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https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/30128
Title: | Mutual Comprehensibility of Written Afrikaans and Dutch: Symmetrical or Asymmetrical? | Contributor(s): | Gooskens, Charlotte (author); van Bezooijen, Renée (author) | Publication Date: | 2006-11 | Early Online Version: | 2006-08-27 | DOI: | 10.1093/llc/fql036 | Handle Link: | https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/30128 | Abstract: | The two West-Germanic languages Dutch and Afrikaans are so closely related that they can be expected to be mutually intelligible to a large extent. The present investigation focuses on written language. Comprehension was established by means of cloze tests on the basis of two newspaper articles. Results suggest that it is easier for Dutch subjects to understand written Afrikaans than it is for South African subjects to understand written Dutch. In order to explain the results, attitudes as well as several types of linguistic distances were assessed. The relations between attitude scales and intelligibility scores were few and weak. Asymmetries in the linguistic relationships between the two languages are probably more important, especially the asymmetries in the number of noncognates and the opacity of the relatedness of cognates. These asymmetries are caused by historical developments in Dutch and Afrikaans, with respect to the lexicon, grammar, and spelling. | Publication Type: | Journal Article | Source of Publication: | Literary and Linguistic Computing, 21(4), p. 543-557 | Publisher: | Oxford University Press | Place of Publication: | United Kingdom | ISSN: | 1477-4615 0268-1145 |
Fields of Research (FoR) 2008: | 200310 Other European Languages 200406 Language in Time and Space (incl. Historical Linguistics, Dialectology) 200405 Language in Culture and Society (Sociolinguistics) |
Socio-Economic Objective (SEO) 2008: | 970120 Expanding Knowledge in Language, Communication and Culture 950201 Communication Across Languages and Culture |
Peer Reviewed: | Yes | HERDC Category Description: | C1 Refereed Article in a Scholarly Journal |
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Appears in Collections: | Journal Article School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences |
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