How different are Dutch and Afrikaans?

How different are Dutch and Afrikaans?

As an estimated 90 to 95% of Afrikaans vocabulary is ultimately of Dutch origin, there are few lexical differences between the two languages; however, Afrikaans has a considerably more regular morphology, grammar, and spelling.

Is German similar to Afrikaans?

Afrikaans descended from Dutch dialects in the 17th century. It belongs to a West Germanic sub-group, the Low Franconian languages. Other West Germanic languages related to Afrikaans are German, English, the Frisian languages, and the unstandardised languages Low German and Yiddish.

Why is Dutch and Afrikaans similar?

Afrikaans and Dutch are mutually intelligible, owing to much of the Afrikaans language having its roots from the Dutch language. This means that most of the words have the same meaning and that the sentences are also the same. A conversation between the two languages would be no problem at all.

Does Afrikaans sound like Dutch?

Afrikaans and English are the only Indo-European languages among the many official languages of South Africa. Although Afrikaans is very similar to Dutch, it is clearly a separate language, differing from Standard Dutch in its sound system and its loss of case and gender distinctions.

Is Afrikaans a white language?

Afrikaans was constructed as a “white language”, with a “white history” and “white faces”.

Can a Dutch person understand Afrikaans?

Although Afrikaans is a daughter of Dutch, Dutch speakers might take some time to understand the language but they can understand Afrikaans. The spelling is also different from the Dutch standard. The mutual intelligibility is more apparent in the written rather than the spoken form of Afrikaans and Dutch.

Are Afrikaners friendly?

Afrikaners are, by nature, a friendly, loyal, and gregarious—but also no-nonsense—bunch of people. The latter may be due to their Dutch heritage, a nation known for its straightforward manner. They’re usually trusting, and their nature is to be generous and helpful when they can be.

Can German speakers understand Afrikaans?

No. Germanic languages are not as mutually intelligible with each other in the way that Romance and Slavic languages are. So no, Germans will struggle to understand Afrikaans. Afrikaans is closer to English and Dutch than it is to German.

What is Afrikaans a mix of?

Afrikaans is a creole language that evolved during the 19th century under colonialism in southern Africa. This simplified, creolised language had its roots mainly in Dutch, mixed with seafarer variants of Malay, Portuguese, Indonesian and the indigenous Khoekhoe and San languages.

Is Afrikaans a black language?

Afrikaans is a southern African language. Today six in 10 of the almost seven million Afrikaans speakers in South Africa are estimated to be black. Like several other South African languages, Afrikaans is a cross-border language spanning sizeable communities of speakers in Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe.

What do Dutch think of Afrikaners?

The majority of the Dutch understand that JUST LIKE IN ANY OTHER GROUP OF PEOPLE: some are racist whilst the vast majority are not. The Dutch people (this is obviously a generalisation) think of the Afrikaners the same way they think of many other nationalities.