Dutch/Lesson Flemish

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The Dutch you learn in this book is standard Dutch, i.e. Dutch as spoken in the Netherlands. But what about the Dutch spoken in Belgium/Flanders? Is it the same?

Introduction

Flemish is spoken in the parts of the light-blue and orange regions (1, 22, 23). It contains Westvlaams (1), Oostvlaams (23) and Brabants (22). 21 is North Brabants and 24 is Limburgish.

What is Flemish?

Flemish (Vlaams) is the Dutch language as spoken in Flanders and parts of the Netherlands. It is a special case- not a language and not a dialect. It has no official status or anything comparable. Wikipedia says that Flemish is the term for a limited group of non-standardised dialects.

This lesson is about Flemish, i.e. the differences between Dutch as spoken in the Netherlands and in Flanders (Belgium). It does not contain all differences, but the main ones.

Why should I read or learn this?

To learn Dutch, this lesson is not required. If you e.g. want to go to Flanders, Flemish people have certainly no problem understanding the standard Dutch you learn. Still, if you want to understand them, it is a good idea to read this page.

Where is it used?

As you read above, it is a group of dialects spoken in Flanders. Flemish is spreektaal, this means it is not commonly used as written language, but as spoken language.

Flemish is even used on TV programs and in schools (by teachers). In short, people using standard Dutch in informal situations seems strange to most people.

Differences

Personal pronoun

The second-person singular jij/je is rarely spoken in Flanders. Instead you'd hear gij/ge (in standard Dutch this is archaic and only used in religious contexts).

Consequences in verb forms

The form gij always needs a t at the end of the following verb form (persoonsvorm). In regular verbs, this does not have any consequences, but irregular verbs become either regular or even more irregular:

If your knowledge of Dutch is good, you may notice that these irregular forms are actually more regular than the normal forms (moogt < mogen (stem = mo[o]g) + t, instead of "mag").

Inversion

When using inversion in standard Dutch, you don't use the ending "t", i.e. "jij bent" → "ben jij". But when using "gij", the ending "t" has to stay:

First-person singular

Note that "ik zen" is also used instead of "ik ben".

Second-person plural

When using the second-person plural form, you can use "gijle" ("jullie" in standard Dutch). This form uses the same verb forms as "gij", which is not the case in standard Dutch, so:

singular plural
English you walk you walk
Dutch jij loopt jullie lopen
Flemish gij loopt gijle loopt

You see the difference?

Objective

In standard Dutch the form u is formal and jij is informal. In Flanders, u is used for both formal and informal. This is not the case in subject, but rather in object.

To understand example sentences, you should know the following:

singular plural
subject object subject object
Dutch jij, je je, jou jullie jullie
Flemish gij, ge u gijle ulle

An example (note that this is a sentence which is very strange, but it shows better what this is about)

Other personal pronouns

The form "gijle" influences the other personal pronouns; i.e. you will sometimes hear "wijle" instead of "we"/"wij" (we) and "zijle" instead of "ze"/"zij" ('they). Note that "gijle" uses singular verb forms, while "wijle"/"zijle" uses plural verb forms, but all of them have plural meanings.

Diminutives

Dutch has diminutive forms, and in Flemish a lot of those forms can be replaced by the form: -(...)ke. Examples:

Mistakes/errors

There are some differences which are often considered erroneous rather than just dialectal.

Articles and pronouns

The articles and some pronouns differ from standard Dutch. In this case, Flemish retains more gender distinctions.

Indefinite articles: In Dutch, the difference between gender has no or little influence on these articles. Native speakers cannot distinguish masculine and feminine words. For native speakers in Flanders, they just have to follow this rule/thing to distinguish them:

The reason for this difference is that in the north the nominative replaced the accusative case, but in Flanders it went exactly the other way around. Originally Dutch had:

casemasculine feminine neuter
nominativeeen maneen(e) vrouween kind
accusativeeenen maneen(e) vrouween kind

In the north, opting for the nominative, all genders have een now, but the definite article still distinguishes neuter (het) from m/f (de). In the south, opting for the accusative, the indefinite article has kept masculine and feminine distinct as well.

Demonstrative pronouns: Some examples:

Vocabulary

Flemish has a lot of influence from French. See w:nl:Lijst van verschillen tussen het Nederlands in Nederland, Suriname en Vlaanderen for a complete list.

Pronunciation

Flemish people often do not pronounce word-final letters. Some examples:

While in the Netherlands the r is being less spoken, in Flemish the h is rarely pronounced:

And of course, like in the whole area of the Dutch language (except the West Flemish and Low Saxon areas), the n' in the suffix -en is rarely articulated:

See also

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