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How Different Are DUTCH Dutch and *Flemish*?
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- Published on Apr 14, 2026
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This video is all about the differences between the way Dutch is spoken in the Netherlands and in the Flanders region of Belgium. Of course there are numerous dialects of Dutch spoken in both countries, so in this video I focus on the varieties spoken in daily life in non-dialectal, informal situations: Standard Dutch in the Netherlands and Tussentaal (or "between-language") in Flanders.
Special thanks to Rafael Janssen for his Netherlandic Dutch samples, and Dries Olemans for his Flemish samples.
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You are wrong about hard g and ch. Thats more north and south Holland. Most of the other provinces use soft g
I have to chime in on the Pimsleur method! I love it. I bought a four-level set of CDs back in 2014 or so) in Spanish, and it cost me an arm and leg -- spread out over time, thank goodness. This monthly subscription they have now is so much better in terms of cost. How have I done in Spanish using Pimsleur? Pretty good, although being a very inconsistent person it's taken me some time to get very far into it -- life got in the way, and I've taken some big breaks. But it's easy to jump back in, and I would recommend Pimsleur highly.
@baskkev7459 No In the North and East of NL they also use a hard g ( mostly) . Roughly , north of the river Rhine. But I even have used some Belgians use a 'hard g' as well.
The video should have been Dutch vs Flemish vs Afrikaans.
Dutch people are really nice. Flemish are racist A-holes
Dutch: "De deurbel is stuk"
Flemish: "Amai 'k moest kloppen want de bel dee et nie!"
S- Mwoaaaah Gertje! 't Is meneer Spaghetti!
G- Maar neen, Samson, da's Albert!
A- 't Is Albertooooooooooooooooo!!!!
@AlAtar360Mijn Miranda zegt dat ook altijd, pa, zegt ze, zo goe als da u kunt kloppen, zo klopt niemand nie
when i translate the comment it turns dutch into english 💀💀💀
@HN-kr1nfsame with Russian
"Amai, 'k moest kloppe want de bel is kapot'
Paul has gotten so wild these days, showing us his actual suitcase
Fr fr fr
yeah he's bang on the comedy now
You said it my man! 😂
@maxrevell3830 I'm glad he's still got his day job!
Yeah
When a Flemish person speaks tussentaal, I have absolutely no problem understanding them (as a Dutch person). But when they speak in their own dialect, my understanding drops to like 10-20%. Important thing to note is the same thing applies to some dialects spoken in The Netherlands!
I was born in Central America and my standard joke to other latinos is that people from Mexico and Argentina understand each other better than people from Limburg and West-Vlaanderen. Seriously, I'm from Antwerp (so sort of in the middle) and I don't understand either when they speak their dialect. A question though, when you hear those people you don't understand, what age do they have? I have the impression that it's 40 and above or so and that the younger people don't really speak dialect anymore, rather tussentaal with the regional accent. What say you?
You will only see "real" Flemish dialect within casual (friends,family) context. Externally the 'tussentaal' has become a standard and even necessary when looking for a job.
So the situation across the Low Countries is pretty much like in Germany.
Which is fun - not only did I have to learn German, but also the dialects (except Plafz, that's throat clearing not a language😜)
There is no language that hasn't 1 or more dialects. Current learning Thai. Thai has about 5 Dialects and 3 unknown dialects. @LMB222
nobody can speak real dialect anymore. it's all tussentaal.
Belgian Dutch native speaker here. Excellently researched and detailed video. I didn't agree with all the info but I'm still very very impressed with the level of detail, nuance and accuracy of the overview. Goe gedaan! 😊
I witnessed myself, a Flemish farmer and a Dutch one from the north of the Netherlands, speaking ENGLISH as it was easier for both.
Flemish guy: "You dirty French speaking Belgian don't even speak Dutch properly." 🤬
Walloon guy: "That makes two of us, buddy." 😏
The same happens between a walloon and a flemish person in Belgium as the younger flemish generation is not learning French anymore.
With the exit of the UK, English is pretty neutral.
Those farmers knew how to speak English and they were not able to speak in Standard Dutch?
Person from the east of The Netherlands here. I dont think it has to do with them not being able to speak Standard Dutch, but more with the accent. My local dialect (Vechtdals dialect) has given me such a thick accent that people in the west of The Netherlands have trouble understanding me. I could very well see that a Flemish person and Gronings person could not understand each other. @Ayazidas
The "unnecessary dat" is very familiar to me as a Swiss German speaker. The same phrase "We don't know where he lives" is "Wir wissen nicht wo er wohnt" in Standard German, but would be "Mir wüsse nid wo dass er wohnt" in my dialect. We have the exact same sentence structure as Flemish.
I speak the German dialect pretty much exactly halfway between Belgium and Switzerland and we have it too. Pretty sure it extends all the way as a belt along the German-French language border
I was thinking the same :D do you both think this comes from French? I mean it kinda has to since it's all Germanic regions close to France but I'm not sure there is an equivalent sentence in French.. I guess it'd be something like 'On (ne) sait pas où il habite' without any 'que' in between...?
Oder hats nen andren Grund? Schweizer oder allemannische Dialekte allgemein tendieren ja dazu, öfter 'wo' statt 'der/welcher/dessen/etc' zu verwenden. Vlt wäre nur 'wo' allein daher manchmal zweideutig, kommt daher die 'wo dass' Konstruktion und hat weder was mit französisch noch mit holländisch zu tun..?
@EvenRoyalsNeedToUrinate Ich habe auch gehört dass es ein Teil von fränkische Dialekte auch ist. Ich bin selbst aber nicht sicher, denn ich spreche nur Hochdeutsch, und keine Dialekt.
this "dass" sounds so incorrect to my swiss german ears. in my dialect we say "mier wüsse nid wo'n er wohnt".
In Flemish fuif doesn't replace feest or feestje, it's a specific type of party. It's specifically a dance party organised by a school, a youth group, a sport club,... As the examples show, it's usually the kind of party school going people go to. Marriages, work parties, etc,... are usually just called feest. Feest is always a good general term, though weather it's a feest or a feestje does matter and it's quite a hard to explain which one you should use. New years or birthday parties can be called, feest, feestje or fuif, depending what exactly you're planning.
Indeed, 'Waar is da feestje?' is also known in Flanders, for example.
To add to that, we also use fuif in the Netherlands. But usually more tongue in cheek as it sounds a tiny bit old fashioned.
I also had that idea, but i also feel like people would instead say "k'ga uitzetten / k'ga uitgaan" instead of "we gaan naar een feestje". I just don't think we use the word as often (and neither a replacement) as the dutch, as we have different expressions for it?
@MrAronymous yes, we understand the word "fuif" but nobody would seriously consider using it outside scrabble.
When I studied Dutch at a Summer course in Antwerp. at the end of course there was a "fuif" for the language students. It wasn't a dance party and the students brought their families, where we sat at tables.
Blokken is only really used when studying for a long time and or intensively like for an exam otherwise we will often also use studeren
Came here to say that but I don’t know if young people still use this term.
@olivieri3786we still do
@olivieri3786Yes we do
it is also used in that context here in Dutch Dutch.
If he wanted to show a really big difference in word use with studying is when you rent a room during your studies.
In Dutch we would say '' een Studenten kamer'' A student room. However in Flemish they talk about "m'n studie kot"
the thing is for Dutch Dutch a "Kot" is more used to say that where ever you are staying is really really bad.
I'm Flemish and we do have a word for walking, which is 'wandelen'.
The word 'fuif' is used for informal parties for young teenagers. When we go to party we say: we gaan straks 'feeste' (we go to party later)
'Allez swat' is like 'but anyway'
I'm very surprised about how much effort you put into this video. Very accurate information, and it probably took a while to complete.
fuif is also used in the netherlands as a party for young teenagers. feesten is also used in the netherlands , and 'wandelen' also means walking in the netherlands... it's just the frequency or preferred words that are different, it's not that those words are not used/don't exist in standard Dutch. That's why we can understand eachother completely.
there is a difference between stappen and wandelen, the latter being closer to ramble or wander, to walk aimlessly, while stappen has mostly has a clear destination. If you'd have to translate walk, I'd use stappen, rather than wandelen.
@barvdw Where I'm from "Gaan stappen" could also mean "uitgaan", so "going out to party".
@kennytheamazing yes, but I'd say that's more common in the Netherlands. In Flanders, you're more going to find 'uitgaan', 'een stapke (in de wereld) zetten', etc.
I find "zetel" and "bank" really funny differences. A zetel in Flemish or a bank in Dutch is a couch. But a bank in Flemish is a bank like you'd use it in English (a place where you store money). But then, when talking about the headquarters of that bank (or any other company), at least in Flanders, we'd call that the "hoofdzetel" ("head couch"). So you have these words that really shouldn't be related at all, somehow ended mixed up with each other.
20 years ago I (Flemish) spoke to a Dutch student in education. I mentioned that one of our main courses in school was Dutch (being our official and first language) Keep in mind we were talking to each other in Belgian Dutch and Dutch Dutch. She was very surprised I had to 5 hours of Dutch each week at school and said: " Oh, really, you learned to speak Dutch, can you do it, I am so curious?" (this was after half an hour of Dutch conversation)
That's shocking!
Speak with someone from Suriname. U will understand that person more than a Dutch person
a lot of dutch people seem to think flemish is an entirely different language for some reason.
As a Belgian (born in Brussels), I am not amazed at all. I grew up in a Dutch environment in Brussels and we used to have 5 hours Dutch, 5 hours French, 4 hours English and 3 hours German. I am sure that all this time is used differently in the Netherlands.
That's hilarious! En dan noemen zij ons "domme Belgen" 🤣😂
I'm a Dutch teacher from the Netherlands teaching Dutch in a Flemish school near Brussels to mainly French-speaking students. The richness of this linguistic diversity is beyond any comparison. Many of my students find the typically Dutch Dutch words I use hilarious.
