Amerikaens: Difference between revisions

'''Amerikaens''' (Dutch: ''Amerikaans'', French: ''Langue américaense'') is a West Germanic language spoken in New Netherland, Tussenland, the Amerikaanse Free State, South Tussenland and, to a lesser extent, Mexico and Opdamsland. It evolved from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollandic_dialect Hollandic dialect] spoken by the Dutch settlers in North America, where it gradually began to develop distinguishing characteristics in the course of the 18th century. It is recognized as a daughter language of Continental Dutch and is the youngest of the Germanic languages.

==== Origin ====

===== Early French influence =====

During its establishment in the 1620s, the original settlers of New Netherland were not Dutch but French-speaking Wallonians families sent by the Dutch West India Company to settle the claimed lands. The Wallonian community made up a bulk of the early settlers, and Hollandic-speaking inspectors and officers often had to resort to frequent code-switching to communicate more effectively. This code-switching resulted in French-origin words entering the Amerikaense vocabulary, mostly words relating to family and household, such as ''koetoe'' (knife; from ''couteau'') and tapie (carpet; from ''tapis).''

It was not until the late 1650s that the first wave of Dutch-speaking settlers arrived in the colony. This immigration wave resulted from the newly-reformed colonial government's efforts to promote settler growth. Hollandic Dutch was the primary variant that these settlers had brought. However, these Dutch settlers had to interact with the French-speaking Wallonian families that had already settled there since the 1620s. These new settlers adopted the French-inspired vocabulary.

===== English influence =====

English settlers began moving in to New Netherland in the late early 1640s, mostly in Lange Island and lands west of the Verse River, mostly coming in from the English colonies.

==== Standardization and Recognition ====

===== De Amerikaense Taelbook =====

The Amerikaens Language Commission (Amerikaens: ''Amerikaense Taelkomisie'') is the official regulating body of the Amerikaense language, and the central authority tasked with developing, preserving, and promoting Amerikaens.

==== Tussenlandic Amerikaens ====

==== New Netherland Amerikaens ====

==== Irokees-Amerikaens ====

In Amerikaens noun genders are removed; the 'The' article in Amerikaens would simply be "De" for all nouns, instead of De/Het in Hollandic Dutch. This occurs without exceptions across all dialects. This corresponds to a series of grammar shifts in Amerikaens where grammatical gender is minimized as much as possible both in nouns and in adjectives which also don't conjugate for gender in Amerikaens.

In Amerikaens Hollandic Dutch words that end in -en (excluding en and een) the n is dropped in most cases (tevreden > tevrede). In Amerikaens, Hollandic Dutch words that end in -de (excluding de) the e is dropped in most cases (zeide > zeyd, zijde > zÿd). In Amerikaens the corruption middle-word consonant corruptions are common such as -tie into -sie (politie → polisie).

Amerikaens preserves the possessive genitive case from archaic Dutch; an example of this would be the sentence '''de vriend van de man''' in modern Hollandic Dutch becomes '''des mans vriend''' in Amerikaens. Historians & linguistics often debate whether the retaining of this case was a direct retention from Archaic Dutch, linguistic feature adopted from English & High German, or a mixture of both.

==== Loanwords ====

===== Words of English origin =====

# Plänti (plenty)

# Super (supper)

#Darn (damn it)

#Too de nainz! (to the nines)

===== Words of indigenous origin =====

# Moes (Moose) from Algonquian

# Wapiti (Elk) from Shawnee/Cree

# Kwaewon (Woodpecker) from Mohawk

# Jötenu (Hail) from Mohawk

# Atÿron (Racoon) from Mohawk

# Anowara (Turtle) from Mohawk

# Sewant (Wampum) from Pidgin Delaware

===== Words of Romance origin =====

# Bufalö (American Bison)

# Kütü (Knife)

== Script ==