As a language,

you need a
standard to live
(by)
Marko Simonovic
(Universiteit Utrecht)
T

Paradigm1: Dialect vs. Language

The classical dichotomy in Europe since the Romanticism
(usually with political implications).
The “linguistic” word dialect is one of the champions of
the common discourse.

- Italy: “Sardinian is a dialect of Italian.”

- Norway: “Kven is a dialect of Finnish.”
- Bulgaria: “Macedonian is a dialect of Bulgarian.”
- Serbia: “Croatian is a dialect of Serbian.”
Assumption: Everything is either a separate language or
a dialect of another language.
Paradigm 2: Dialect vs. Regional
Language vs. State language

Since 1992, the implementation of the European Charter

for Regional or Minority Languages (Lane 2011) ushers a
third “kind”: Regional languages, whose definition “does
not include either dialects of the official language(s) of the
State or the languages of migrants.”
Method: Agential Realism (Barad
2007)

“Apparatuses are specific material reconfigurings

of the world that do not merely emerge in time but
iteratively reconfigure spacetimematter as part of
the ongoing dynamism of becoming” (142).

"Apparatuses produce differences that matter -

they are boundary-making practices that are
formative of matter and meaning, productive of,
and part of, the phenomena produced." (146)
Agential Realism (Barad 2007)
Agential Cuts
“Agential cuts – intra-actions – don’t produce (absolute)
separation, they engage in agential separability –
differentiating and entangling (that’s one move, not
successive processes). Agential cuts radically rework
relations of joining and disjoining.” (2010: 265)

● This move replaces subjects&objects as pre-existing

entities by ongoing intra-action in which agential cuts
are produced.
● Agential cuts are produced within apparatuses

For our purposes: Paradigm 1 & Paradigm 2 are parts of

apparatuses wthin which agential cuts are enacted.
The Charter: The Preamble
“The member States of the Council of Europe signatory
hereto,
[....]
Stressing the value of interculturalism and multilingualism
and considering that the protection and encouragement of
regional or minority languages should not be to the
detriment of the official languages and the need to learn
them;”
Cutting apart-together: Official languages and Regional
languages; State and RL community
T

The Charter: The Preamble

Realising that the protection and promotion of regional or
minority languages in the different countries and regions of
Europe represent an important contribution to the building
of a Europe based on the principles of democracy and
cultural diversity within the framework of national
sovereignty and territorial integrity;
Taking into consideration the specific conditions and
historical traditions in the different regions of the European
States”
Cutting apart-together: Official languages and Regional
languages; State and RL community.
The Charter: the definition
"regional or minority languages" means languages that
are:
i. traditionally used within a given territory of a State by
nationals of that State who form a group numerically
smaller than the rest of the State's population; and
ii. different from the official language(s) of that State;
it does not include either dialects of the official language
(s) of the State or the languages of migrants;
The Netherlands: “The initial state”
- the whole country
is parsed by
“regional” names
for local varieties

- some dialects are

more “standard-
like”, but none is
necessarily non-
Dutch
The Netherlands
Frisian has been recognised as the official language of
Friesland/Fryslân from 1956.

Ever since, in common discourse, there have been claims

that “Frisian is a dialect of Dutch.”

The remaining “dialects” were dialects of Dutch (with

some recognition of the continuum with German dialects)
until the ratification of the Charter, when Low Saxon
(1996) and Limburgian (1997) got the status of regional
languages (Dutch: streektaal).
Implementation of the Charter in the
Netherlands
Regional languages: Protectable linguistic
otherness within the state’s borders

Dutch Low Saxon German Low Saxon

Dutch Frisian Geman Frisian

Dutch Limburgian Belgian Limburgian

(because the latter is not an entity)
Plasterk contra Frisian
Ronald Plasterk

- now Minister of the Interior and Kingdom

Relations
- 2007 - 2010 Minister of Education, Culture
and Science
- PhD in Biology
- resistant to linguistic discourses
Plasterk (2005)
“Isn’t it weird that school children in Limburg
and Drenthe and The Hague, where I myself
come from, are not allowed to drop a serious
subject in order to fiddle around in their local
dialect for a bit, but in Friesland they are?”
Plasterk (2005): linguistic arguments
A piece of text from the journal of the Fryske Akademie,
of which he concludes that that Frisian is:
“simply Dutch, written phonetically, and with some
dialect pronunciation, as in the whole Eastern and
Northern Netherlands”
plus “loanwords which all Dutch 5-year olds spell wrong,
e.g. [...] etalage “shop window”, which they spell as
etalaazje, but then they go to school and learn that it’s
wrong; except in Friesland, where they learn it is Frisian.”