Yep, totally get that ... I also have a theory that e.g. in the Antwerp dialect, many verbs are reflexive, which I very unscientifically attribute to the influence from Spanish rule centuries ago :)
@petervanackeren5227daar heb ik nog nooit over nagedacht… Interessant! Het zit in ieder geval in het lexicon (sinjoor, paljas,…), maar die reflexiviteit van werkwoorden zie ik minder. Heb je voorbeelden?
Hollands is leuk: stokbrood stick-bread. Tja.
@dutchreagan3676pain du stock
@dutchreagan3676 frans brood
11:20 In Flemish the word for studying is 'studeren' just like in the Netherlands. The word 'blokken' means studying in 'de blok' wich is the period between the the end of the lessons and the exams.
that's the same meaning in Dutch. or more just that someone is studying for a particuliere subject very intense.
Some years ago (pre Euro) I traveled through several European countries. While in Belgium I was amazed at their linguistic fluency. They switched between French, English and Flemish almost as if it were one language. I had recently taken some French classes so I was very used to listening to how people spoke.
Generations of living on the border of several language zones will do that.
And even more importantly, having no dubbed movies; all subtitles. That way you hear the foreign language all the time while being to read what it means.
yep that's easy for us , our language is easier to speak then english , altough english is used around the world ...
German language is the same too ,
i never had to learn any of these languages in school , they're just so easy because they all look alike and sound the same
In Flanders I presume, lol. Try using English in Brussels lol. and it's the frickin' capital.
That's Flemish people for you. We always adapt to others! Greets from Vlaanderen, province of Antwerp
as a West Flemish person, our dialect is so different that even belgian dutch doesn't come close to our dialect, heck, you'll probably get subtitles reading this
en ik dachte 'k ik dad ons dialect moeilijk was om te verstoan! gaat nar antarepe en ge zult het nog verstoan ma gelle sprekt gieën vloms
Teeg'n wie zegjet !
I am from Drenthe and I can understand West-Vlaams (Belgium) and Zeeuws (The Netherlands , since by chance independently the West Flemish dialect group and the Neder Saksische dialect group developed the same features.
@NickyBouwersI am Italian, I studied a year in Madrid with a lot of Belgians and Dutch. They said to me that for example people from Dutch and Belgian Limburg understand eachother perfectly and have far more in common with each other than with the rest of the country. Two of my friends were from Dutch and Belgian Brabant. I don’t understand Dutch but I usually can hear when someone is from NL or BE. People from Dutch Brabant have a similar Rrr as Flemish and sound much softer. I actually thought they were both Belgian at first. They both mocked the other Dutch and Belgians by saying they need subtitles to understand them.
West Flemish is unique, but what about Ghents? It differs from the surrounding regions.
I once heard that it's origin has to do with the Vikings (not proven) sailing up the Scheld. They had a settlement in Ghent (proven).
When I was young and travelled the world, in foreign countries when we were talking Gents the people thought we were from Scandinavia (see my profile name which is pure Gents).
I understand West Flemish because I know West-Flemish people for a long time.
Let's celebrate our dialects!
Hi Paul! A native flemish speaker here: the pronoun “gelle” is really uncommon in tussentaal. I would consider it to be hard dialect whenever someone says that word (mainly from the antwerp or leuven regions)
I found lots of variations of that word, so I went with the one the speaker in the video uses.
@Langfocus Most certainly fair. I will second the rarity of the pronoun "gelle" though. Here in West Flanders, I've effectively never once heard it. Then again, Tussentaal has many variations anyway, so perhaps it's more common at the other side of the country.
An excellent video all the same. Well done, Paul!
@Langfocus There are many forms indeed. I live in East-Flanders and mostly use gulle, gulder of gullen and would say gulder is the most often used form (although that might just be because of where I live). To me personally it was immediately clear where the speaker came from and it was also obvious from some of the grammar examples. Like the 'repeated ik' thing was something I would never use, or at least not as explicitly as in this video. But then again, I think you'd get the same thing no matter where the speaker was from.
I live in South Africa, have some knowledge of Afrikaans and learning Dutch Dutch, I must say thhat gelle sounds a lot like Afrikaans Julle (Pronounced "Yelle")... to mean plural "You".... I thought since Afrikaans is very close to Flemish, 'julle' (and even hulle which means they) could be common there as well.
@siyabongamviko8872 Interesting! Thank you for your reply!
I've always found Afrikaans an interesting language; definitely one I'll learn in the future. From what I've heard, similarities between Afrikaans and Flemish aren't uncommon.
Fun video, but quite a few things were off. For example, the tussentaal examples were often presented as counting for the whole of "tussentaal" when they were very specific region exclusive dialect words. Also, tussentaal isn't a standardized sort of language that's in between, it's merely the zone were most speakers find themselves in 99% of the time but everyone still uses their own dialect and words that are distinct. So an example was the "gelle" form, plural of "ge/gij". Gelle is really only used in dialects from certain areas, and definitely not by most people. "Jullie", the standard form, is far more often used by most people even informally. Only ge/gij/u differs from formal Dutch. (Also also, gelle isn't the only variation of jullie, eg. ulle, gellie, gie... But only in dialects) Another error is the double negation thing. Same thing again, only in some dialects do peope say "dakik" or "hebbekik" instead of "dat ik" and "heb ik". Also, the tripling of "ik" is just the same thing, only very regional dialect. Most people don't say "ik ganekik" but just say "ik ga/kga". I think you based your info a bit too much on one source that happened to be using his own dialect. Like, "klappen" is only used by people from one region and not the others when speaking "tussentaal"
Exactly what I was thinking while watching this video!
@helene7532 thanks for the support Helène
I find your complaints to be more than reasonable, but however, we must consider the limitations that a 18 minute non-academic video has in it's releasing. He probably isn't in one of the dutch-speaking countries and had limited resources, like time frame and management, to provide us with a proper research on the matter.
But yes, I do agree with your critique. Single source/little source materials are disappointing.
Love and peace to you ♡
I speak some Dutch (not fluently), but I was quite surprised at how different the Flemish accent was. I could understand most of what the Netherlands Dutch speaker was saying, but I struggled to understand anything the Belgian said.
A bit too much dialect examples compared to the 'tussentaal'
I sometimes have struggle understanding dutch people because of their accent too, but it differs from person to person. Like on dutch television, some people their accent are easier to understand than others. And i recall having trouble watching some dutch films without dutch subtitles.
A lot of ‘flemish’ you dug up there is local dialect and spoken dialect to boot. No one but a ninkapoop writes it down like that.
I'm in a similar but reverse situation. As a French speaker living in Belgium, I also speak some Dutch though not fluently. But being exposed to our Flemish neighbors it's easier for me to understand Tussentaal" thant Dutch Dutch.
the Dutch speaker in the examples speaks a lot clearer and slower than your typical Dutch neighbour, thats for sure haha
The "poepen" example is cute! We Germans use cognates for both: pupsen = to defacate, poppen = to have sex.
this had me guessing how it could lead to some gross misunderstandings lol
We also have the synonym "vogelen" like you use "vögeln" in German.
Let's go to the toilet.
"Poepen?"
Exactly!
Pupsen is more farting than pooing 😊
I've heard "poepen" used to mean farting/passing gas in some regions, I'm sticking to synonyms for all 3 and avoid the confusion.
As a Belgian, I could instantly tell where the flemish speaker in this video was from the first time he spoke in the video. Tussentaal is regional also, where we basically all use the same words, but there is still a pretty strong difference in pronunciation. If you go from Oostende to Brussels on the motoroway, this is less than an hour's drive, you'll find a significant difference in the sound to the speech on every exit you take, and they're far from subtle.
Oostende 😎😎
I would say even some of the vocabulary choises in this video's tussentaal are very regional. I would never say "gelle" for "jullie" but I know to the west in Brabant they would.
@AnahitKirakosian-y5rBrussel😎😎
Voor klonk het Leuvens 😂
@LVDvideonee eerder Gents
As a french speaking Belgian, it's fun to discover that in school we learned a mix between both. The tussentaal prononciation but the standard Dutch grammar
usually, tussentaal is not learned at school, it's like when you say in french: tas à la place de tu as, so normalement tu apprend le néerlandais standard parce que moi à l'école j'apprend non plus pas le francais comme tas mais jsp c bbizzare
There's a few things I'd like to add about the history of Tussentaal.
It really began in the 50's, when the governemnt tried to force the use of Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands (General Civilised Dutch). It declared that Flemish Dutch was actually just improper and encouraged people to stop speaking it. It replaced common words with weird, unual neologisms. Like instead of garage, it wanted you to use Autobergplaats (Car storage place). People really didn't like this and their dialects being called uncivilised. At this time, tussentaal was already forming so people backed it, and it kepts spreading. So the governemnt largely stopped forcing this Hollandic dialect. The sentiment is noticeable in songs like "'t Is Vlaams, 't trekt op geen kloten" by Wannes Van De Velde.
And now, it's the language of everyday life here. And correct Dutch is now AN, without the civilised bit.
This is a really cool fact. So it was almost a reaction to avoid a more unnatural 'forced' version?
@Neophlegm It was not because of that that it emerged, but it gained massive amounts of popularity because of it.
@T1tty5uck3r da' was interessant. Da' wist ik niet eens. Hebben ze ons nooit op school verteld. Ik kan me wel herinneren dat in de jaren '80 programma's op de BRT soms echt nep klonken (ik denk aan Merlina en zo) en ook toen VTM kwam was dat nog geforceerd, maar nu is dat er toch uit.
@T1tty5uck3r doesn't the VRT and most federal institutions still use ABN?
Hier in Nederland had ge 't zelfde beleid, men moest ABN praten mè kinderen want dà was goed voor hun hersenen, door 't praten in dialect werden ze dom. Dì het op verschillende plekken gewerkt en op andere totaal nie. Nederlands Limburg is 'n goei voorbeeld van waar 't totaal nie aansloeg.
