Talk:Francization of Brussels

This is a translation

This is a translation of the Dutch wiki site, with references and all. Will be a work in progress, but the Dutch version is very nicely written. Any help is requested--Daveblack (talk) 15:15, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Dutch or Brabantian

This article is about the shift from one language to another —not about the (still ongoing) process of replacing dialects by standard languages. If one thinks like that, this entire article is pointless, since that happened everywhere in Europe during the past century. The language of Brussels was Dutch, of course in its older form, and in spoken language, the Brabantian dialect, but Dutch was used in the local administration, literature, etc, it was the local cultural language till French took over this role. Therefore, mentioning the fact that local people spoke their own dialect only makes the introduction more complicated since this in se had nothing to do with the shift to French, and thus it is not an oversimplification. Not the fact that people spoke there own dialects made them switch to French, it's the fact that every connection with the Dutch standard language was (also actively) taken away. Linking this to Flemish nationalism, is totally ridiculous. --Hooiwind (talk) 22:09, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Please use a username to edit articles. You should know that the results of those censuses were always doubted by Flemings: thus now using it as to prove that French overtook Dutch (or Brabantian, Flemish, Low Country Chinese, or whatever) already in 1910 is irrelevant. You are dragging less relevant things into the first (!) sentence of an article, that creates bias, not the other way around. You might just as well say that nobody spoke Dutch in Belgium nor the Netherlands than since the 60s, which is clearly totally incorrect. This is not only about daily speech, it's about the shift from one language to the other, in every aspect of life. That's why mentioning that 'only' the dialect was spoken, is both not true and gives a too narrow interpretation to the francization. --Hooiwind (talk) 22:51, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Answer:
a- I created an account. Happy now?
b- Concerning the language spoken by the majority of the inhabitants of Brussels before the 19th century, it was a mix of Southern Brabantian dialects, I think everybody agree with that, including you. Nobody is trying to hide the fact that these South Brabantian dialects were highly related to Dutch, in fact the sentence that you keep reverting specifically says "the majority of people spoke local Brabantian dialects OF THE DUTCH LANGUAGE". Can't be more clear than that.
c- This insistance to write that people in Brussels spoke Dutch is wrong for two reasons. First it is inaccurate. People did not speak standard Dutch, they spoke dialects that were related to standard Dutch but distinct from it. In fact people from Amsterdam would have had trouble understanding people from Brussels speaking in their local dialect. To write that people in Brussels spoke Dutch is as inaccurate as writing that people in Strasbourg spoke German when in fact they spoke Alsatian, a regional language related to but quite distinct from standard German. Of course the written language of the Brabantian speakers of Brussels was standard Dutch (or sometimes a mix of Brabantian and standard Dutch), but don't forget that a lot of people didn't know how to write and read, and anyway what this article discusses is the language people spoke (orally). Second, this insistance to write that the language of Brussels was Dutch is politically controversial. I hope you do realize this is exactly the propaganda of the Flemish extremist parties such as the Vlaams Blok who wish to portray Brussels as a "Flemish" and "Dutch"-speaking city (when in fact it was a Brabantian city, not a Flemish city, and people spoke Brabantian, not standard Dutch), this in order to "reconquer" Brussels, which is the avowed goal of the Vlaams Blok.
d- Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, we need to be accurate and precise, and not oversimply things, especially when this oversimplification is politically controversial. Juste imagine if a German extremist decided to change the Strasbourg article and write that Strasbourg was a city whose language was originally German that was later Francized (is that even a word in English by the way?), when in fact people in Strasbourg never spoke standard German (only a small minority did so), they spoke Alsatian (and used standard German only as a written language) and then they gradually switched to French. The current wording is both precise ("Brabatian dialects") and does not hide the strong relationship between Brabantian and standard Dutch ("of the Dutch language"), so please let's leave it at that. Unless of course you have ulterior motives of a political nature, but I hope that's not the case.
e- Concerning the 1910 census in Brussels, your personal opinion is that its results are doubtful. You're perfectly entitled to your opinion, but from what I understand articles on Wikipedia cannot be based on personal opinion. Articles must be based on established facts supported by sources. Unless you have a source that specifically says that the results of the 1910 census in Brussels cannot be trusted, please kindly stop removing these census figures. I hope this clarifies all points. Bruxelloise (talk) 01:01, 12 February 2008 (UTC)