Plasterk’s apparatus: intelligibility, word-by-word

translatability, restrictedness of linguistics features.
Plasterk (2005)

“Why does everyone in Holland seem to believe that

Frisian is a separate language, whereas there are more
Turkish speakers in Amsterdam than Frisian speakers in
Leeuwarden? [...] I have nothing against Frisian, as long as
everyone gets that it is as much of a fairy tale as the
Efteling is.”

Apparatus: Number of speakers/functioning community.

Plasterk (2007)
Plasterk-the-minister symbolically apologises by delivering
a speech in Frisian in Ljouwert. However, he concludes:

“[... I]f you ever come to the Hague, I challenge you to

deliver a speech to me in Haags, the language I was raised
in, as an urban dialect much lower on the ladder of
prestige, but therefore not less interesting, and surely not
less dry.”

Technique: Calling every linguistic otherness a language.

Taalunie contra Limburgian
Taalunie (founded in 1980) is unique intergovernmental
organisation of the countries using Dutch as their official
language. The Taalunie is managed by a Comité van
Ministers (Committee of Ministers) comprising the Dutch
and Flemish ministers for culture and education.

In June 1999 the Flemish authorities asked the Taalunie for

advice concerning the recognition of Limburgian, also given
the fact that recognition has already taken place by the
Netherlands.
In July 1999 the Taalunie issued a negative advice.
Taalunie (1999)
“[I]n all scientific literature, both diachronic and synchronic,
Limburgs is always considered a dialect of Dutch and not a
separate language.”
Plus, since “Limburgs is considered a dialect in the
Netherlands as well, the recognition is a form of
discrimination with respect to other dialects, such as
Zeeuws and Achterhoeks.”
Finally, if Limburgs and the other Dutch dialects get
recognised, there could be consequences for “the status
and use of Dutch, since speakers of recognised regional
languages cannot be considered native speakers of Dutch.”

Apparatus: Monolingual norm

Well spotted, Plasterk - Lexical
entanglement
Dutch: Europees Handvest voor regionale talen
of talen van minderheden

Frisian: Jeropeeske Hânfêst foar regionale

talen of talen fan minderheden

Limburgian: Europees Haandvest veur

regionale talen of talen van minderhejen

Low Saxon: Europees Haandvest vör regionaal

Well spotted, Plasterk - Lexical
entanglement
German: Europäische Charta der Regional- oder
Minderheitensprachen

German Low Saxon: Europääsche Charta vun de Regional-

oder Minnerheitenspraken

Luxemburgish: Europäesch Charta fir Regional- oder

Minoritéitssproochen

Plasterk uses this to (re)install the Separable Vocabulary

Norm.
Well spotted, Taalunie - community
entanglement

● Regional languages are spoken by bilingual

communities (if there are communities).

● Limburgian/Low Saxon/Frisian accent in

Dutch is not foreign, and most probably not
L2.
The Taalunie uses this to reinstall the
Monolingual Norm.
Entangled languages
● Good example of Baradian relata which do
not pre-exist the relation

● Dutch regional languages are entangled

with Dutch

● Most European languages may show some

level of lexical entanglement with English
The Charter missed the level in NL?
● Dutch regional languages may turn out to
depend on Dutch for new terminology, but
also for establishing commonalities within
the regional language (due to shared
knowledge of standard Dutch)
● This may mean that most products of
emancipatory interventions (as the one
Plasterk received) may make the regional
languages only more dutchified
The Charter missed the level in NL?
Could it be the case that in the specific case
the object of state protection is ill-defined?
(It seems that the Charter actually works with the
assumption “Everything is either a separate language or
a dialect of another language”. This leads to
contradictions in the case of entangled varieties.)
What are other protectable linguistic entities?
● Constellations & Practices
● Intelligibilities
● Linguistic cultures