2017611 HowdifferentaretheDutchandGermanlanguages?

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Dutch(language) German(language) SpecificLanguages Linguistics Comparisons

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How dierent are the Dutch and German languages?
WhatisitlikeforaGermantohearDutch?

11Answers WhatarethedifferencesbetweenDutchandGerman
languages?
Angela Obosi, Understanding Dutch does not help much with Flat German, how
DoGermanandDutchdiffergrammaticallyinany
annoying!
way?
Updated16Apr2016
Don't know if I just don't nd the question odd, because my English isn't that good. I HowoldistheDutchlanguage?
understand the question asking for particular dierences and will try to answer it that way.
WhydoesSwissGermansoundsosimilartoDutch,
Well, I also do not know Dutch very well. I'm just listing the dierences I mean to know butnottoHighGerman?
(Dutch speakers are welcome to edit).
What'scloser,ScotsandEnglishorDutchand
German?
Dutch has some more sounds than German, and these sounds are hard to speak for
Germans. Examples are "ui" (nd a sound example below) and "schr". AFAIK What'ssodifficultaboutDutch?
German has no sounds that aren't familiar to Dutch speakers.
WhatisthelanguageborderbetweenGermanand
Dutchlike?

CanDutchandGermanscommunicatewitheach
otherintheirownlanguage?

HowisAfrikaansdifferentfrommodernDutch?

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In German only some dialects use a rolling R. Dutch has several R sounds. In Dutch
dialects the use of R sounds varies a bit, but all dialects have words with a rolling R-
sound.

In vocabulary one can see that Dutch, German and English have the same root
(West Germanic languages). Dutch is more closely related to English than to
German.

(source: West Germanic languages )

German has undergone several consonant shifts. Some of them aected Dutch too,
but not English. Most of them didn't even inuence all German dialects and didn't
reach Dutch (High German consonant shift ).

A dierent adoption of words especially from Latin, French and English is the
reason for some more dierences in today's vocabulary of Dutch and German (for
instance gift: it's 'cadeau' in Dutch and 'Geschenk' in German).

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There are a lot of false cognates - words that seem to be the same but aren't. Just
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one example: 'viese enkel'. In Dutch that means 'dirty ankle'. In German it means SignIn
'mean grandchildren'.

In Grammar you also see the shared roots and clear dierences. Dutch has genders
as well as German. But (btw. like most North Germanic languages) there are only
two of them: a common gender that corresponds to male and female in German
and a neuter gender which German has too. Also conjugation has similarities, but
generally diers.

Edit: How could I forget spelling? There are sounds that are spelled dierently, for
instance [x] is written 'g' in Dutch and 'ch' in German. Dutch has very consistent
spelling rules that usually allow to guess the spelling from the sound of a word and
otherwise the sound of an unknown word often can be correctly reproduced from
the written word. German spelling contains a lot of ancient oddities, much more
original spelling of adopted words and more variations of the same 'function'.
Example: Dutch has very strict rules how to spell a long spoke vocal. If needed a
vocal can be made made long by duplicating itself, 'i' by writing 'ie'. So a long 'o' can
be 'o' or 'oo' depending on strict rules about the sounds place in the syllable. In
German the spelling of a long 'o' sound can be written 'o', 'oh' or 'oo', a long 'i' sound
can be 'i', 'ih', 'ie' and 'y' .

Remark: Edits regarding my English are much appreciated too.

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RelatedQuestions MoreAnswersBelow

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WhatisitlikeforaGermantohearDutch?
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WhatarethedifferencesbetweenDutchandGermanlanguages?

DoGermanandDutchdiffergrammaticallyinanyway?

HowoldistheDutchlanguage?

WhydoesSwissGermansoundsosimilartoDutch,butnottoHighGerman?

Martijn Sjoorda, Native.

Answered14Nov2013UpvotedbyMarcEttlinger,PhD,Linguistics,UCBerkeley.

When you want to look at it from a scientic, linguistics perspective in terms of grammar
and deep structure: pretty dierent, but I love leaving that to the resident genius in that
eld, our dear Mr. Marc Ettlinger.

In the day to day, if you are reasonably intelligent, you can master reading Dutch or German
as a German or a Dutch person and getting 80% of what you are reading in the space of a
few weeks. A two week vacation (with maybe a strong accelerator such as a teenage holiday
romance) is usually enough to be able to entertain a basic conversation or at least
understanding most of what another is saying in either language that's not your mother
tongue.

17.7kViews28Upvotes

David Rosson, Linguist cum Software Engineer

Answered14Nov2013UpvotedbyMarcEttlinger,PhD,Linguistics,UCBerkeley.

They are supposedly the descendant and codied versions of what used to be at the two
ends of a dialect continuum .

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See also:
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Receptive multilingualism as a language mode in the Dutch-German border area SignIn
Overview on Google Books
Summary: PDF Link

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