Re: Newest natlang?

Selon Dirk Elzinga <dirk.elzinga@...>:

> Funny story. I was an exchange student in the Netherlands during the school
> year 1989-1990, and Nelson Mandela was released from prison during this
> time. It was major world news, so of course the Dutch media outlets sent
> representatives there to report on the story. As I recall, the Dutch and
> Afrikaaners would address each other in their respective languages without
> any need for interpreters. However, the Dutch media had (have?) a policy
> that foreign languages must be subtitled on television programming, so the
> whole exchange was "translated" for the audience back home.
>
Not only foreign languages. If someone speaks in a Dutch dialect deemed (by
whatever rule of thumb) too different from standard, they will be subtitled as
well.

This has led to a time when I asked to my husband what weird dialect of Dutch
that particular woman was speaking on TV, just to get a reply that she was
speaking Swedish!

Oh, and yes, the policy is alive and well, as it should be. Subtitling is less
intrusive and more practical (and cheaper) than voice-overs.

As a foreigner speaking Dutch conversationally, I personally find Afrikaans
relatively difficult to understand, on the level of unfamiliar Dutch dialects
like Drents and Gronings, but not as difficult as Fries, which is a different
language altogether. Written Afrikaans, on the other hand, is quite easy to
read.
--
Christophe Grandsire-Koevoets.

http://christophoronomicon.blogspot.com
http://www.christophoronomicon.nl

It takes a straight mind to create a twisted conlang.

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