Is there a real difference between Dutch, Flemish and Dutch?

Question

In South Africa ??
Have always been curious because I got different answers before from people. I tried to learn Dutch at uni and had 2 teachers : one from the Netherland and one from the Flemish region in Belgium.

I don't expect many responses.....am curious about what the Dutch speakers would say. Thank you !

No : Flemish is not - in my experience anyway, have lots of flemish people in my family - a mixture of Dutch and French..

Thank you very very much alchemist. I will look up that. Half of my family actually comes from Brugge too but forgot their "own " language. Thank you again for so much information.

Answer 1

Right, last one for tonite ... :-)
I am flemish, originally from Bruges.
If you imagine the maps of Netherlands and Belgium ... Forget what is above the river under Dordrecht (Hollands Diep). The area below Dordrecht is called Moerdijk. 'Officially' hum, hum, everyone that lives north of the Moerdijk is a Hollander. Their language is totally different from the people below it. I used to live in Zevenbergen.
The language borders as such go vertically between the Moerdijk (on a horizontal line across the Netherlandsmore or less) and where they start speaking Walloon in Belgium. So a person from Bruges will be able to speak Flemish to someone from Vlissingen and they will both understand each other. A person from Middelburg will speak very simalar to a flemish person with an east Flandres accent. And someone from breda and Antwerpen will have not too much trouble understanding each other other.

Now ... if you take two old biddies, one from brugge and one from Antwerpen they both speak Flemish but their own little form and chances are they will have to revert to some form of ABN (Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands) before they will understand each other.
Similarly, you take one Amsterdammer and one person from Zeeuwsch Vlaanderen (the bit of Zeeland that is stuck to Belgium, doe a google on Sluis) the Amsterdammer will not have a clue what the Zeeuw is on about if he talks in his own dialect.

I moved to Amsterdam aged 18 and as history would have it, they really give Belgians a hard time. So i learnt Dutch and to this day speak it with a North Holland accent. It freaks the Dutch out because they can't get their heads around a belgian that can pronounce the throaty G that is what makes Dutch so distinctive from ABN. If you listen to the news of both countries or listen to radiostations you can hear the difference between a dutch speaker and a belgian speaker.

Flemish is not a written language and i had to write many time I SHALL SPEAK ABN WHILST IN CLASS in my years in school. ABN translates to 'Generally Civilised Dutch'.
Flemish consists of west flemish, east flemish, antwerp and Limburg dialects. Not sure if Brabant (the belgian one) has a distinctive flemish, i think it leans towards the others and a big chunk of Belgian Brabant is bilingual. Netherlands has Zeeuwsch, brabants, Limburgs and a few other dialects that the average hollander doesn't understand (Twente, Friesland, Achterhoek etc ...)

Hollanders are the people that live in the provinces of north and south holland by the way and to some degree the ones that live in province of Utrecht too. It all goes back to the 1700's. Hope that makes sense.

Also check out Baarle Nassau and Baarle Hertog, There's an interesting bit of history there too.

Stillwater: You understand the Belgians on television because they are speaking standaardnederlands. The definition of standaardnederlands is governed by the Nederlandse Taalunie (founded in 1980, the year i left school). It is what is taught in schools but not neccessarily what is spoken at home or in the kroeg of 't cafe ;-)
I found this in reference to Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands:
"Vroeger werd gesproken van Algemeen Beschaafd Nederlands (ABN). Deze aanduiding is in onbruik geraakt, mede doordat het woord beschaafd kan worden opgevat als suggestie dat mensen die andere varianten van het Nederlands spreken niet beschaafd zouden zijn." So basically they call it standaardnederlands now because the other one has implications through the use of the word 'civilised'. And still i maintain that someone from Amsterdam would not undertand a Zeeuw speaking dialect. He might catch some of it but not all. Have you ever been south of the Moerdijk?

Answer 2

Dutch in South Africa is quite different from Flemish and Dutch, but all would understand each other.
Flemish and Dutch are simular. They pronounce some words different and use some words in one country that are rarely used in the other country. There are TV-shows where Dutch and Belgium people work together. We (Dutch) understand everybody without problem. South African Dutch would cost more effort. They not only pronounce words different, they also use different expressions and different order of words. "Ik weet het niet" would be Flemish and Dutch. "Ik nie weet nie" (or something like that) would be South African.

Answer 3

I am a native speaker. Dutch and Flemish are the same language but have some different words and accent, like American and Brittish English. Afrikaans is spoken in South Africa, it is similar to Ducth but it is a different language.

Answer 4

I've always thought that the difference between Flemish and Dutch is like English and American. You can say one word in English but it will mean differently in American.

Answer 5

as i know people who live in Belgium speack Flemish and dut it is in Netherland, Flemish conside mix between dutch and french

Answer 6

you cant cough up dutch you can flem do you really care