Die Reihe der germ. stl. Reibelaute /f, þ, h, s/ verändert sich nicht geschlossen und z. T. später als die 2. LV.; ob dieser die Veränderungen zugerechnet werden dürfen, ist daher umstritten." Sonderegger (Althochdeutsche Sprache und Literatur, 3rd ed., p. 16) on the other side clearly distuingishes between these the shifts: "zweite oder hochdeutsche Lautverschiebung: "t, p, k > ʒʒ (ss) [...]" [I just cut here because you know what I mean] and "Entwicklung von þ (th) > d". Braune et al. (Althochdeutsche Grammatik, 15th ed.) first show the pre-Olduppergerman (is that the correct name in Englsh? It says "Voraltoberdeutsch") consonants (§84, p. 82), point 3 marks f, þ, s, and h (p. 82). In § 85(p. 84) you find this statement: "Dieser Wandel von þ>d ist kein Teilprozess der LV." So you can find this development in §102a. (Sorry that I didn't translate it.) --89.53.42.51 16:40, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That's very useful, thanks, and should possibly be put into that article as a footnote. --Doric Loon 17:28, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, you're welcome. It's a question of categories, like the dialect question, it's all just constructs to help us find our way in complex fields, and categories are always negotiable. I couldn't have said it any better. I think that's why there's a real fight between those who claim LG is a language and others who say it's a dialect. Linguistics offer no simple, generally accepted criteria to decide this question, as it is of little academic interest. I've just run through some literature about that topic due to my own work. Most of the definitions really base on (it's also in the article, sorry that this is a "Textwüste" or "Bleiwüste" as we call it in German but I can't write it that briefly): The most interesting part about that is, that indeed the pro-dialect arguments still refer to those old, that I mentioned above. They are still used. Stellmacher (Niederdeutsche Sprache, 2nd ed., 2000) uses a very sophisticated system of national language ("Nationalsprache"), standard language, dialect, etc. to show that NLG isn't a language anymore (though he roughly went through older periods one might asked why he then titled the book "Niederdeutsche Sprache" although most parts just refer to NLG). Well, after all it's just a modified system that Goossens introduced thirty years ago. Lesle (Plattdeutsch zwischen gestern und morgen: Geschichtsbeschleunigung und die Suche nach der identitas, in: Peters et al.: Vulpis Adolatio. Festschrift für Hubertus Menke zum 60. Geburtstag, p. 430-448) remarks that there is a strong cultural alliance fighting for the status of LG as a language (which is true). His article is more a history of NLG culture and its instrumentalisation. All those institutions claim that there's a common identity, something that holds such dialects together: the language Low German. However, he doesn't give a reason why NLG is a dialect, he just uses Goossens arguments to vote in favor for. Even those who say it's a language - I just name Wirrer - think in such categories and enphasize on cultural achievements NLG has made since the 19th century. Well, it's easy to disprove that. However all those arguments against language refer to that old model. The can be disproven if you simply change the view of LG and HG. As we both confirmed LG doesn't belong to HG. They so to speak a group of independent dialects that formed the language MLG. We can simply ask the question: if MLG was a language, why not NLG? The answer was given above? Well, that's just one point of view (I just mentioned something about it above). Of course LG doesn't fulfil these criteria given by Goossens, but is that really neccessary? I will just give two examples: Frisian and Sorbian. As I mentioned above, both fail these criteria, too. Both are spoken in Germany, both don't belong to HG. If you are consquent you have to say: Frisian is a dialect and Sorbian is a dialect. I've never found that claim. Both are categorised as language. There are other languages all