I'm a native Dutch speaker from the Netherlands. I have no trouble understanding Flemish people speaking Tussentaal, but when they speak in local dialects, it gets more difficult... But then there are also some dialects in the Netherlands that I find hard to understand, especially Limburgish. Dutch people often also have a hard time understanding people from the northern provinces of Groningen and Drenthe, but where I grew up in the Veluwe region, the local dialect had many similarities with the dialects spoken there so that's not a problem for me.
Even though there are fewer and fewer people speaking local dialects in the Netherlands, people from different regions do definitely have different regional accents when speaking standard Dutch. By the way someone speaks, you can often broadly tell where they're from. As said, I grew up in the Veluwe region in the province of Gelderland, but now I live in Nijmegen, which is in the same province, but south of the rivers, whereas the Veluwe is north of the rivers... And those rivers generally mark the border between the "hard G" to the north and the "soft G" to the south. After several years of being surrounded by the "soft G", my Gs have also started to soften, and I've picked up quite a few southern colloquialisms. :)
I think west-flemish is the hardest dialect to understand out the bunch. I am biased being from central-limburg i dont speak dialect i can understand some of it
nijmegen hebben ze toch de harge g of nie
@tikket10 vergeleken met boven de rivieren issie wel zacht hier.
The rivers aren't only marking the difference between 'hard g' and 'soft g'. Also between using the word 'patat' (north of the rivers) and 'friet' or 'frieten' (south of the rivers).
Sometimes, it's the little things that trip people up. A decade and a half or so ago, a new Dutch manager was hired in the Flemish-speaking office my mother worked at the time.
Deciding on getting to know everyone, he decided to have one-on-one meetings with everyone in his office.
So, he stepped out, walked up to the first person he saw, who happened to be a young lady, and invited her to his office.
Unfortunately, he did so by asking 'Kom jij eens mee naar mijn kamer?' - the young lady in question turned bright red, and the entire office fell absolutely silent, staring at the new manager, who had absolutely no idea what he did wrong.
In Flemish, a 'kamer' is a 'bedroom' - he basically, in Flemish, he invited her to his bedroom.
In Dutch Dutch, 'kamer' means 'office'. In Flemish, an office is a 'bureau' - which, in Dutch Dutch, is the desk, not the room it is in.
A small difference in words, but a huge difference in meaning. Thankfully, once the confusion was cleared up, everyone had a good laugh about it.
Oh, this must have been something.
I find it confusing that "bureau" means desk, since I was more used to it meaning a department. The bureau of internal affairs.
@mffmoniz2948 I am just a junior language nerd, so the way I see it is that the office furniture came first - you can see how in Dutch Dutch, the bureau (French loanword)/bureel (fancy-schmancy Dutch-Dutch word) is the desk, but in Flemish, the bureau can be both the desk and the room it is kept in - I can see how, in the same way, the piece of office furniture could become the entire department.
We do have various words for ministries - there's the 'Department', as in, 'Departement Omgeving' (Department Environment, responsible for the environment), or a ministry (Ministerie van Justice - Ministry of Justice). Of course, because Flanders is in Belgium, and Belgium loves making things complex, we also have 'Federale overheidsdiensten' - Federal Governmental Services. This to show they're federal (as in, Belgian) rather than regional (like Flanders). But that's just government bureaucracy. (Hah! see what I did there?)
Ja, het is een grappig vertaal!
@mffmoniz2948 To be fair, in Dutch Dutch bureau also means office. E.g. my dad was an architect working for Achitectenbureau Van den Broek en Bakema before starting his own firm.
@mffmoniz2948 We use both cause we also say politiebureau for police station.
Goed jongen! Mooi om het allemaal zo eens op een rijtje te zien staan en uitgelegd te krijgen dat er structuur steekt in de verschillen.
Less than 5% different in vocabulary I would wager. But I had family near the border, went to Flanders nearly every year, watched Flemish TV almost as much as Dutch TV, read Flemish comics, etc. When you watch Flemish comedy shows, you get exposed to all different kinds of dialects, so it becomes really easy to understand. I use some Flemish vocabulary and structures, so sometimes people that only know me from online communication ask if I am Flemish. lol
As somebody who studied in South Holland I have no problem communicating in Dutch, but older people talking Vlaams is like gibberish.
Can you recommend some Flemish comedy?
@tinfoilhomer909 why thanks! 🤣😂
@junk__account7610 I will check in on the answer to this too because apart from Geert Hoste, there isn't somebody I would compare. I think most Flemish comedians are too over the top with their dialect, accent or dirty talk. Phillippe Geubels maybe? I watch Arjen Lubach now. Funny accent but he's into politics too, like Geert Hoste was. I hope other people can give more ideas.
5% difference in vocabulary might be correct, but Dutch and Flemish speakers will choose different words to say the same thing for probably 99.9% of the sentences.
As a Dutch Dutch Native speaker, the Dutch speaker in the video sounds really off. He's trying to pronounce standard textbook Dutch, but no one I've ever heard speaks like this. There are also some mistakes in pronounciation. For example: the singular indefinite article in Dutch Dutch is the same word as the word for "one", both are "een", but are pronounced differently. The indefinite article is pronounced more closely to unstressed "an" in English. Also, Dutch native speakers, just like Flemish speakers, drop a lot of final Ts. All of this makes the difference seem a lot bigger than it actually is.
The t-dropping is mainly in the South (esp. Brabant and Limburg).
I personally live on the border between the "Northern" and "Southern" dialects in The Netherlands. Depending on whether I'm speaking with a southerner (e.g. at work and with some parts of my family) my accent is much more southern and I use some southern dialectical words, but with friends, most other family members and people I don't know it's as close to Standard Dutch as one could reasonably expect, even reinserting consonants I wouldn't even pronounce in my own city (for example final t or n)
I don't speak Dutch (except for some tonguetwisters and words), but I noticed "een". I've seen it written "één" for the number to distinguish it from the article.
@pierreabbat6157 yes, "één" is common, though not used everywhere.
AI voice?
Dutch person from Dutch Limburg, lived in Gent (Oost-Vlaanderen) for 5 years: for normal work communication which was in "tussentaal", no real problems. For talking to contractors and people in stores, it requires learning to understand the Gent dialect. Note that understanding the Oost-Vlaanders Gent dialect does not give you any help with understanding people from West-Vlaanderen, which is only 30 km away. Even worse, understanding the West-Vlaanders Brugs dialect does not help you understand the West-Vlaander Kortrijks dialect :).
Sounds exactly like my experience coming from Amsterdam to study in Maastricht. Kerkrade dialect is completely different from Maastricht dialect. It's just that noone will speak these dialects to you once they realise that you're not from there.
As a West-Flemish person from Waregem who lived in Ghent. I feel for you. :)
Watching someone seriously explain Flemish dialect sentences like 'Da ga ni' is insanely hilarious
I like how you include more of your personality in recent videos/years. Keep up the professional work
As an Indonesian, especially since I’m studying in the Netherlands, learning Dutch is as if it’s a combination of English, German and a touch of Indonesian in it, considering the language has a lot of Dutch loanwords (e.g. “kamar” from “kamer”, “handuk” from “handdoek” and “koper” from “Koffer”). I never talked to a Flemish person before, since I rarely travel outside the Netherlands, so this video gives me a bit of insight as to how Tussentaal is spoken.
Also, I believe French fries is also spoken as “friet” in DUTCH Dutch, together with “patat”; I learned that playing Duolingo.
Finally, could you, if possible, also do a comparison video of Dutch and Indonesian some time in the future? Just for fun. Thanks in advance.
Groeten uit Indonesië 🇳🇱
Salam dari Indonesia 🇮🇩
This is what British colonization has done to the brains of people. English is actually the mix between Dutch/French/Greek/German.
I mean, they’re two completely unrelated languages. That’s like asking to compare Chinese and Hindi.
@ferretyluv true, but like I said, Indonesian has a lot of loanwords borrowed from Dutch, so it’s not *that* unrelated
Well Suriname Dutch from Suriname will suite you because there are MANY javanese people here . Salamat from Surnaam
@FRN1-19 so, a comparison between Indonesian Javanese and Surinamese Javanese? Not a bad idea
Informative video! Side note Dutch “Krant” for newspaper is also a French loan word derived from courant.
It would be interesting to see you do a follow up with a comparison between Dutch and Afrikaans, which is a sister language of Dutch.
In Afrikaans it is “koerant “ closer to the French
@violjohn Afrikaans speaker myself here, the Dutch Krant is a contraction of Koerant
@Delzaan Ja seker, I was wondering if the French Huguenot influence helped to keep it as koerant here in SA
Huh? French say gazette! Witch is also common in several Flemish dialect.. i thougth Krant was the Germanic based word???
He did one about 7 years ago: ruclips.net/video/uI49IqDCgg8/video.html
10:23 we also use feest, but that's more of a party with family or friends. A "fuif" is a bigger public party with people you don't know
Native Flemish speaker working mostly all over the Netherlands here. This is one of the best comparison vids I've seen about Dutch and Vlaams, but there's quite a few remarks to make. For instance, that the Dutch speaker in the video sounds like he's at an oral exam, hardly anyone in the Netherlands will speak that way (unless they think you're very hard of hearing). Also, the Flemish dude's "ich" is so Limburgish nobody from the western end of Brabant would believe he's ever been to the province before. Zoutleeuw ofwa? Reserve-Limburgers. ;)
When communicating with the Dutch as a Flemming I rarely have trouble understanding them, unless they unleash their heaviest dialects like Drents. The same is true of most of our Flemish dialects, even inside Flanders itself. In fact, if people from the coast or Limburg come on tv, they get subtitled and it's not uncommon for people who live a mere 10km apart to speak a dialect so profoundly different they barely understand eachother. Often there's even class divides within the language so that cities like Gent have two distinctly different dialects. There are also many words used in specific dialects that are unintelligible to those from other dialects. Words like "boesjkammeree" (swing set) , "seule" (not the French word but meaning a bucket) or "blafeturen" (shutters).
