Bladeitsch is hie geschwetz

1. Hoch Deutsch or High German is the language taught in school all across Germany. It is there for anyone to use. It is mostly used in the hill country to the south.

2. Plattdeutsch or Low German is a language all its own. It is there for anyone to use. It is mostly used in the flatlands to the north. It is similar to High German.

What is often confused with these two is local, dialectical German; that is, the dialects of local communities and areas, some smaller than a county. These local dialects are amazingly varied and utterly independent of High (Hoch) and Low (Platt) German - and they are everywhere.

In our town in Hessen we referred to our dialect as "bladeitsch", a dialectical version of of the word Plattdeutsch, But not THE Plattdeutsch language of the north, at all. Folks in our town would ROFL at some of our own expressions and sentence structure. I LOVE our dialect in Hessen - since I know the difference between it and Hoch and Low.

Just a couple of miles away the people referred to their dialect as "Heinerblad" or "Heinerdeitsch" or "Heinersprach". They had a particularly difficult expression, "Heiner stek er au ah oh." During carnivals and festivals one would hear the locals constantly testing others to see if they could say that. If they could not, they were not local. In High German, the same expression was "Heiner steckt er auch einen an." In Plattdeutsch one might hear "Heiner steckt er auch ei ah."

Let me give you an example of a particular dialect that is different than Plattdeutsch, and certainly different than Hoch Deutsch:

"Mittlerweile hawwe mir soviel Leit Berichte zugeschickt, wo-se vun friejere Zeide verzehle duhn, daß mer jetzt ab unn zu emol so ebbes bringe kenne. Unn sicher werd deß aach manchen jingere Ewwerschter indressiern, wie die Leit hier frijer geläbt hawwe, unn was do so alles in unserm Ewwerscht bassiert is. Also, en alde Ewwerschter verzehlt: Vorm erste Weltkriesch unn aach noch denooch sinn alsemol Zerkuss nooch Ewwerscht kumme. De greeßte woar de Hagenbeck. Der hott dann mit seune viele Wäje de ganze Maggtblatz eugenumme."

Different than High, different than THE low, ROFL for German speakers! Try running THAT through a computer translation program!

Bottom line: High German is preferred speech in some areas of Germany, Low German in others. Draw a line through Germany from West to East through the city of Kassel, and from Kassel northeast to Rostock. High is in the northwest segment, and low is south of the line. But dialectical German is everywhere, different between towns that are only a few miles apart! One person who speaks High, Low, and some dialectical German required interpetation by me when we traveled in far southern Germany, Austria, and Switzerland! I had to interpret! A person who does not speak German cannot possibly understand these nuances and wholesale differences! Persons emigrating from Germany to other countries might refer to their particular dialect as "low", but NOT meaning the particular Plattdeutsch spoken mostly in the north!

In several mailing list discussions, most of us are talking about apples and oranges. To further complicate matters, there are many varieties of apples, and oranges are grown in many places on earth.

Don

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