Talk:History of German

Untitled

Looking at the German article I wonder if Low Saxon should be included here, afterall Modern German is rooted in Old High German, not Low Saxon.

I propose to move the Low Saxon bits, and make a new article out of them. Rex 13:46, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Comments:

The modern standard language is only one variety of German, and a pretty recent one at that - it doesn't provide any basis for deciding what is and is not part of the German language over the entirety of its history. A History of German page should cover all varieties of German. And there's no need for a new article - there's a Low German article already in existence. --Pfold 16:32, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

I understand that, but this is the intro:

"The history of the German language as separate from common West Germanic begins in the Early Middle Ages with the High German consonant shift. Old High German, Middle High German and Early Modern High German span the duration of the Holy Roman Empire. The 19th and 20th centuries saw the rise of Standard German and a decrease of dialectal variety."

It this clearly is about High German, which is the ancestor of modern Standard German, the language is question here. I think it would be better to move the pieces on Low Saxon to the article on Low Saxon languages, and keep this article strictly focussed on the evolution of todays German language. Rex 17:44, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Removing sections

This article, according to the article, is about the history of the German language, the modern language of Germany, which is derived from High German dialects. Why should this article also mention Low Saxon (All of the Low Saxon sections are included in the Low Saxon article btw.) as wel? Even the German article only mentioned Old, Middle, New High German and contempory German. I really don't see why they should be included, could someone please explain why they shouldn't be removed.  Rex  14:33, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

this is silly. This is not the "history of Standard German" or the "history of High German", it is the history of the German language, including Low German. I see no reason why you might want to remove reference to Low German. I know you are unhappy with some terminology, but even from a Dutch nationalist perspective (which I know you hold from other articles), I don't see how your removal may be motivated. That the German article is incomplete is hardly a reason to mutilate the English one. It is preposterous to say that the modern German language is "derived from High German dialects". As you can learn from the very German language article,

The variation among the German dialects is considerable, with only the neighbouring dialects being mutually intelligible. Some dialects are not intelligible to people who only know standard German. However, all German dialects belong to the dialect continuum of High German and Low Saxon languages.

Sure, Low German is today spoken by a small minority. This is no reason to ignore it, especially in a historical article, since historically, Low German was much more widespread. As for your point that there are Old Saxon and Middle Saxon articles, well, this is WP:SS, and you could remove the Old High German section on the same grounds, since we have an Old High German article.

dab (ᛏ) 17:44, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

(Apart from the fact that I'm not a Dutch nationalist, furthermore how would my edits interest a Dutch nationalist?) Then you might want to rewrite this article (and edit the article on German wikipedia). The intro of this article is the following:

The history of the German language as separate from common West Germanic begins in the Early Middle Ages with the High German consonant shift.

How can you link this to Low Saxon? Also, after middle saxon, nothing is said about Low saxon ... as if it went extinct (and in a way it did).  Rex  19:18, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

well, you seem to imply that Dutch is fundamentally different from German all the time. I gladly recognize that you do not think of yourself as a nationalist, but, from your edits, you seem to have some sort of obsession with "Dutchness". I realize that Low German never underwent the 2nd sound shift. It is known as German nevertheless. Also, the 2nd sound shift is not a clear isogloss, but rather a whole bundle of isoglosses, and "Upper" vs. "Central" German is an attempt to capture those in a simplified scheme. The intro is correct, the categorization and development of the various dialects known as "German" are dominated by the process of the 2nd sound shift. That doesn't mean that they all participated. I don't know why we are debating this, seeing the simple fact that Low German is considered "German": either you accept this, or you need to point out according to whom Low Saxon falls outside the term "German". dab (ᛏ) 19:55, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