over the world that would be dialects if you use Goossens definition on them. The sociolingustical position simply seems to define something like a national language. So we can take a look at important questions like: LG is very different for HG standard language so is Swiss German. Why should LG be a language and Swiss German not? I would answer as follows: it doesn't matter that Swiss German is also different, it could even more different than LG. But it doesn't matter. LG doesn't belong to HG, Swiss German does. The question if Swiss German should be considered a language is another question because you must then find reasons that justify that. In case of LG you have a justification: LG doesn't belong to HG so it could be a language (it's pretty irrelevant how similar HG and LG are). The reason could also be very simple, it's just a question: If Frisian and Sorbian are language, why should LG get a special treatment. What makes LG so different that it can't be a language? Frisian does not fulfil one of Goossens point. Frisian consists of different dialects, there is no standardization, it's spoken by few speakers on a small territory, it's not used in scientfic texts etc. I could also say that about Sorbian. In the end voters for dialect are using the same arguments that voters for language have (however vice versa). I will give you two examples: Lesle states: "Der Einfluß der hochdeutschen Standardsprache über Jahrhunderte hinweg hat jedenfalls sowohl zu erheblichen Strukturveränderungen in den Formen geführt als auch einen generellen Funktionsverlust der gesprochenen Sprache nach sich gezogen." I don't need to say about point 2 of his argumentation because that is also true for Frisian or Sorbian. The question about point is: what degree of change do you need that we can say it's no language annymore (It's simliar to ask: if LG is so different from HG and a language, why can't we say Swiss German is one?). You can't objectively answer that question because it's not like Berlinerisch then became a Central German dialect. I would like to quote another linguists that was also cited by Goossens, Gernentz (Niederdeutsch - gestern und heute. Beiträge zur Sprachsituation in den Nordbezirken der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik in Geschichte und Gegenwart) "In der historisch gewachsenen Struktur steht zum Beispiel das Mecklenburgische dem Westfälischen sehr nahe, aber es gibt kein engeres Band mehr, das diese Mundarten fester miteinander verknüpft. Und genauso ist es mit den Verhältnissen der übrigen nd. Mundarten miteinander. Dafür sind alle nd. Dialekte nun näher an die sich ausbreitende deutsche nationale Literatursprache herangerückt. Ja, man kann sagen, daß sie im gleichen Verhältnis zur deutschen Literatursprache wie die Mundarten des hd. Sprachgebietes stehen. Das Bairische und das Mecklenburgische zum Beispiel unterscheiden sich in ihren Merkmalen zwar deutlich, aber beide sind deutsche Mundarten, beide gehören sie in das Gefüge der sprachlichen Existenzformen des Deutschen." Gernentz claims that e. g. Mecklenburgisch-Vorpommersch is just as near as Bavarian to the standard language (that's what he meant by writing "Literatursprache"). The question is why it should be import that LG dialects are not so different to HG? They don't belong to HG, that's more important, hence it doesn't matter. The argument of difference is something very unclear, you have to ask: how manny differences does it take that a dialect can be seen as a language (you can also ask the question vice versa: how many smiliarities do you need that you can claim it's dialect)? So the answer is very difficult, more emotional then. --89.53.42.51 20:58, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
 * pro-language: long tradition in culture, literature, high importance in the Middle Ages, reconquest of lost, oet me say, fields of communications such as TV, newspapers, computing (e. g. translations, see here ), differences between LG and HG
 * prodialect: communication (still) restricted, no stanardization, etc.