And on a much lighter note about the "poepen" issue; Easily solved by using the word "neuken", which even the most hermitic Achterhoeker or B'achtendekupenaar will understand. Add a questioning look to make friends quickly.
B'achtendekupenaar as if the B doesn't belong in the word Bachten... Or was it an accident to place the apostrof there.
Neuken in de koeken
t'es giene van zoutleef! Ich paas da d'em van Gent es.
As a Dutch speaker from the Netherlands I think the Dutch dialect Drents is just as hard to understand for me as some of your dialects in Flanders 😂😂😂
Tès toens towch iene dau blaave plauken es zun.@spikeweaver
Please make a dedicated video on West Flemish! As you have pointed out, what we understand to be "Flemish" today is mainly cleaned up Brabantian. Historically Flemish is the dialect continuum spoken in French-Flanders, West-Flanders, Zeeuws-Flanders, and parts of East-Flanders. Flemish has a lot of different words that do not occur in Brabantian:
English - West Flemish - Dutch:
to fish - peurn - vissen
immediately - bedain - onmiddelijk
duck - kwêkhoann (lit. croaking rooster) - eend
angry - dul - kwaad
Even more interesting is that it has a lot of different pronunciations that are preserved historical links between English and Saxon. I'll give some examples:
English - West Flemish - Dutch:
Fisher - Visscher - Visser
I brought - 'k brochtn - ik bracht
soft - zochte - zacht
Thin - dinne - dun
sun - zunne - zon
Thunder - dunder - donder
little - letter - weinig
Spider - kobbe (from cobweb) - spin
it rains - 't rint - het regent
courtyard - koer - plein
Some words also have a plural -s in flemish that doesn't occur in dutch:
trains - trings - treinen
swines - zwiens - zwijnen
clothes - kleers - kleren
For verb conjugations West Flemish and especially French-Flemish are a bridge between dutch and english. the 'ge-' prefix slowly reappears when moving english to french flemish to dutch:
English - French Flemish - West Flemish - Dutch
Done - edoan - hedoan - gedaan
Boereeeennnn
Please make a dedicated video on West Flemish!
@shadow_RBRMo. Wuk wit je gie doavan. 😂
@dennisdecoene moatje wuk weete gie van duiven melken, get nog nooit ni meegevlogen
@JFJ12 🤣
I am from Haarlem, the place where the most standardized, "proper" form of Dutch is spoken, but I prefer Flemish literature, movies, TV and comedy over Dutch ones any day, as it is not so stiff, dry and badly acted.
That said, I sometimes describe Haarlem as the "northernmost city of Belgium", as it has a nice old open square in the centre with lots of good restaurants, with Vlaamse Friet and locally brewed beer 😋
BTW, highly recommended comes the Netflix show 'High Tides' (or 'Knokke Off' in Dutch), a Dutch-Flemish co-production.
I recently saw the open square on NPO's 80 Jaren Oorlog and I was pleasantly surprised, it looked Belgian indeed
Always welcome in the deep south my friend!
Wow, Ik ben het niet gewoon dat men mijn cultuur zo een groot compliment geven. Bedankt :)
You never know how much of people int the north are the descendants of refugees from the south during the religious war of the 16the century. They brought with them all their belongings - material and immaterial.
5:00 As a flemish speaker, we usually don’t use “u” as a personal pronoun, but mostly “uw”, which is a possessive pronoun. Example: “Vergeet uw jas niet” which literally translates to “Forget your jacket not” (Don’t forget your jacket)
We use both:
Ik zie u graag.
Ik heb het u gezegd.
Ik verzorg u goed.
We use both the possessive and personal pronouns u and uw but only ever as (direct or indirect) objects, not (in informal speech) as subjects or as part of subject clauses.
Great video! In Dutch you can also use "blokken" for studying, but it's more specifically meaning "cramming" ...
Right, I didn't really agree with the use of blokken either. In general we'll use studeren too, unless you're under stress or you have to learn it by heart in a short timespan. That's when I use "blokken" or "van buiten blokken" (to memorize). Paul, in case you're still reading all the comments, for students from college and university the two (three?) weeks before the exam periods are called "den blok" because you have jam everything into your brains for the exams and that's when we will use the word "blokken" instead of studeren. At least here in Antwerp. Please, correct me if I'm wrong. I honestly loved this video.
@ccatarinajm7114 So it seems we use "blokken" in the same way. In that case I propose replacing this exampe with "op kot" en "op kamers"!
Studying in a crunch would be my definition.
@ronald3836 niet perse, mijn oudste woont gewoon thuis, maar die heeft ook moeten blokken, de afgelopen maand. Als je toch al in Antwerpen woont, waarom zou je nog op kot gaat als je hier studeert? 't Eén heeft niet perse iets met 't ander te maken, toch?
Blokken is usually used in Flemish for "cramming" for final exams. I suspect this may be true in Dutch Dutch as well. Flemish definitely uses studeren for normal studying.
Something like tussentaal also exists in the Netherlands, with both the tussentaal variant and standard Dutch you would still clearly hear an accent.
English: I grab my wallet and go downstairs.
Standard Dutch: Ik pak mijn portemonnee en ga naar beneden.
My “tussentaal”: Ik pak me mijn beurs en ga naar onder.
My dialect: Ich pak mich mieng bueësj en gank noa onger.
As a Dutchman from below the rivers, I speak with a softer G, drop t's, and use friet instead of patat. I never learned Brabantian dialect (though I can hear the difference between Brabantian dialects in the Netherlands), and it's dying in the Netherlands. It may be in decline in Belgium, but nowhere near as much as it is in the Netherlands.
Wow! It is VERY USEFUL information!! I live in Antwerpen and learn Flamish and already from the first months of studying I understood, that there’s a big difference between literature form of language and the real one, in life 😄
This video explains a lot!
Thank you very much👏
I grew up in South Africa. I had Afrikaans friends, we did Afrikaans at school, we did our National Service and I did Afrikaans-Nederlands at university. I have no difficulty interacting with anyone Dutch or Flemish
When I went to South Africa years ago, I was amazed at how close Afrikaans was to West-Flemish when it comes to pronunciation. So much so that my friend, who was from Antwerp, had to give the phone to me as she couldn't understand the cab driver who was speaking English. I fully understood him. The way he spoke just clicked more for me. We still laugh about this to this day. We also tested this later on with somebody speaking Afrikaans and me West-Flemish and the vowels we used and how we pronounced them were so similar. Perhaps it's because Bruges used to be a major port back in the day and we still sound a bit more "medieval'ish".
As a Fleming, I can understand Afrikaans (for most part) but not speak it.
Dutch & Afrikaans are uniquely similar... much more than eg. Dutch & Frisian... which is remarkable considering how long it's been since Dutch colonists founded Transvaal & Oranje-Vrijstaat...
Except that Afrikaans is all in the Present tense, there is no past and future tense like in English and Nederlands, this from an English speaking Afikaner 😁
I'm South African. My home language is English, although I do have a very good command of the Afrikaans language.
I must say I understand Flaams slightly better than I do standard Dutch.
Any idea as to where the majority of Afrikaaners hail from? Being mostly sailors I wonder if most hailed from Amsterdam or Rotterdam?
Comparing the three languages I almost want to say most are originally from the Dutch/Belgium border area?
I'm from the North of Groningen and as a Fc Groningen supporter we have a brotherly connection with Beerschot from Antwerp so we speek regularly. It's reasonably easy to understand each other but with alcohol the Groninger and Antwerp dialect really comes out and then it gets a lot more difficult 😂
Ik werk (als Nederlander) veel met Vlamingen en heb nooit problemen met standaard-Vlaams (wat Paul tussentaal noemt, nooit van gehoord). Wanneer je het filmpje bekijkt, lijken de verschillen veel groter dan ze in werkelijkheid zijn. Als het om dialecten gaat, zou je het gehele taalgebied moeten bekijken en dan is het verschil tussen Vlaams Brabants en Nederlands Brabants kleiner dan tussen Zuid-Hollands en Twents. Of zelfs West- en Oost-Vlaams. Limburgs vind ik aan beide kanten van de Maas zelfs erg op elkaar lijken, meer dan Limburgse dialecten onderling.
Overigens is de situatie m.i. vergelijkbaar met standaard-Duits en Oostenrijks. Of standaard-Duits en standaard-Zwitserduits.
Mooi filmpje, Paul!
Of vergelijkbaar met Spaans Spaans en Spaans in Colombia, Mexico, Argentinië enz., of Portugees Portugees en Braziliaans Portugees, of Zweeds Zweeds en Fins Zweeds of Frans Frans en Québecois of Azebeidjaans Azerbeidjaans en Iraans Azeri, of...
Ja, in welke taal heb je eigenlijk niet zulke verschillen?
Exact
Lol, most Dutch don't speak General Dutch, they speak simplified international Hollandish interjected with English.
Also there is a difference in meaning between standard language, General Dutch and Standard Dutch. The first is the official language chosen by the Flemish ministry to be used in schools, the second is the language published by 'het genootschap Onze taal' (and that is currently chosen as standard language) and the third is the dutch spoken by supporters of the soccer team Standard, which would make it French actually ;o).
Also, the abbreviated pronounciation you classify as 'tussentaal' (such as 'k for ik) is actually considered valid in General Dutch spoken language, because it would be ludicrous to pronounce every word like you would to teach a five year old.
Furthermore, presenting 'tussentaal' as something all Flemish speak where Dutch use General Dutch is disingenious; there is in Flanders a gradient in formality where for official occasions you'll use General Dutch and the more informal the setting the more you'll use 'tussentaal'. Mind you that interactions with the government in Flanders will not be using formal language because the government wants to signal familiarity with the citizen. So where a Dutch mayor may use very formal language at a wedding, Flemisch mayors will speak informal dialect to accentuate the familiarity with the villagers.
