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I watched this documentary last night, about a Mennonite colony in Belize where transport links have become sufficiently present that the more conservative members were unhappy with the attractions of mobile phones and the possibility of prompt medical care in the context of emergencies(!). This led to an exodus to a new colony in the Peruvian Amazon, with no significant existing infrastructure.

I found the Plattdeutsch very hard going; I suspect most German-speakers would, absent also knowing Dutch or time in very rural northern Germany.

The English they speak reminds me of the occasional German or Dutch-speaker IrCOve met with poor English. It is very odd to see white people of European descent with such enthusiasm for subsistence farming!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2LFy0PCe8s
--
rCyAs I sat looking up at the Guinness ad, I could never figure out /
How your man stayed up on the surfboard after fourteen pints of stoutrCO
(C. Moore)
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On 16/06/26 20:50, Aidan Kehoe wrote:

I watched this documentary last night, about a Mennonite colony in
Belize where transport links have become sufficiently present that
the more conservative members were unhappy with the attractions of
mobile phones and the possibility of prompt medical care in the
context of emergencies(!). This led to an exodus to a new colony in
the Peruvian Amazon, with no significant existing infrastructure.

I found the Plattdeutsch very hard going; I suspect most
German-speakers would, absent also knowing Dutch or time in very
rural northern Germany.

The English they speak reminds me of the occasional German or
Dutch-speaker IrCOve met with poor English. It is very odd to see white people of European descent with such enthusiasm for subsistence
farming!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2LFy0PCe8s

There was a significant German community that grew up in the
wine-growing part of South Australia, starting in the 1840s and 1850s,
probably as the result of religious conflict in Prussia. Sorry, I don't
know where from, although I've seen reference to the Harz mining region. Eventually they became of interest to linguists because of the
old-fashioned nature of their dialect; I gather that it was, by the 20th century, significantly different from the German of Germany.

During WWI and WW2 Germans were unpopular in Australia, so many of those
people changed their names and became wary of speaking German. I don't
know whether the language has since died out.
--
Peter Moylan peter@pmoylan.org http://www.pmoylan.org
Newcastle, NSW
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Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> wrote:

I watched this documentary last night, about a Mennonite colony in Belize where transport links have become sufficiently present that the more conservative members were unhappy with the attractions of mobile phones
and the possibility of prompt medical care in the context of
emergencies(!). This led to an exodus to a new colony in the Peruvian
Amazon, with no significant existing infrastructure.

I found the Plattdeutsch very hard going; I suspect most German-speakers would, absent also knowing Dutch or time in very rural northern Germany.

Standard Dutch is really 'Hollands', mostly, [1]
but it has long been incorrect to call it that.
(except in some foreign languages, like 'Oranda' in Japanese)

The native dialects of regions outside Holland and Utrecht
(for example Drente, or Limburg, or much of Flanders)
may be incomprehensible to those who know only standard Dutch.
The same goes for the German dialects spoken across the border.
OTOH those who speak 'Limburgs' will understand the German dialects
from the other side of the border,

Jan

[1] In particular the 'Hollands' as spoken in Haarlem.




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Ar an s|-|| l|i d|-ag de m|! Meitheamh, scr|!obh Peter Moylan:

[...] There was a significant German community that grew up in the wine-growing part of South Australia, starting in the 1840s and 1850s, probably as the result of religious conflict in Prussia. Sorry, I don't know where from, although I've seen reference to the Harz mining region.

Looks like all over, though very few from Austria:

https://sahistoryhub.history.sa.gov.au/subjects/germans-in-south-australia/

The initial wine growing settlement was from the Rheinland, which makes sense, Brandenburg with its rainy climate and the rest of core Prussia didnrCOt have many people comfortable with viticulture.

Eventually they became of interest to linguists because of the old-fashioned nature of their dialect; I gather that it was, by the 20th century, significantly different from the German of Germany.

During WWI and WW2 Germans were unpopular in Australia, so many of those people changed their names and became wary of speaking German. I don't
know whether the language has since died out.

IrCOm not aware of any extant German-speaking community in Australia, I imagine I
would have heard of them if they existed.
--
rCyAs I sat looking up at the Guinness ad, I could never figure out /
How your man stayed up on the surfboard after fourteen pints of stoutrCO
(C. Moore)
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Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> posted:

Ar an s|-|| l|i d|-ag de m|! Meitheamh, scr|!obh Peter Moylan:

[...] There was a significant German community that grew up in the wine-growing part of South Australia, starting in the 1840s and 1850s, probably as the result of religious conflict in Prussia. Sorry, I don't know
where from, although I've seen reference to the Harz mining region.

Looks like all over, though very few from Austria:

https://sahistoryhub.history.sa.gov.au/subjects/germans-in-south-australia/

The initial wine growing settlement was from the Rheinland, which makes sense,
Brandenburg with its rainy climate and the rest of core Prussia didnrCOt have many people comfortable with viticulture.

Eventually they became of interest to linguists because of the old-fashioned
nature of their dialect; I gather that it was, by the 20th century, significantly different from the German of Germany.