 * You've criticised Goossens for selecting criteria that do not produce reasonable results for Sorbian and Frisian (i.e. failing to categorise them as separate languages, which they are generally accepted to be). Please note that Sorbian and German obviously don't form a diasystem, so the criteria could never be applied to them anyway. The arguably more interesting case of Frisian I can't comment on at the moment.


 * Please don't take this too harshly, but to me your contributions looks like acres of text that I find trouble mustering up the motivation to plough through, so to speak. Also, I'm afraid I've quite lost track of what exactly is being discussed here and how it pertains to the main article. It's true that I opened this discussion with a rather lengthy contribution myself; but I merely attempted to give an example of a linguistic standpoint. --SKopp 14:09, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

First of all I would like to apologize that I wrote so much stuff that you lost track. I hope you will fight through this text ;-) So I will give you a brief recap. First of all I made clear that LG is a separate group of dialects compared to the HG dialects. I think we all agree to that, don't we? Then I went on to Goossens linguistic arguments and tried to show where they fail. Please note that Sorbian and German obviously don't form a diasystem, so the criteria could never be applied to them anyway. Well, that's the problem. Gossens didn't really define an intelligible diasystem. I just will give you his definition: "Unter 'Diasystem' verstehen wir eine linguistische Konstruktion, zusammengesetzt aus den Elementen einer Reihe von Kommunikationssystemen (Sprachen gemäß Auffassung 1.2.1), die alle in einer Formel untergebracht werden können, weil jedes dieser Systeme fundamentale Übereinstimmungen mit jedem einzelnen anderen System aufzeigt, aber in bestimmten Punkten von ihen afweicht. Die grundsätzlichen Übereinstimmungen sind für die Konstruktion des Diasystems notwenig, weil sonst nichts die Vereinigung in einem Diasystem rechtfertigt und ermöglicht. Sie sind die sprachhistorische Folge der Verwandtschaft (d. h. des gemeinsamen Ursprungs) dieser Systeme und sekundär auch der Entlehnungen, die zwischen diesen Systemen stattgefunden haben." What does it say? It's very vague. What does "fundamentale Übereinstimmungen" (fundamental accordance) mean? He just states the systems must be similar due to their common origin and their influences on each other. But where shall we begin? If we are expecting something like a common German (which is also arguable) how is it defined? Well you can then eliminate Sorbian but what's with the indogermanic origin? Goossens writes "fundamental" so we can drop it. But then we can't drop Frisian either because in those times we are talking now no one can say how Frisian fits into that scheme. Furthermore LG was a language, so why does it now belong to that diasystem? Obviously no one sees such a certain common ground for the older periods. I just will give you an example how Goossens tries to define Old Saxon as a language in comparison to NLG: "Wohl scheint festzustehen, daß es als Konglomerat von Dialekten aufgefaßt werden muß, ohne überdachende Schriftsprache. M. a. W. [mit anderen Worten], jedes as. [altsächsische] Denkmal hat seine eigene Sprachgestalt und steht für sich. Doch scheinen die überlieferten Formen des As. sich in ihrer Gesamtheit so stark von den anderen kontinentalwestgermanischen abzuheben, daß man von einer eigenen Sprache reden kann: 'Der Unterschied war wohl nicht so groß wie der zwischen dem heutigen Deutsch und dem Holländischen, aber doch so bedeutend, daß die meisten Germanisten geneigt sind, das Altsächsische nicht als Dialekt, sondern als eigene germanische Sprache anzusehen." I just repeat Goossens' arguments: OS had no literary language, it consisted of many different dialects but it can be seen as a language because those dialects had pretty much in common and OS was different from other continental West Germanic languages (although it certainly had not that degree of difference that High German and Dutch have today). Look at the arguments that are provided in favour of language today. They are the same. Goossens can't really say why OS is a language he just claims it. The only difference between "yesterday" and "today" is a construct of diasystem. But it also bases on the argument of fundamental accordance between its subsystems. It is rather unclear at what degree of similarties you can say these dialects belong to that diasystem. Goossens just says that LG has a "Dachsprache" now and there's no real language border between LG and HG. But he also states: "Altsächsisch und Mittelniederdeutsch: Die Anwendung des Kriteriums erscheint nicht sinnvoll." He claims that because there where no language borders at that time. That's also true in these times if you look at the dialects. Why should we then say: We don't take that for OS and MLG but for NLG. Just because there are "Dachsprachen" today? We could also ignore that today. So his only argument (in comparison to Frisian) is the fundamental accordance between LG and HG. But he never stated what it is. One could also argue there are fundamental differences between these dialects. You see such an argument is quite uncertain and cannot be proven. We can only say: Frisian does not belong to that diasystem because it is not as similar as LG to HG. The system only refers to Germany. In the U.S. there is a (very) small population of Low German speakers. Their „Dachsprache“ is English. If you use Goossens definition on that, well then these dialects form a language. I could also say that about Plautdietsch. Just imagine this situation: A Russian born Plautdietsch speaker moves to Germany. In Russia he then spoke a language, in Germany it suddenly becomes a dialect. You can argue that Plautdietsch belongs to LG but does it belong to that diasystem, even in Russia? If the answer is yes then you successfully identified a LG dialect (which is necessary). Gernentz wrote (see above) that the LG dialects are so different to each other that there is no common ground anymore. Goossens uses that argument, too. If you identify Plautdietsch as a LG dialect you would disprove that. So Goossens also uses the argument of similarity (because that's left if you want to intergrate LG in such a diasystem) which is - as we all argued - rather uncertain. --89.53.23.145 16:25, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Disputed Neutrality Template
I added this template to the "Status with respect to German and Dutch" section, although I can see that this has already been argued to death on this discussion page. I think that I bring a new perspective to this debate, however. See, I have almost no knowledge of the German language, or any other Germanic language, save English. Thus, besides some of the word charts given above, I don't know much about the differences. However, I did notice that the wording (at least at the beginning of the section) heavily favors dialect status. And without checking the page history, I know that the bottom part, starting with "Low German has been recognised..." has been written by another person. This makes the article a bit choppy. I think that articles should be written by many people almost as if it were written by a single objective person.