So that means you will change the German wikipedia article?  Rex  19:59, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that this article is a quick-and-easy orientation article which only serves the purpose of leading into other articles. Therefore this is in any case not the case for controversies or complications, which rather belong in the main articles which are linked from here. So the real question here is what will help the beginner most. I would say, include everything: certainly Old Saxon, but why not also modern Low German, which currently lacks a section in the article. The Low German article can then discuss whether LG is really German or not. (PS - the Old High German section needs tidied up.) --Doric Loon 22:47, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Alright, but in my opinion that means this article needs to be more general, more explaining. Now it just looks like the history of standard German (thus OHG -MHG -SG) with the history of Low Saxon added just for the sake of it being German as well.  Rex  23:03, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

"alright", and then you go and remove them anyway? bad style if you ask me. dab (ᛏ) 08:15, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I did not remove information, I relocated it, and action inspired by Angr. Every interwiki article on this article is about High German, not Low and High German, even the German wikipedia. German today refers to High German, Standard German. This article is now once again selfcontradicting. Rex 12:28, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Again ...

Because of this articles style and the inclusion of the history of Low Saxon this article is selfcontradicting. If no one (with opposing views) reponds to this message I'll remove the sections on Low Saxon in 4 days.Rex 17:39, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

why? you know that I'm opposed to that. Low German is part of the history of German. what is the contradiction? If you like we can discuss organization of the article, maybe separate High and Low German in two h2 sections. I do not propose duplication of material, WP:SS is fine. dab (𒁳) 17:41, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Okay, that was really fast :-)

Dbachman, this is the current intro:

The history of German as separate from common West Germanic begins in the Early Middle Ages with the High German consonant shift. Old High German, Middle High German and Early Modern High German span the duration of the Holy Roman Empire. The 19th and 20th centuries saw the rise of Standard German and a decrease of dialectal variety.

Where do you see a sentence refering to Low Saxon? To me, this article says it's about the long road from Germanic dialect towards the modern German language, this doesn't (directly) include Low Saxon. Just look at the German wikipedia article, it too does not refer to Low Saxon.

I know Low Saxon is a part of the history of the German language but it's a bit like Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals. Both are related, have the same ancestor, but the Neanderthals are not the ancestors of modern humans in the same way that Low Saxon isn't the ancestor of modern German. I don't mind the article mentioning Low Saxon, but it should play a much lesser role than it is playing now.Rex 17:49, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

that's not a contradiction, then, but just missing bits in the intro. I do see the problem, of course, but if this is to be the History of High German, where do we treat the History of Low German? I will be happy to summarize discussion of Low German here, and branch out detailed discussion somewhere else. There is still no getting around the fact that "German language" refers to both High and Low German. Old Saxon isn't the ancestor of Standard German, but it is, of course, the ancestor of modern Low German dialects. We can agree, then, to re-organize the ToC to treat Low German in a separate h2 section. dab (𒁳) 17:52, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Oh please you and I both now that "German" in nearly all cases referes to High German. And if that's the case then why not turn "History of German" in a dismbig page? Rex 18:12, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

"German" is often taken as "High German" because the Low variety was marginalized in Early Modern times; this is the history article, its scop including times before Low German was marginalized. dab (𒁳) 18:36, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

This article is written now. When people say German they almost always mean High German, not Low Saxon. So when people want to know about the history of German, they generally want to know about the direct line from PG to SG.Rex 19:22, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Flag

Although the Federal Republic of Germany today is the country with the most German native speakers, I think it is not correct to use the German tricolor flag representing the language. It is like using only the Union Jack or the Stars and Stripes to represent the English language. German is also the official language of Austria and Switzerland (and Liechtenstein and Luxembourg), and recognized minority language in several other countries. An alternative would be this flag: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:D-A-CH_Flag.svg

Even better would be to drop the flag at all (it is not used in the German version of the article!). --El bes 21:37, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

The flag is part of the {{History of Germany}} template, and it's appropriate there, and the template is appropriate here. —Angr 08:19, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I see, it is a technical problem, that would be complicated to fix. But I want to emphasize again, that the history of the German language is not only related to the history of Germany. As a comparison, there is no such template nor flag in the article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_English_language --El bes 19:48, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I see no reason to slap the {{History of Germany}} template on this article. We don't sport a {{history of India}} topic at Sanskrit or a {{History of France}} one at Gaulish language. --dab (𒁳) 05:10, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Phonology

