Spotlight on Minority Languages – Low German/Low Saxon

NOTE: Special thanks goes to Jhan Nîillh and Martin ter Denge along with other members of the Regional, Minority and Indigenous Languages group on Facebook for their contributions to this article.

‘Low German’ and ‘Low Saxon’ are both names for the same language.

• For simplicity’s sake, generally speaking, this article will use the term ‘Low German’.

Low German belongs to the Germanic branch of the Indo-European family of languages.

• More specifically, it is a West Germanic language.
• Some examples of other West Germanic languages are Dutch, German, Frisian and Afrikaans.
• It’s closest relatives are Frisian, Scots and English.
• As the lingua franca of the Hanseatic League, a trade group that existed in the middle ages, the earlier form of the language, Middle Low Saxon, has had a influence on several modern day European languages, such as Swedish.

According to Ethnologue, there are approximately 301,000 active speakers of Low German. However, feedback from native speakers indicates that there are actually a few million speakers, specifically those of dialects spoken in Central Europe. 

• For example, there are approximately 1.8 million speakers in the Netherlands.
• Many of its speakers are found in parts of Germany and the Netherlands.
• It is a recognized minority language in Mexico, Bolivia and Paraguay.
• The Pomeranian dialect is recognized as a co-official language in the Brazilian state of Espírito Santo.
• There are also some speakers found in coastal areas of Poland.

Low German is written using the Latin alphabet.

• However, it does not have a uniform standard orthography. For example, the orthography used in Germany is different from that used in the Netherlands.

Here’s an example of the spoken language:

For more resources for Low Saxon/ Low German, see here.

References

Simons, Gary F. and Charles D. Fennig (eds.). 2017. Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Twentieth edition. Dallas, Texas: SIL International. Online version: http://www.ethnologue.com.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_German

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Low_German