One part says, "Linguistics offer no simple, generally accepted criteria to decide this question, as it is of little academic interest. However, scholarly arguments have been put forward in favour of classifying Low German as a German dialect." Yes, this last part is cited, but the wording is a little strange. In one breath, it says that linguistics doesn't itself come to any real conclusion with regards to Low German's status, but that "scholarly arguments", as opposed to "dumb-person arguments"--


 * I'm sorry, but I feel I have to interrupt you here, as regardless of the merit of the rest of what you have to say, this is an obvious false dichotomy. 'Scholarly,' implies two things that go beyond generic 'smarts':
 * 1) The author is an accredited expert *in the field* (which in modern terms mainly comes down to holding a PhD), not just generically smart. Noam Chomsky for instance, holds a doctorate in linguisics, but not in political science are government.  Therefore, regardless of how smart he may be, his works are scholarly in the former field and not the latter.
 * 2) Probably more importantly, scholarly works are peer-reviewed. This is as opposed to works which may be either unedited, or edited by someone who knows substantially less about the topic than the writer.  A PhD can still make a simple mistake, or may just make up a fact, and although the peer review process is hardly infallible, it is hoped that review by other credentialed experts will catch most of these problems.


 * I only interrupt because your usage above could be interpreted to claim that use of the term 'scholarly arguments' is inherently POV. An encyclopedia needs to rely on scholarly information above that which is not, and thus could not function if that claim were true. The rest of your argument may have great merit, I haven't fully ingested it, but I felt this issue vital enough to the concept of an encyclopedic entry that I had to make the point right off.  Stancollins (talk) 14:47, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

. . .say that it's a language. Well, these scholarly arguments have to use more than linguistics (such as the arguments listed below that) to come to that conclusion because linguistics doesn't give them that silver bullet. Now, Low-German speakers might just be proud of their speech and not want it to die off, but if linguistics itself doesn't come to a conclusion, I would say that their argument that it is a separate language (or a group of languages) holds weight.

On the Dialect or language section of the Wikipedia "Dialect" entry, it also says that "There are no universally accepted criteria for distinguishing languages from dialects, although a number of paradigms exist, which render sometimes contradictory results." Below that is something interesting - a Yiddish expression "A language is a dialect with an army and navy". This applies to the arguments given on this page that Low German is a dialect, namely that it doesn't have a written standard, it's not widely used, and it's not used in the government. However, for example, in New Guinea, there are not only many different languages, but also many different language FAMILIES. However, nearly all of these languages, which are far removed from any other in the world, don't have a written standard, and are not used in the government. I'm sure that many are used by fewer people than Low German is. Also, imagine this - if history had unfurled in another manner and the Low Germans had established their own nation, then would Low German then be a language?

Then, there is the argument that Claims to the contrary have also been made, ascribing to Low German the status of an independent language on par with German, Dutch, Danish, etc. They are often motivated by efforts to paint an uplifiting, positive picture to combat the perceived image of Low German as a dying and irrelevant idiom[3], and show comparatively little interest in establishing objective criteria and measuring Low German by these. Notice that the citation is only for the part before the somewhat demeaning last part. If linguistics itself cannot establish objective criteria, then how is it that pro-dialect scholars can but pro-language non-scholars (I would assume, according to this section) still can't. Again, the people who see Low German as just a dialect or group of dialects basically just used the "dialect with an army and navy" reasoning. This seems highly imperialist to me - to say that Low German is just a dialect because it can be subverted by a nation that doesn't use it.