Als je NL en BE Brabant naast elkaar legt, hou he denk ik wel heel sterk vooral de verschillende taalevolutie over? :-)
Ik erger mij rnkel aan de zo Engelse uitspraken in NL Nederlands van de voorbije 20 jaar.. en als ik naar kinderen voor kinderen opzoek van jaren 80 of 90 is dat nog bijna niet zo.. dus NL is echt wel serieus verengelst in haar uitspraak van onze moedertaal hoor! :-). Vlaanderen ook wel wat natuurlijk, maar absoluut niet in die mate, is vooral dat vb kids kinderen vaak begint te vervangen enzo
Ik heb ook nog nooit van 'tussentaal' gehoord
11:26 small correction, boven de rivier it is friet, onder de rivier it is patat but in the rivier it is always nat
I'm from west Germany, close to the dutch and belgian border (Aachen, Eifel, Düren, Stolberg, that region), so I grew up close to these countries, and with our regional dialect, rhineland platt (rheinisches Plattdeutsch).
To me, both tussentaal and standard dutch are inaudible to me. I've always been most familiar with regional dialects close to the dutch and belgian borders.
And I love how we all say that damn G differently lmao
Hello, native dutch dutch speaker here. Usually there is no problem communicating with any Flemish speakers. But when the regional dialect is too heavy, there will be less you pick up in conversation. Important side note to the statement above is however. That because of all the regional dialects in the Netherlands as well, the same problem arises with regional dialects in my own country.
In conclusion a dutch dutch speaker might understand a tussentaal flemish speaker better than a regional dialect speaker in their own country.
I went to Amsterdam as a Belgian (Flemish). I asked on the tram if a specific stop was serviced. The person on the tram did not understand me. Then someone from the Netherlands dit repeat me wordt for wordt (I didn't use tussentaal). Then the tram assistant literally said: ooh, and repeated everything what I said word for word. On these moments I think: sorry but you just don't want to understand me.
exposure to accents is just a really big factor im sure the guy didnt mean anything by it 😭 I couldn't understand some british accent for the longest time because im never exposed to them
In Amsterdam mag je al blij zijn als iemand nog NL spreekt. Daarboven op zijn er sowieso veel snobs. Waarschijnlijk wilde diegene het niet eens proberen
@ooievaar6756 Dat was geen snob. Ik bedoel: ik heb het over de trambediende.
@Ceelbc Als ze daar ook maar een klein accentje horen, anders dan Jordanees, dan willen ze je niet verstaan... Zelfs iemand van de chrachechorrel verstaan ze niet.
It could also be that sometimes people aren't just used to hearing certain accents, and they just don't make the necessary connections to get to the right understanding..
It would've been interesting to mention that Flemish has retained more of its medieval roots (Flanders was a very rich and powerful region before The Netherlands) and because of the many occupations of Flanders (the Habsburgers, Burgundy,...) a lot of influence from other languages is there as well. Standard Dutch has changed a lot too. In the 1970s television series had Flemish and Dutch actors playing side by side without any real problems of understanding. They both spoke standard Dutch with slight tonal differences. Nowadays, Dutch actors need to be subtitled. One of the most blatant differences is the use of the American 'R'. It used to 'roll off the tongue' like you can still hear in Scottish as well but then the Dutch youth started the imitate the typical American 'R' 'like in 'cawwww' instead of 'ca(r)'. When a Flemish person says 'bloedrood' (blood red) the 'r' is still rolling, the Dutch make it sound like 'bloedwood', the 'r' has gone silent and is way back in the throat.
Finally another Dutch video
I must point out that some of the Flemish examples used in the video as ''tussentaal'' are actually Flemish dialect only used by certain communities in Flanders.
For example 7:45 ''Gelle'' is actually dialect from the region of Antwerp, no one else in Flanders uses that word.
But I can understand the errors, because the Flemish linguistic landscape is not even well documented by the Flemish themselves. 😅
But the rest is just parking so it's safe to say that it's used in Flanders
Wow, as a German speaker I need to say that the Flemish dialect is way more comprehensible to me than Standard Dutch "ich haa oech pertang geire ne leste kee gezien" "ich hätte euch jedoch gerne ein letztes Mal gesehen"
- (note that "Kehr" is also used in my German Mosel Frankish dialect for time instead of "Mal" - it comes from the Latin word Curvus for "round")
I'm not a native, but as far as I remember, maal could also be used in standard Dutch instead of keer, although sounding more formal. No idea if it's used in Flemish dialects, though.
@lucaslourenco8918 Not that I know of, it might be in some far flung dialect that I don't know but I've never heard it in everyday use. I've only ever seen it used like that on TV or in books.
That's because this particular example is from Limburg dialect in the east. I have lived in Maastricht and they use similar words. In fact a friend of mine from Maastricht can speak his dialect in Berlin and people simply understand him just fine. Try something from West Vlaanderen and you'll probably find it a bit harder to understand.
Als jemand der nicht aus einem Dialektraum stammt der so nahe liegt wie deiner, dem Moselfränkischen, empfand ich das Niederländisch der Niederlande tatsächlich als einfacher zu verstehen - bis auf ein paar wenige Ausnahmen wie „tas“ für Tasse statt Tasche oder „schoon“ für schön statt sauber.
I am living in Belgium and learning Flemish and might I tell you everytime I think I'm getting better at it I meet someone new that I can't understand ahahah
I'm a Brazilian living for almost two decades in the Netherlands, my partner is Dutch and we go often to Belgium for visit as his brother lives there and is married to a Belgian lady. At first sight, you would say: it's all Dutch but it gets complicated the longer a conversation goes and the longer you stay. Different words and the accent blocks you from understanding what has been said. But I pretty much love the differences.
Flemish speaker here, the Grammar parts on doubling pronouns or the "gellie" part are really specific to a regional dialect and are not considered "tussentaal" as far as I know
For the French loanwords: in Flanders we also use the same words as in NL, the loanwords are more often considered "tussentaal"
Same with klappen afaik
@laurensholthofIk heb nog nooit van klappen gehoord dus ik dacht al
@cursedtmm Ja ik ben van antwerpen en klappen is een antwerps/ vlaams-brabants fenomeen...
But no Flemish person would ever order a 'sudderansj'. 😅
yeah in my region we'd say gunder/gulder instead of gelle
I want to point out that 'u/uw' is just a conjugation of second person singular 'ge'. It's a separate form called the familiar tense, rather than being a variable of the informal tense. The familiar tense lost favor in the Netherlands and has been forgotten due to standardisation.
Being from Belgium, I didn’t agree with some of the points in this video. But then I remembered I’m from the West-Flanders, so what do I know. xD
As someone from vlaamsbrabant I also didnt agree with plenty of stuff in here. A lot of it was translated into very west and eastflemish dialect or other dialects. Instead of the official or tussentaal the creator presented it as.
I'm from Limburg and I also didn't really agree with a bunch of things in the video tbh. Some things are true. Some things are half true like for example the studeren vs blokken. We say both, blokken just has more weight to it. Like for a big exam or tough theories. And some things aren't completely true or at least I've never heard of them. Like wandelen not being mentioned for walking or rennen being weird for Belgians, it's not, rennen is also commonly used here. I've also personally never heard anyone say gelle voor plural you or klappe for speaking but that may be a regional thing. The double repeating of the subject I feel is also not that common. I've def heard it, but I don't think most people do it.
In Dutch you say 'je spreekt goed Nederlands' in tussentaal you say 'Ge spreekt goed Nederlands' in West Flemish you say 'Gie sprikt goe Vlams' or even 'Gie klapt goe Vlams'! West Flemish, I love it!
The random e+ee --> ie is really weird for me in the province antwerp. we do both. We would say "Gij sprieëkt/klapt goe nieëderlands/vloms
As a flemish this made me laugh. Those flemish words depends on the region & dialect.
Couple of thoughts from a Dutch language nerd from North Brabant studying in Antwerp;
1 Flemish has a mediaeval vibe to it for me. A lot of things common in Flemish sound old-fashioned in Dutch. Gij is like Thee to Dutch Dutch ears, Nochthans sounds like a word from a Victorian novel to me and my favourite is "Moeten and Mogen" which in Flemish, and 'creative Dutch' can be used as if-clauses;
"Mocht België morgen vergaan, waar zou jij dan naartoe gaan?"
"Were Belgium to collapse tomorrow, where would you go?"
In Dutch Dutch, you can't do that. You can't not say "were...." you have to say "If...." which sounds way less poetic.
2 I have no difficulty understanding Flemish as I come from North Brabant which has similar dialects. But don't put me in a town in West Flanders or Limburg, cause then I'll have a problem.
However, the difference between dialects is fading in the Dutch region as a whole. People still speak it! And I noticed things stay more independent in Belgium than they do in the Netherlands.
3 Everyone, take these 'differences' with a grain of salt. I've heard other accents drop their t's and slur their words into dak, daje or even worse "dahajeniemoe'endoen" meaning "dat had je niet moeten doen" but being slurred into one word. (You shouldn't have done that). The gender thingy is true but isn't a reliable way for French people to find out the gender of words and the duplication of pronouns happens, but I think more often in the form "da'ik" instead of "dak ik" although I have heard both.
Also, true people from Brabant and Flanders say 'kweenie' when they don't know something. Henry van Loon, comedian from Eindhoven, North Brabant made this great little funny video about it;
Fun fact; even 'people from North Brabant who speak good Dutch' like me and Henry have a tendency to slur our words result in 'da's' instead of 'dat is' or 'beswel' instead 'best wel' lol
ruclips.net/video/hWpdM2dQk7I/video.html
About that, there are some difference between North Brabantian and Flemish but also a lot of similarities. Jij is informal, u is formal and gij is dialect (seen as lower class, boorish, mostly used among the lower class and the elderly).
I think New Kids shows quite well what Brabantian in the Netherlands is like. It is intelligible to Dutch speakers, but still distinctly different.
