Limburgish
[4] In the Dutch province of Limburg, all dialects, despite their differences, have been given collectively a regional language status, including those comprising "Limburgish" as used in this article.
In the area around the old Duchy of Limburg the main language today is French, but there is also a particular cluster of Limburgish (or Limburgish-like, depending on definitions) dialects.
The term Limburgish can refer to all varieties spoken within either the Belgian or Dutch province of Limburg, the South-East of Flemish Brabant, the North-East of Liège as well as in combination with the adjacent Rhineland region in a Limburgian-Ripuarian context.
Regardless of the exact definition used, the term Limburgish itself is specific to the Netherlands and Belgium, where it used by linguists and speakers alike and is strongly connected to the cultural and regional identity of the inhabitants of both Belgian and Dutch Limburg.
The early medieval Limburgish writer Heinrich von Veldeke is claimed by the tradition of both Dutch and German dialectology.
[22] Currently Limburgish – although being essentially a variety of Low Franconian – still has a considerable distance from Standard Dutch with regards to phonology, morphology and lexicon.
Between 1995 and 1999, a uniform standard form called AGL (Algemein Gesjreve Limburgs, "Generally written Limburgish") was developed and proposed, but found too little support.
[citation needed] It is especially in the Dutch province of Limburg that Limburgish is used not only in everyday speech, but also often in more formal situations and on the local and regional radio.
Depending on the city in these parts of Belgium, according to A, Schuck (2001) 50% to 90% of the population speak a local or regional form of Limburgish, which seems to be a clear overestimation.
[citation needed] Moreover, research into some specific variants seems to indicate a gradual process of development towards the national standardised Dutch, especially amongst younger generations.
[32] Within the modern communities of these provinces, intermediate idiolects are also very common, which combine standard Dutch with the accent and some grammatical and pronunciation tendencies derived from Limburgish.
that the arguments put forth against the recognition of Limburgish were not based on linguistic considerations, but rather a concern for maintaining the dominance of the Dutch language.
An attempt at recognition, made after Limburgish had been recognised in the Netherlands, failed in the Belgian parliament due to Flemish opposition.
As usual inside dialect continua, neighboring languages have a maximum of similarities, and speakers being used to the rather small individual lingual differences in their immediate neighborhood perceive them as close, and familiar, while more distant ones become gradually harder to understand with distance.
All dialects in the Dutch province of Limburg spoken north of the tonality border are Kleverlandish in linguistic respect.
The dialects spoken in the most southeastern part of the Dutch province of North Brabant (i.e. in and around Budel and Maarheeze) also have many Limburgish characteristics.
This superordinating group of Low Franconian varieties (between the rivers Meuse and Rhine) is called Meuse-Rhenish (Rheinmaasländisch).
The northwestern part of this triangle came under the influence of the Dutch standard language, especially since the founding of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1815.
At the same time, the southeastern portion became part of the Kingdom of Prussia, and was subject to High German language domination.
The Northern Meuse-Rhenish dialects as spoken in the Netherlands and in Germany (a little eastward along the Rhine) are unambiguously Low Franconian.
[citation not found] South Low Franconian (Südniederfränkisch, Zuidnederfrankisch) is the term used by dialectologists in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands to describe the dialect group that encompasses the Limburgish varieties of Belgian and Dutch Limburg, and also the closely related dialects in adjacent areas in Belgium (e.g. Eupen in Liège Province) and Germany (stretching from the Dutch border to the Bergisches Land Region near Düsseldorf east of the Rhine).
[42][43] In most of the Limburgish dialects spoken to the southeast of Panningen—for example those of Roermond, Sittard and Heerlen—[ʃ] appears at the beginning of words in the consonant clusters sp, st, sl, sm, sn and zw.
The diphthongs /iə ø eɪ æɪ uɪ ɔɪ aɪ ou/[clarification needed] occur, as well as combinations of /uː ɔː ɑː/ + /j/.
In many dialects such as that of Maastricht and Sittard, the long vowel /aː/ in Dutch cognates is most of the time realized as [ɒː], as in nao ("after", "to, towards").
In about 50 Belgian Limburgish dialects, the rounded front vowels /y, yː, ø, øː, œ, œː, œy/ are unrounded to /i, iː, ɪ, eː, ɛ ~ æ, ɛː, ɛi/ in most native words.
Other Indo-European pitch accent languages that use tone contours to distinguish the meaning of words that are otherwise phonetically identical include Lithuanian, Latvian, Swedish, Norwegian, Standard Slovene (only some speakers), and Serbo-Croatian.
In addition, both the phonetic realisation and the syllable-based distribution of the contrasts between push and dragging tone seem to be mora-bound in the eastern dialects only.
This tonal shift also occurs when the adjective gets an inflectional ending, as in nen gieëlen appel ("a yellow apple").
[də ˈnɔːʀdəʀˌβɛntʃ˨ ən də ˈzɔn | βøːʀən ɑn dɪskəˈtɛːʀə | ˈeː˨vəʀ ˈβiə vɔn ɪn ˈtβɛː ət ˈstæʀ˨əkstə βøːʀ || ˈtuːn ˈkum təʀ ˈdʒys ˈei˨mɑnt vʀ̩ˈbɛː˨ | ˈdiː nən ˈdɪkə ˈβæʀmə ˈjɑs ˈɑːn˨ɦaː][52] De naorderwèndj en de zon weuren an disketaere ever wieë von hin twae het sterrekste weur, toên koem ter dzjuus eejmand verbae diê nen dikke, werme jas àànhaa.
In the masculine singular forms of mien, dien, zien and oos, final -n is added under the same phonological conditions which apply to articles and adjectives.