I know that such distinctions are not so simple, but I would just like to know this: Can a High German speaker with absolutely no prior exposure to Low German understand the majority of what a Low German speaker says? Can a High German speaker have a full conversation with a Low German speaker, while each of them only uses their own dialect/language? If they can, then I (without any formal learning of German) would agree that Low German is a dialect. But if they can't, then I would classify Low German as a language. Sometimes, I think it's good to step away from all of the technical stuff and just understand it in simpler terms.

At any rate, no matter whether Low German is a dialect or a language, I think that the pro-dialect words are too strong and seem to imply that that position is objective and the other position is not objective, but rather "motivated" by some un-scientific, provincial reason. However, as far as I have read, the "linguistics jury" is out on this, and forever will be. Thus, even the "scholarly" dialect argument is based merely on a preference for that term instead of the other. --Riction 02:48, 18 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Mutual comprehensibility is certainly not the key criterion. However, since it is not irrelevant either, and since you asked the question, the answer is that a speaker of standard German who has no prior knowledge of non-standard forms, can understand as much Low German as he can Bavarian or Swabian; how much that is will depend on his intelligence and innate linguistic adaptability, but at any rate, in so far as mutual comprehensibility contributes to a definition of dialect, it would suggest that either every German dialect is a language or none of them are.  To say Bavarian is a dialect but Low German is a language is only possible if you are thinking politically rather than linguistically.  --Doric Loon 12:51, 18 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Riction: I was following you up to the point where you suddenly pulled a completely new criterion out of the hat and suggested we used that ;) — I think we will have to accept that the status of Low German won't be decided on this talk page. What should get across in the article in one way or another, I think, is this:


 * There are two different opinions; one favouring the language category, the other favouring the dialect category.


 * Linguistics isn't particularly interested in the question and doesn't offer a simple answer, but the community of Low German scholars [on German universities] seems more or less to operate on the assumption that Low German is a dialect of German.


 * The language's "fans," that is to say, those who are promoting its use – by such means as reading contests, theatre groups, newspaper columns, radio features, etc. – oftentimes stress that in their opinion Low German is an independent language.


 * As for who has the better arguments, well … we know that the "dialect" side at least tries to establish some objetive criteria. --SKopp 15:24, 24 July 2007 (UTC)


 * but the community of Low German scholars [on German universities] seems more or less to operate on the assumption that Low German is a dialect of German. That's not quite right. That question is also discussed by Low German scolars. Wirrer for examples arguments in favour of language, Stellmacher in favour of dialect(s) (as I mentioned above).
 * we know that the "dialect" side at least tries to establish some objetive criteria. You just look the the Low German community. Its arguments are more "emotional". However, there are also objective criteria in favour of language:
 * diachronical view: Old Saxon and Middle Low German are considered to be languages, the New Low German dialects mostly preserve the phonological criteria that separated OS and MLG from Old High German and Middle High German. (I just mentioned that above.) Of course that argument does not refer to similarities to High German but has only a historical dimension. The criterion of dissimilarity is quite emotional and is not an objective criterion (I just quote Doric Loon here, because I couldn't say it better: the answer is that a speaker of standard German who has no prior knowledge of non-standard forms, can understand as much Low German as he can Bavarian or Swabian; how much that is will depend on his intelligence and innate linguistic adaptability. I could also add Dutch dialects because they are also similiar to German.).
 * sociolinguistic view: LG has no standardised orthography and is not used in all aspects of communication (scientific texts etc.). That would be the strongest objective criterion against language (cf. Goossens, Stellmacher et al.). However, you could also say that about other "languages", cf. Frisian, Sorbian, Indian and African languages etc.
 * The second argument is also used by linguists (it's in German, I'm afraid). The first one is often neglected because most of today's definitions (whether they vote for or against dialect)use a synchronic point of view (cf. Wirrer, Goossens Schuppenhauer). By the way: in Low German philology there is no fight between dialect and language. I've got the impression that only the Low German organisations fight for language because of its seemingly higher reputation. That's why LG is today one of Europe's "regional languages". I think it's a good idea to show both positions in that article. --89.53.11.29 21:28, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