4 How DARE you forget about the Flemish a???? It's usually written as 'ao' and I know it really well as we have it in "BRAOBANT" (North Brabant) as well ;). I like it. There's probably some fancy IPA term for it, but I was never a fan of phonology. People from North Brabant and Flanders just have a certain way of pronouncing their a's. There are some people who adopt a Dutch a when speaking formal Belgian Dutch though.
5 The vocabulary thingy was fun, but no complete. As in. Proper vs schoon is not the problem. Being Dutch and knowing my French very well, I learned Flemish vocabulary quite quickly when I moved here. But Tussentaal is not the problem. It's the fact that it's two different countries. You have to deal with two different school systems that use different words or two different health insurance policies that use different words or two different ways of dividing the country with different words. That's the tricky part. It's different meanings but also, see 1, in Flanders they say 'Schepenen' which is a word that goes back to the Middle Ages. We don't use that word in Dutch anymore having replaced it with 'wetsambtenaar' (a gouvermant worker/official on a local level). So the words are different and often have a mediaeval vibe to them for me as a Dutch person. But the words are not the problem, that's doable, it's when the two countries use two different systems so you have to learn the words 'again' with their new meaning. (For example how a word like "sixth grade" translates....)
When I go back to my family in the Netherlands, I sometimes get confused and use Flemish with Dutch people, or vice versa saying something Dutch among Flemish people. I still didn't know "Ik zie u graag" means I love you. And some others were also new for me. Although I knew most. Some fun ones to include are 'ça va' meaning 'it's fine/I'm good' both when someone asks if everything is going alright emotionally or physically (you're carrying a bunch of stuff). Another fun one is "mercikes" and "salukes" which are softer/more informal versions of "merci" and "salut" (meaning 'thank you' and 'good bye')
6 I could write full essays on Flemish vs Dutch Dutch because I LOVE the subject, but my last remark will be this. Flemish people have a stereotypical Dutch accent which I have noticed is just Hollandish. (The group of dialects spoken in Holland)
Dutch people tend to just say "Allé" and "zotteke" a lot and for the rest they try to make a sentence out of some vague Flemish sounds they remember from Mega Mindy (which Dutch people watch in Flemish) when trying to imitate a Flemish person. Although "Allé" is by far the most important. Just say Allé a bunch and you're good with your Flemish stereotype as a Dutch person.
North Brabantian grammar and Flemish grammar are also really similar so Dutch people can quite easily use one for the other. (North Brabantian being well known by most Dutch people because of New Kids.)
7 The Flemish also kept little habits from the French. Like counting backwards with grades (grade 1 is high than grade 4 instead of grad 4 being the grade for elder kids), in University at least giving points in rates of 20 (so you need a 10/20 to pass instead of 5/10 or 50%) or using AZERTY instead of QWERTY like the Netherlands and the English-speaking world.
TL;DR Dutch and Flemish is more distinct than American English and British English, but less so than English and Scotts. Maybe it's a bit like Deep South English and General American English. But it is hard to say.
I love the relationship between Flemish, Dutch, the Flemish dialects and the Dutch dialects as their own weird special mix of languages and dialects..... :)
Also, sorry one last thing, I have noticed Flemish also have a tendency to say foreign words the Dutch ways saying words like "drugs en plannen" like you would in Dutch instead of using English pronunciation which is the Netherlandish way to do it. But Flemish people also often using a Dutch version of a French word instead of the Dutch word. For example assurantie and taxatie instead of verzekering and belasting (assurance and taxation as you may have guessed).
Although I agree with many things you've said, I have to tell you that in Flanders grade 1 is for the younger kids and grade 4 is for kids who are older, so when you're 12, you're in 'het eerste middelbaar', and when you're 18, you're in 'het zesde middelbaar'.
@sauronthenecromancer2535 Oh, that's an honest mistake on my part.
Yes I could have looked it up, but after living here for half a year among Flemish friends, I still have not remotely a clue how the Belgian school system works! (One day.... one day I'll understand it!)
I like your thoughts
Tldr
@danielsan1414 "Tldr"
Who gives a sh*t that you didn't read it because it was too long for you. What is the purpose of commenting with something like that anyway? Is it so we know you're lazy and/or have a short attentionspan and/or you're not too smart? Is that it? Because that's how that comes across.
The person did not type all that to just entertain someone like you. If anything it is clearly not meant for you. Are you starting to understand how dumb that "tdlr" comment looks now? To just say it in other words: the world does not evolve around you.
*sigh* I sometimes hate people.
I'm a native German (originating from the west of germany, specifically the Rhineland and the Eifel region), my second language is English wich I speak and write on a C2 level and 5 years ago (at the age of 29) I moved to West-Flanders in Belgium and learned Dutch, wich by now I speak and write in a C2 level as well. Learning Dutch here in a school for foreign adults was quite easy and fast as there is not much difference between Dutch and German in general. I picked up quick and after just about 3 months I could have normal conversations with other students and the teacher. So I thought "I should stop school and go work! I am ready!"
And oh boy, was I wrong! I realised quite fast that the Dutch I learned in school is not the same as what the people speak around me. I still was able to adapt kind of fast and by now I'm so used to the "melody" of (especially) West-Flemish that I have difficulties to understand Dutch-Dutch people.
Watching the video i also realised how deep i am into the Flemisch way of speaking as most of your examples you gave in Flemish were exactly the way i would have said or used it.
Some words in German and in Dutch are actually quite 'false friends' though...
I remember something from a long time ago. I was a child still and we were camping in Germany.
There was a little playground on the camping.
I had tried to 'jump' of the swing and had fallen on my knees. They were both badly bruised/scraped because of the gravel in the playground.
The son of the camping owner was just visiting his parents. Because he was a medic he took care of my scraped knees. He kept saying 'Ist nicht schlimm, ist nicht schlimm' thinking this would comfort me.
But I cried louder and louder not only because my knees hurted, but mostly because to me it was like being told I had behaved stupid.
German 'schlimm' = 'bad/terrible/severe'; Dutch 'slim' = 'clever'; 'niet slim' = 'very stupid'. 😢😂
I don't know what your sources were, but you nailed most things spot on! (Native flemish speaker here)
Another great video, thanks for covering this! I am a native Flemish speaker and have no trouble understanding our neighbours to the north. It's worth noting that the difference in Flemish dialects is astounding for a rather tiny region. The accents can change rapidly as well, you can get an audible difference with a mere 15min. drive. Adding to that, I grew up on the border with the Netherlands and the accent is different on both sides of the (barely visible) border. I personally love the variety, though it does pose difficulties for new learners, like my English partner 😅
I'm half English half Belgian and I asked my dad what the equivalent would be in terms of how different he sounds to "standard" Dutch; he said the closest analogy would be a Geordie compared to southern English
With regards to that last example; in standard Dutch, "nog graag" en "graag nog" are equally valid
Non-native (but otherwise highly fluent) Standard Dutch speaker here. I was surprised how much I learned from this video about our neighbours to the south, so many thanks for diving into the differences! One interesting sidenote is that many (but certainly not all) of the "Flemish" vocabulary words you mentioned can also be used in Dutch, especially depending on one's region. There's very famously a patat/friet border, where people in the south of the Netherlands use the latter when describing fries, and northerners use the former. In general, I can understand people from around Antwerp, but any other Flemish dialects are a lost cause. I would also agree with your assessment that standard Dutch is taking over the Netherlands; even in areas well outside the Randstad (where standard Dutch is most spoken), many kids are growing up speaking it, although many of them have adopted the Dutch equivalent of a "Valley girl" accent, which can be grating at times.
Finally, a fun little bit of trivia: I think they recently retired the term, but for the longest time, what you refer to as standard Dutch was called "algemeen beschaafd Nederlands" , or literally "general civilized Dutch". As you can imagine, that ruffled some feathers 😂
As a kid I moved from the south of the Netherlands to Flanders (a distance of only 40km) and you’ve made a beautiful list of all the small language confusions I ran into, well done!
Really love that you made this video, it’s rare to find an analysis of the tussentaal we actually speak, as opposed to the standard Dutch we pretend to speak and teach to foreigners.
I’ve known people who got very discouraged learning Dutch in language courses once they realised it’s not what Flemish people actually speak. I’ll refer to this in the future, thx!
Haha, made me think how I learned French before immigrating to Canada (Montreal), just to be completely knocked out by the way the locals here speak. It is not what we all got prepared for hahaha! Watching the video I caught myself a lot on thinking that the overall volume of grammar/vocab/pronunciation differences seems pretty similar to French French / Quebec French.
As a German native speaker I was an "Erasmus"-student in Flanders in the early 90s. To prepare for my exchange year I had a dutch language course before starting but nothing really prepared me for all the different dialects of my fellow students in the student home. However after a few months I immersed in the language which at that time wasn't already labelled "tussentaal' maar "ABN" (Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands - Belgian/Flemish Style). I succesfully did a language exam at the end of my one-years studies but being in a pub and understanding local people in Antwerp always remained a challenge.
After all these years I still try to make use of my dutch language knowledge as much as possible in Belgium as well as in the Netherlands but you will always recognize me as someone who learned the language in Flanders.
In those days standard Dutch was still "beschaafd" (civilised) and dialects were considered uncivilised. Worse was that the Dutch considered anything typical "Zuid-Nederlands" (Flemish) also uncivilised, which was supported by some Belgian teachers. I still remember the "correct" pronunciation of "tram" was "trèm".
Meanwhile the "beschaafd" has been dropped and we don't give an F*** what the Dutch think about our Flemish anymore.
Een duidelijk overzicht hoe beide Nederlands gesproken in België en Nederland wordt uitgelegd.👍👌
Native Dutch speaker from Flanders here. Your channel is a trusted source of very accurate information about languages and this video is no exception. I have only minor quibbles that aren't even worth mentioning.
I have lived abroad for about 15 years and the most stubborn myth I always encounter, is that people think Dutch and Flemish are two different languages. They are most certainly not. We share the same dictionary, the same grammar rules, the same language academy, common language and spelling competitions, etc., despite minor differences. I usually make people understand by comparing to British English and American English (or Australian, Irish, etc.). The difference is roughly the same.