During WWI and WW2 Germans were unpopular in Australia, so many of those people changed their names and became wary of speaking German. I don't know whether the language has since died out.

IrCOm not aware of any extant German-speaking community in Australia, I imagine I
would have heard of them if they existed.

Some guide books will tell you that plenty of German is spoken in the south of Chile, in Valdivia and other places further south (Osorno, Puerto Varas, Puerto Montt), but although I've been to all of those places, Valdivia many times, I've never heard German spoken in public in any of them. The first time I was in
Valdivia I had a meal in the Restaurante M|+nchen, but I didn't hear any German
there. A cousin of my wife's lives in Osorno, and when we visited the family the teenage son was at the Deutsche Schule Osorno, founded in 1848 and the oldest
German school in the world outside Germany.

One sign of German influence is that everywhere the south of Chile there are places that offer kuchens (ignoring the fact that K|+chen is already plural without an s, just as espaguetis ignore the fact that spaghetti is already plural
without an s).

Unconnected with any of those was the Colonia Dignidad, further north in the middle of nowhere and thoroughly German, founded in 1961. It was very useful during the dictatorship of Pinochet as a detention and torture centre, and at least some of its first residents had clear Nazi connections.

By contrast, in 2013 I spent a week in Blumenau, said to be the centre of German
culture in Brazil. There I did hear German spoken on the streets a couple of times.
--
athel

Living in Marseilles for 39 years; mainly in England before that,
with long periods in Singapore, California, Chile and Canada
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On 2026-06-16, Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> wrote:

I found the Plattdeutsch very hard going; I suspect most German-speakers would,
absent also knowing Dutch or time in very rural northern Germany.

I don't understand a word and can't match the English subtitles to
anything I hear. I wouldn't have managed to peg it as anything
under the umbrella of "German". ... Oh, she's counting to five.
Yes, that's clearly some sort of northern Continental West Germanic. ;-)
--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber naddy@mips.inka.de
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Ar an s|-|| l|i d|-ag de m|! Meitheamh, scr|!obh athel:

[...] Some guide books will tell you that plenty of German is spoken in the south of Chile, in Valdivia and other places further south (Osorno, Puerto Varas, Puerto Montt), but although I've been to all of those places, Valdivia many times, I've never heard German spoken in public in any of them. The first time I was in Valdivia I had a meal in the Restaurante M|+nchen, but I didn't hear any German there. A cousin of my wife's lives in Osorno, and when we visited the family the teenage son was at the Deutsche Schule Osorno, founded in 1848 and the oldest German school in the world outside Germany.

One sign of German influence is that everywhere the south of Chile there are
places that offer kuchens (ignoring the fact that K|+chen is already plural without an s, just as espaguetis ignore the fact that spaghetti is already plural
without an s).

Writers in German from the early 20th century noted that German settlements east of Germany tended to preserve their language and culture while they lost it fairly quickly in the USA. I suppose this is a counterexample to the idea that it might specifically be US or English-speaking culture that made the difference.

Unconnected with any of those was the Colonia Dignidad, further north in the middle of nowhere and thoroughly German, founded in 1961. It was very useful during the dictatorship of Pinochet as a detention and torture centre, and at
least some of its first residents had clear Nazi connections.

By contrast, in 2013 I spent a week in Blumenau, said to be the centre of German culture in Brazil. There I did hear German spoken on the streets a couple of times.

I used to know a woman, in her late thirties now, who grew up in Marechal C|ondido Rondon, in Paran|i. She spoke German natively with a Black Forest accent; her grandparents left the Black Forest in 1946. I had no trouble understanding her. Wikipedia tells me rCLpossui uma forte influ|-ncia da cultura
germ|onica, demonstrada na arquitetura e pelo Hunsr|+ckisch, um dialeto alem|uo brasileiro ainda muito falado entre os mais velhos[9]rCY so it may be that itrCOs
not as much spoken among the twenty-somethings there.
--
rCyAs I sat looking up at the Guinness ad, I could never figure out /
How your man stayed up on the surfboard after fourteen pints of stoutrCO
(C. Moore)
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Ar an s|-|| l|i d|-ag de m|! Meitheamh, scr|!obh Christian Weisgerber:

On 2026-06-16, Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> wrote:

I found the Plattdeutsch very hard going; I suspect most German-speakers would,
absent also knowing Dutch or time in very rural northern Germany.

I don't understand a word and can't match the English subtitles to
anything I hear. I wouldn't have managed to peg it as anything
under the umbrella of "German". ... Oh, she's counting to five.
Yes, that's clearly some sort of northern Continental West Germanic. ;-)

And yourCOre in the north, if I remember correctly. Wow.
--
rCyAs I sat looking up at the Guinness ad, I could never figure out /
How your man stayed up on the surfboard after fourteen pints of stoutrCO
(C. Moore)
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On 2026-06-16, Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> wrote:

And yourCOre in the north, if I remember correctly. Wow.

No, Rhein-Neckar, just north of the Speyer line, so at the southern
end of Central German.
--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber naddy@mips.inka.de
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