Product Overview
Plautdietsch Language Bible
Plautdietsch, or Mennonite Low German, Was Originally a Low Prussian Variety of East Low German, with Dutch Influence
450,000 Native Speakers!!!
Product Details
- Hardcover
- Publisher: Bible Society (1989)
- Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.8 x 1.3 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
Plautdietsch [ˈplɑtditʃ] or Mennonite Low German, was originally a Low Prussian dialect of East Low German, with Dutch influence, that developed in the 16th and 17th centuries in the Vistula delta area of Royal Prussia. The term Plautdietsch literally translates to 'Low German', plaut meaning 'flat' (referring to the plains of northern Germany), and the term Dietsch originally meaning "of the Tribe", and referring to all the continental West Germanic peoples and their languages (i.e. Low German, Dutch, High German). In other Low German dialects, the word for Low German is usually realised as Plattdütsch [ˈplatdytʃ] or Plattdütsk [ˈplatdytsk], but the spelling Plautdietsch is used to refer specifically to the Vistula variant of the language.
Plautdietsch, an East Low German dialect, was a German dialect like others until it was taken by Mennonite settlers to the south west of the Russian Empire starting in 1789. From there it evolved and subsequent waves of migration brought it to North America, starting in 1873, and mostly from there to Latin America starting in 1922.
Plautdietsch is spoken by about 400,000 Russian Mennonites, most notably in the Latin American countries of Mexico, Bolivia, Paraguay, Belize, Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay, as well as in the United States and Canada (particularly Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Ontario).
Today Plautdietsch is spoken in two major dialects that trace their division to Ukraine. These two dialects are split between Chortitza Colony and Molotschna. Many younger Russian Mennonites in Canada and the United States today speak only English. For example, Homer Groening, the father of Matt Groening (creator of The Simpsons), spoke Plautdietsch as a child in a Mennonite community in Saskatchewan in the 1920s, but his son Matt never learned the language.
In 2007, Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas directed the film Stellet Licht (Silent Light), set in a Mennonite community in Chihuahua, Mexico. Most of the film's dialogue is in Plautdietsch, which some of the actors had to learn phonetically. Other parts were played by people of the local community.