While I'm totally unemotional whether Low German is a language or a dialect I am somewhat surprised that the number of people who speak Low German is an argument in this. Until World War II Low German was widely spoken in Northern Germany. I cannot believe that the fact that we have neglected our cultural heritage and let so many children grow up without Low German would have an impact on defining Low German as a language or dialect. Surly that definition must be something justifiable by the characteristics of Low German itself, regardless of how many people speak it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.225.81.43 (talk) 05:39, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

I have limited ability to judge any of the scholarly arguments put forward either way on this argument, but for the Wikipedia, if there is a clear international arbiter of such disputes, then their view should be followed. SIL International is the sole Registration Authority appointed by ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) for the registration of languages (ISO 639-3), designating each with a separate 3 letter code. They recognise this language with the alternate names of Low Saxon and Low German under code NDS (also giving alternate names Neddersassisch, Niedersaechsisch, Nedersaksisch, Plattdütsch, Nedderdütsch), but treat the variations on the dutch side of the border as a series of languages within the Low Saxon sub-family (e.g. Gronings - code GOS). Note that if scholars disagree with them, they are able to submit change requests, and that this is taken up widely in the linguistic community - for the year 2007 406 changes were requested to various language registrations, with 395 of the requests being approved. This included 41 requests for merger, which is what would be required to change the status of this language to that of a dialect. I'm providing the following as an 'audit trail' - see [http://www.iso.org/iso/about.htm 1. Shows what ISO is and its support by 157 countries] [http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=39534 2. ISO's explanation of 639-3] [http://www.iso.org/iso/standards_development/technical_committees/maintenance_agencies.htm#639 3. ISO's recognition of SIL International as registration authority for 639-3] [http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/default.asp 4. SIL's explanation of 639-3] [http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/scope.asp 5. SIL's description of the scope of 639-3] [http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=nds 6. SIL's description of language code NDS] [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=nds 7. More detailed description of NDS from SIL's publication 'Ethnolgue'] [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90433 8. Ethnologue page showing Low Saxon family tree] Rhillman (talk) 23:11, 19 April 2008 (UTC)


 * This thread is rather old, but as Stancollins' recent comment made me read it, I will add some comments:
 * Doric Loon said: the answer is that a speaker of standard German who has no prior knowledge of non-standard forms, can understand as much Low German as he can Bavarian or Swabian. That's not true. The German standard language is based on a mix of features of Upper German and Middle German. Low German has many features completely different from Upper and Middle German, while Bavarian and Swabian are Upper German.
 * SKopp said: the community of Low German scholars [on German universities] seems more or less to operate on the assumption that Low German is a dialect of German. That's true, but it's not really based on linguistic evidence but on convenience. When modern linguistics were established in the 19th century, German scholars researched dialects in Germany and Dutch scholars researched dialects in the Netherlands. They divided the cake along the national border, although the dialects are the same on both sides of the border (they have diverged since then due to influence of the standard languages, but back in the 19th century this influence was very limited). And Low German was covered by the German language departments of universities cause the amount of Low German research and teaching was too small to form a department of its own.
 * Riction asked: Also, imagine this - if history had unfurled in another manner and the Low Germans had established their own nation, then would Low German then be a language? If e.g. the Hanseatic League had turned from a merchant union into a political entity the national standard language of that entity would be Low German. There can be absolutely no doubt, that Low German would be seen as a language of its own if that had happened (although it most definitely wouldn't be called Low German then). If we exclude recent lexical innovations adopted into Low German due to influence of the German standard language, Low German is just as different from standard German as Dutch is.
 * IP said: in Low German philology there is no fight between dialect and language. That's not correct. In philology it is discussed too. Of course no real "fights", but there is no "fighting" by the Low German organisations either.
 * The "Low German is a dialect" argument is solely based on the fact that it is no standard language. --:Slomox:: &gt;&lt; 03:01, 19 February 2010 (UTC)