It would be really nice if it were possible to see the phological development of German... The Jade Knight (talk) 17:26, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Incorrect map

The map "Sprachenkarte Deutschland1880.png" is currently used in this article. This 19th century map, made during arguably the height of (ethno-)nationalism in Europe; especially in newly founded Germany, is inaccurate. It shows Dutch as part of the German language; or rather, it shows German being spoken in the Netherlands and Flanders. Modern linguists, just like many contemporary French, Dutch and English linguists, have - in the past 130 years - completely changed this image.

Let it be clear that I'm not trying to prove Dutch isn't German, which would be ridiculous as discussions involving "French is Italian" or "German is Dutch" would make about as much sense. I would like to see this map removed because it;

• Represents a biased (i.e 19th century German) point of view.
• Makes linguistic distintions which are completly obsolete and proven to be wrong.
• Offensive towards speakers of the Dutch language.

If someone would like to adapt this map to modern linguistics (which I think is possible as it seems to be in the public domain) then that's okay; but there is no reason, whatsoever, to keep this obsolete, inaccurate and offensive map in this article. I am removing it, until supporters of the map add their arguments in this section. Westbrabander (talk) 18:32, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

The map is not inaccurate per se; it shows Low German (not "German", which refers to High German) being spoken in the Netherlands and Flanders, and one definition of Low German, according to our article, is: "the closely-related, continental West Germanic language family unaffected by the High German consonant shift, nor classifying as Anglo-Frisian, and thus including Low Franconian varieties such as Dutch". That may not be the most widespread definition of Low German nowadays, but it's a valid definition now, and certainly was a valid definition at the time the map was made. You say the map "represents a biased point of view". Yes, it does; but so would a map showing Low Franconian as separate from Low German, and so would any other map. There's no getting around it, so it's better to include a helpful and informative map and explain the map's POV in the caption than to remove it entirely. You say it "makes linguistic distintions [sic] which are completly [sic] obsolete and proven to be wrong". I think you mean it fails to make linguistic distinctions which are generally held to be correct (namely that Low Franconian and Low German are distinct), but again, any map has to make some overgeneralizations to avoid information overload. If the map distinguished Dutch from Low Saxon, someone could still come along and say it fails to distinguish the Dutch Low Saxon varieties from each other and from the Low Saxon of Germany. Or that it fails to distinguish the various Low Franconian varieties, or that it fails distinguish Limburgish, or something. No map can be perfect, and this map is not significantly less perfect than any alternative. Next, you describe this map as "offensive towards speakers of the Dutch language". I frankly don't see how any educated Dutch speaker could possibly be offended by this map, but if so, once again, the same thing would be true of any possible replacement. There will always be someone who finds something "offensive". Removing the map from the article removes the only map this article has of the territory of the continental West Germanic languages in the modern era, and for absolutely no valid reason. +Angr 19:57, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

In modern, especially in material published by German linguists, Low German refers to Low Saxon and is no longer used as a term meaning both Dutch/Low Franconian and Low Saxon which has no linguistic basis. The map is old incorrect, and has to go.Westbrabander (talk) 21:17, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:History of English which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 17:45, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:History of English which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 13:16, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Second paragraph too political

The second paragraph of the article is overly focused on the aftermath of the Second World War and contains political overtones that are inappropriate for an article on language. It should be deleted in its entirety.

Particularly inappropriate is the use of the term "German catastrophe" without definition and without an acknowledgement as to its history and meaning. This is a term invented by a particular historian, Friedrich Meinecke, who was anti-Semitic and supported the invasion of Poland. The term cannot be separated from its origin, and should be removed.

Agreed - I'll remove it. In fact the whole lead could really do with a rewrite.--Pfold (talk) 09:43, 6 April 2021 (UTC)