The funny thing is, that even when I'm done explaining, people usually respond with: "Ah! So, it's kind of like Swedish and Norwegian or like Spanish and Italian!" That just shows how convinced people are that they are different languages.
So, please my fellow Dutch speakers, can we please all make an effort to not misinform our friends abroad?
Yes, there are minor differences, but we clearly speak the same language, regardless of your political views.
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On mutual intelligibility: Flemish people usually understand everything Dutch people say because we have been exposed to their accent since childhood. The other way round much less so, because the Dutch tend to forget that we also exist (18m vs. 6m), so many of them have barely ever heard our accent. This can be compared to New Zealand English. You don't necessarily encounter it very often and the first encounter might be surprisingly hard to understand.
But the mutual intelligibility of written standard Dutch is virtually 100%. I would go as far as to say that they are in many cases indistinguishable, meaning you wouldn't be able to guess which country the author is from.
The difference is even smaller than UK and US English. It's more like Australian English versus New Zealand English.
Even in written Dutch there are distinguishing characteristics, mostly in choice of words, sometimes also in the sequence of them.
But according to the best definition of a language, Flemish is a different language than Dutch.
(A language is a dialect with a fleet and an army.)
"Tien voor Taal" (mostly won by the Flemish) wouldn't have been a show if Dutch and Flemish weren't the same language.
@AmedeeVanGasse I disagree. I'm native Dutch but consider myself an almost-native English speaker now (Canadian) and I have to listen pretty hard to figure out if people are Aussie or Kiwi, while I'm pretty sure that everybody with a passing knowledge of spoken Dutch can hear the difference between Dutch Dutch and tussentaal (A term I didn't know existed lol).
I'd put the difference between Dutch Dutch (Double Dutch?) and tussentaal somewhere along the same lines as New England US English and Southern or Appalachian US English.
"They are most certainly not.".. As with many things, this depends on what aspects you are comparing in in what context / from what point of view. Even if they're strictly not different languages (but such claims are not at all trivial to decide for languages, by their nature), in practice they can still behave like they are in certain ways. For example, subtitles for tv / films are often specifically created in an NL or BE variant (or both) because it would get very difficult to quickly read and understand for a large part of the audience otherwise).
I'm Dutch and I've been born and raised near the city of Tilburg at less then 20 km from the border with Belgium in the province of North-Brabant. Our local dialect is the 1st language I learned, it's my mother tongue. My whole family on both sides speak dialect, as did basically my whole social environment in my younger years in the 70s. Standard Dutch is my 2nd language, in a sense. First it was the language from tv and the radio, and from some people originally not from my province. By the time I went to school standard Dutch entered my personal life. Long story short: my dialect is about 95% the same as the Flemish/Tussentaal that's being explained here. And I love it! It's so soft and pleasent! And in a way it's an older form of Dutch. or rahter still close to older Dutch. We still have cases in our grammar for instance. Something that has long disappeared in Standard Dutch - bar from some very few fossilised constructions like: 's avonds (des avonds) [in the evening]. Sadly dialects are disappearing fast now,,,
Thank you for this comment. Exactly my feeling when watching this. Differences between Standard Dutch and Flemish aren't as black and white as presented in this video. It is basically a language continuum. The closer you grow up to the Belgian border, the more "Flemish" your dialect. Almost every single example presented as Flemish in this video applies to the Dutch province of North Brabant as well. Great video though, but very Leuven centric. Flemish dialects from Antwerp, Ghent, the coast or Limburg sound completely diffeeenr.
I grew up near Tilburg and still live there; and the beauty I think of this video is that, despite how much of the Tussentaal being described also applying to my local dialect, I could still pick out any Belgian who crosses the border hearing them speak just one sentence! Something about the Flemish tone of speaking, or the difference in how certain phonemes are treated makes it instantly stand out… I’m not sure how to quantify that little “Flemish” sauce, the same kind you hear when someone from (Dutch) Limburg, or east of Eindhoven is talking to you, even if they’re speaking regular language and not dialect at all; you instantly catch them out.
Waarom leert een ouder een boerendialect aan als 1e taal. Blijft lachwekkend 😂
Flemish guy here. We had a laugh here at home when we figured out from a dutch-dutch (we call it” Hollands”) recipe that “kookzuivel” (cooking dairy) means “room” (cream). Who in Holland came up with that? 🙃
kookzuivel - waaaaaat? 😆 Vijf jaar in NL gewoond, en die kende ik nog niet!
Er bestaat wel zoiets als 'kookroom' (misschien in vergelijking met 'slagroom' maar ik kan mij niet voorstellen dat er een groot verschil zal zitten tussen beide producten) maar 'kookzuivel' is niet hetzelfde als room. Room heeft een wettelijk vastgesteld minimaal vetpercentage, als je daaronder zit mag je het geen room meer noemen. Dan krijg je dat soort gekunstelde termen als 'kookzuivel'. Vergelijk 'fruitspread', feitelijk gewoon jam maar omdat er niet genoeg suiker in zit, mag het officieel geen jam genoemd worden.
Your video about this language is amazing. Bravo.
I'm a Dutch native from Noord-Brabant. The funny thing is that a lot of what you told about Flemish is true for my local dialect (Midden Brabants, Tilburg/Waalwijk region). I recognized a lot of your examples for Flemish from my own dialect. Like dropping the 't' at the end of a word, pronounciation and the use of genders. Most people in the Netherlands will definantly hear that I'm from Brabant. Usually I dont have any problems understanding Tussentaal or Flemish dialects close to Antwerp and the Dutch border. It becomes more difficult the further west you go (e.g. West Vlaams). PS: In Brabant we also say friet.
If you look at the dialect map, you'l see that Noord-Brabant , Antwerpen and Zuid/Vlaams-Brabant are the same dialect group.
@treseniebrain enlightenment moment.
As a native German, I think I'd have an easier time reading standard Dutch from the Netherlands, but inversly an easier time understanding spoken Flemish.
Depends on where in Germany you come from. Big difference for Germans from Saxon and Franconian areas. North-eastern Netherlands do speak Saxon dialects, while Brabantian and Limburgish is pure Franconian and not difficult to understand for people from the Rhineland.
I am a Dutch person from the south of the Netherland and I have absolutely no trouble understanding almost every Flemish speaker. Some Flemish accents are a little harder to understand but all (that I've heard at least) are very intelligible to me. I speak standard Dutch but I live and grew up in a pretty rural area and some people, like my father and grandpa, have very thick accents that are a little similar to Flemish accents. I also grew up with a lot of Flemish television (KetNet and studio 100 are my childhood lol) so that may have helped too. I often have a harder time understanding northern accents like the accents spoken in Groningen or Friesland than Flemish, but that may be because of the influence of Frisian and lower Saxon, which aren't even Dutch to begin with
The relation between “walk” and “run” is really like to what in Chinese and Japanese.
walk: 走(C) / 歩(J)
run: 跑(C) / 走(J)
Actually the soft "g" is also common in the Dutch provinces Noord-Brabant and Limburg.
You got 99% right which is really impressive.
A few minor corrections
- the indefinite article "een" in SD is pronounced with a scwha, unlike the number 1 or the stressed één
- the Flemish also use "studeren" in general, but use "blokken" for the intense study towards the exam, emphasizing rote memorizations; this periode is referred to as "den blok".
- etage is not so common anymore as a loan word
A few additions
- like we, Flemish, use many French loan words, the Dutch will use German loan words which we'd find far fetched, though the influence is not as strong is French on us
- there's actually some kind of "West Flemish tussentaal" as well. West Flemish dialects in general are stronger and more remote from the Flemish tussentaal than Brabantian (as you pointed out correctly). Therefore those dialects tend to be better preserved and when West Flemish people from different parts of the province meet, they will often resort to a common way which you could identify as "west flemish tussentaal". This might be true for the eastern part, Limburg, as well, but I'm less familiar with that area.
A general observation
- there used to be a time when Flemish watched Dutch television, resulting in a stronger influence on our language. Given the disproportionate population, the influence has always been one directional. Around the nineties, the rise of commercial television in Flanders disrupted that influence and "tussentaal" took over as a standard. Recently thought, the rise of social media has again bridged the Flemish and DUtch youngsters and their popular culture, so that at least the "youth language" now bears more similarity and we see a revival of the Dutch influence on our language, since the elders take over fashionable terms from their kids.
Ironically in NL we still use etage
In Belgium we call the type of house with a garage as ground floor and everything else on the higher floors a "bel-étage".
And, don't forget to put pretty much everything in the diminutive! Everything has to be tiny!
I never really noticed it until my English-speaking husband pointed it out. Now I cannot stop hearing it.
On a flight to Brussels, they told us before landing that 'in een klein kwartiertje gaan we een klein ontbijtje serveren'. Not just diminutive, but you had to say 'klein' as well! We wondered whether we were going to be served two bread crumbs!
11:07 we also say "proper maken" if it's not cleaning actively, but just making something clean
As a bilingual Flemish guy, I think it's easier for us to understand someone from Holland, cuz at school we learn AN and not Flemish (Algemeen Nederlands = Common Dutch), which used to be known as ABN by the way (Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands = Common Civilised Dutch). The "beschaafd" has been dropped, cuz it sounded like we are less civilised then Dutch people. It was invented in the end of the 19th century to unify the flemish people, cuz they wanted to keep Belgium (or rather Flanders) together. There was to much difference between our dialects and we didn't feel Flemish. Belgium only exists since 1830. It also eased the communication between the different flemish regions and Holland.
There are a few words I'd expected to hear in the video, but it didn't.
1: Orange juice in Holland is "suderans" (which comes from French jus d'orange), we tend to say fruitsap (= fruit juice) or if we want to be more specific "appelsiensap". Since the most ordered juice is orange juice, the waiter knows we mean "appelsiensap" when we're saying "fruitsap". For all other juices, we specify which one.
2: Craving in dutch is "zin hebben" in Flemish it's "goesting hebben". Our schools are trying to learn our kids not to use "goesting hebben" anymore, which really bothers me. "Goesting hebben" is typical for Flemish, we're Flemish and not Dutch. So if they want to use "goesting hebben", don't tell them it's wrong!!!!! Just tell them it's more appropriate, but don't tell them it's wrong.
For "Going out to party", we also tend to use "stappen" sometimes, like in: "'k ga e stapke in de wereld zetten" ("I'm gonna make a step in the world" literally)
Grammar police here: "cuz"is not yet acceptable in formal written English for "because". Pity, because you are almost perfect otherwise (we do not "learn" someone to do something)
Really nice work on the video! I'm from West Flanders myself and we have different grades of dialect. Older people usually have a very thick dialect, whilst younger people have a lighter dialect mixed with standard language, English and French. But when talking to people from other regions and people from the Netherlands we tend to switch to the more universally understandable tussentaal. Although a lot of the same words have a different meaning, we are aware of this when speaking to these other people so we adapt our thinking, so most of the time there is no real issue.
I would like to remark that at 15:15 nobody would spell it like 'swat'. It should be 'soit', as it originates from the French for 'so be it'.
But otherwise, such a great video! As a native speaker of Flemish, I think that modern spoken Dutch is diverging rapidly from Flemish because of some sound changes, while the Flemish dialects (and the tussentaal) are a bit more conservative. If you watch the news in Flemish, I think it kinda sounds like the Dutch news from 50 years ago.
Another strange fun fact: as you can see in this video, Flemish has a lot of French influence, but this is not always the case. I find it rather amusing that Dutch people pronounce 'dossier' (a file, case study) with a French pronunciation /dɔˈʃeː/, while in Flanders it has been 'dutchified' to /dɔˈsiːr/
Indeed, Flemish is not rarely "more Dutch" than Dutch. And I wonder if the video has "etage" backwards. In Dutch we use etage and verdieping equally often. Google tells me that verdieping is more common in Flemish than etage. Another example is "regenscherm" which no Dutch person will ever use. (De vandale website beweert zelfs dat regenscherm geen woord is.)
and "schoonbroer" sounds like a calque of the French "beau-frère".
ik dacht altijd dat het van het engelse 'so what' kwam... het leek logisch in mijn hoofd want ik begon het meer en meer te horen in het middelbaar circa 2016 en ik ging er gewoon van uit dat het internet slang was
@irakyl Woon je in België of Nederland?
@irakyl: honi soit qui mal y pense. Dat had je al in je lagere school kunnen horen… als je een tweetalige meester of juffrouw had 😅😊
So Flemish is less likely to give you a sore throat😂
Wait until you see the r there
@Skillz_101 Der zijn er een stuk of 6 verschillende die ik allemaal door elkaar gebruik. Allemaal harder dan de moderne Nederlandse r, dat klopt, maar de Nederlandse r is tegenwoordig meer w dan r
@CouldBeMathijsright, just refered to the flemish r on this video which was a lil hard.
@Skillz_101 Yeah that's true. You do hear people speak with that r, but it's a tiny minority
As a Flemish Belgian myself I don't have any problems understanding people from the Netherlands since in schools we learn Dutch Dutch, but people from the Netherlands do often have problems understanding us because they of course don't learn Flemish in their schools
The reason for that is , Nederlands is a language and Vlaams a Nederlands dialect .
4:22 As a Netherlands Dutch, I usually shorten that sentence even more to 'kweenie'.
Same in Belgium
As a Flemish person, many of the "tussentaal" words sounded more like dialect (e.g. velo), although I might just be speaking in a more "standard Dutch" way than other Flemish speakers.
Very informative video. Dank je wel!
What an amazing rundown of the difference between Dutch and Flemish. Some examples I thought were a bit to far towards the actual dialect rather then being tussentaal. Specifically the example of stappen seems a bit off from my point of view. Flemish people also use stappen to go out, "een stappke doen", "een stappke in de wereld zetten". "wandelen" is more commonly used in tussentaal to say you are going for a walk.
Yet another example, allthough very nuanced. in tussentaal we use "waarom" rather than "voorwa". We also use "voorwa" but it has a more aggressive feel to it. So in a conversation with someone where you ask them to do something and they respond with "voorwa", you kind of feel like he is disrespecting you.
As someone from Flanders who grew up in both Flanders (Antwerp) as the Netherlands (Rotterdam) I always noticed that people from the Netherlands find our Flemish weird and funny. Dutch people also tend to have difficulties getting used to the Flemish accent. It is also peculiar that Flemish people tend to "clean-up" their speaking when talking to dutch people. I used to do it myself but have since stopped doing that.
Again amazing rundown or our language.
'K weet ni ma hier in antwerpen, zelfs in tussetaal zeggen we nooit "een stapke doen" ma soit
@WolfGubbelmans Een stapke doen ni nee, maar heb wel al 'op stap gaan' gehoord? 'Ah, gade op stap?' als iemand z'n jas aantrekt bv. (in Antwerpen)
Just a nice fact is that the written language is 100% the same between the two countries. There is this written competition between the two countries and all the contestants write down the same text spoken by the host so the grammar is 100% the same as the same rules applies for both
There *was* this written competition...
Sadly they don't hold it anymore. At least, not on television...
I am a student in Flanders, and I've been learning Dutch for about a year now. This video opened my eyes (and ears) as to why it was so difficult for me to figure out what was being said when I tried to decipher my friends talking; I've mostly been using 🇳🇱 Dutch learning materials to learn, so I would be completely dumbfounded when I heard my Flemish friends speak. Thank you for such a comprehensive video, very well put and explained! :)
Gij zijt gij goe bezig 😉😄
Je moet opletten want niet alles wat hij zegt in de video klopt helemaal.
You have to pay attention because not everything he says in the video is completely correct.
Thank you for making this, I really enjoyed it! :) Greetings from Antwerp
The different nouns always lead to funny conversations between me and my friends from The Netherlands
The limited Dutch I have always learned and heard is mostly from Limburg in NL, and so when I see Dutch people saying patatas, I’m like, WTF? No, they’re frieten! I’m also weirded out by calling the Maas anything other than the Maas. I also live in Germany, and speak German fluently, so Maas is 👍there as well. Then I see the English name: Meuse, and I’m just like… no. 😭no!
as a Belgian I was working in the south of the Nederlands, when I went to the supermarket, I couldn't find regular water. when I asked for help I used the words plat water mening flat water. the women stared at me like I was from Mars, apparently they call it Niet koolzuur houdend water meaning Non-carbonated water. sometimes it's easier to communicate with a English speaker then with our brothers and sisters from the Netherlands. the Dutch an Flemish speakers are always joking about our neighbors, but we have a friendly connection like no other country has. when we meet for the first time it's like meeting family.
Spreekt voor u eige ik haat die vettige hollanders me hun gierig gedrag en hun kaas obsessie en die fkn kkr "g" da hun uitspreke alsof der al 3dage iets vast zit in hun keel da der maar ni terug uit wilt kome
As a Dutch Dutch person I sometimes struggle with Flemish Dutch even if they use the same words we do, I have auditory processing issues and the lack of hard consonants in Flemish Dutch makes it difficult for me to get a grip on the sentence.
Another amazing video!
I’m a native French speaker from Belgium now living in Canada.
I learnt Dutch at school from 12 to 18 and mastered enough my Dutch to be able to enter the Belgian Army as a student officer (for which Dutch is mandatory).
That’s funny how my Dutch prononciation is 100% the Belgian one but my grammar, my vocabulary and nearly anything else is the standardized Dutch from The Netherlands :-D
The only exception would be some flamish words borrowed from French like frieten, blokken (we say « bloquer » instead of « étudier » (to study) in Belgian French and that French verb is not understood in France or Quebec at all).
I understand « poepen » as « to fuck » since in Vlaams we would say « schijten » to say « to shit ».
Anyway, that was an interesting video! Thank you for that!
Schijten of kakken😂
It's a nice analysis in general; I'm actually surprised to see a video about my native language and to see attention being given to Flemish 😄.
That said, some of these Flemish examples are not general usage at all XD! I'm a speaker of Tussentaal and believe you me, words like 'gelle' for 'jullie' and 'klappen' for 'spreken' are really regional. There is also not an absolute distinction between 'vader' and 'papa'. A Flemish person will definitely refer to their father and mother as 'mijn vader' en 'mijn moeder' - this is not a Dutch thing. 'Papa' and 'mama' are just more affectionate and informal, and people in the Netherlands will also address their parents as 'mama' and 'papa'.
Nothing Flemish in the video is *not* used in Flanders, but some of it is more regional and closer to dialect than it's made out to be.
Well, you *are* making me wonder if the version of Tussentaal that I speak is unusually close to standard Dutch now :p.
What I find interesting is that Dutch from the Netherlands and Flanders seem to be moving away from each other more. When I was a child, all Disney movies were dubbed by actors from the Netherlands, and I also watched a children's programme from the Netherlands without any problems. The accent was a bit different from my own, most notably there was the guttural 'g' that we don't have in Flanders. Nowadays, we have separate dubbing, and when I watch programmes from the Netherlands, they get subtitled - because the dialogue and accent tend to be more local than they used to. It seems to me that Standard Dutch in the Netherlands has really gone the way of RP in the UK, where people move towards Estuary English and nobody seems to speak RP anymore.
Dutch living and working in Brussels in an office full of Flemish people. The verb 'poepen' has caused quite a bit of confusing. "Mijn vrouw wilt wel n'es nen keer met nen andere man poepen" doesn't make any sense in Dutch Dutch haha.
Actually scratch that, "lopen" has caused most confusion because that's a word you actually use in daily speech, and all the Flemish variants like stappen have different semantics in Dutch as you're saying. When I say I'm going to do my rounds, my colleagues usually tell me I may walk and don't have to run.
Some more Frenchisms: stylo for pen, plaque for licence plate