{"id":3446,"date":"2025-03-17T14:35:18","date_gmt":"2025-03-17T13:35:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.uantwerpen.be\/bladspiegel\/?p=3446"},"modified":"2025-03-17T14:35:18","modified_gmt":"2025-03-17T13:35:18","slug":"germans-say-da-dutch-use-weil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.uantwerpen.be\/bladspiegel\/germans-say-da-dutch-use-weil\/","title":{"rendered":"Germans say “da”, Dutch use “weil”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Aber”, “weil”, “da” and “also”: these tiny words in a piece of academic writing can reveal the author’s first language. “Dutch first language speakers writing in German rely on connectives in ways that show how their first language subtly shapes cohesion in a foreign language,”\u00a0says Helena Wedig (TricS<\/a>).\u00a0Insights on these writing patterns could help improve language teaching and assessment. <\/strong>(Text: Helena Wedig)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Dutch and German are closely related, the question of whether Dutch as a first language helps to acquire German remained unanswered. Helena Wedig has taken part in the quest for the answer by specifically looking into connectives, the words or phrases that link sentences or clauses together. For her doctoral research at the Department of Translators and Interpreters, she examined the influence of Dutch on the use of connectives in academic German texts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marking connections explicitly<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In the study, Helena compared the use of connectives in texts of three groups: German learners with Dutch as their first language, first language German speakers, and German learners with other language backgrounds. Her focus was on the Dutch speakers, who turned out to use connectives in German slightly more frequent than first language German writers. \u201cI found that writers with Dutch as their first language tend to be more explicit,\u201d Helena says. \u201cIn comparison to writers with German as a first language, more often they used coordinating connectives such as \u201cund\u201d to merge two grammatically independent sentences into one.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Viele glauben, die Verwendung [des Dialekts] f\u00fchre zu schlechten Hochdeutsch-kompetenzen in der Schule und<\/strong> au\u00dferdem benutzen Jugendliche ihn \u00f6fter auch in der geschriebenen Sprache.<\/p>\nMany believe that the use of [dialect] leads to poor High German skills at school *and* <\/em>additionally young people use it more often in written language.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Relying on Dutch strategies<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The study also uncovered patterns in the connectives preferred by German writers with Dutch as a first language. \u201cDutch writers were more likely to use words like \u2018aber\u2019 (but) and \u2018also\u2019 (thus) compared to other writers,\u201d Helena says. \u201cWhat stood out most was their strong preference for \u2018weil\u2019 over \u2018da\u2019 (both meaning \u2018because\u2019). This could be linked to the more common use of the Dutch equivalents \u2018omdat\u2019 instead of \u2018daar\u2019, which might make \u2018weil\u2019 feel like a natural choice.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u2022 Trotzdem gibt es Personen, die gegen Kiezdeutsch k\u00e4mpfen, weil <\/strong>sie meinen es verderbt die deutsche Sprache.
\u2022 Da <\/strong>die deutschen W\u00f6rter ohne Varianten nicht im W\u00f6rterbuch stehen, handelt es sich nicht um ein vollst\u00e4ndiges W\u00f6rterbuch.<\/p>\n\u2022 Nevertheless, there are people who fight against Kiezdeutsch because they believe it spoils the German language.<\/em>
\u2022 As <\/strong>the German words without variants are not in the dictionary, it is not a complete dictionary.<\/em><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Helpful in language teaching<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Understanding this influence of Dutch as a first language on learning German is valuable in language teaching. When learners are aware of similarities and differences between the two languages, they can use this knowledge to improve their writing and overall language skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contact<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Helena Wedig \u2013 helena.wedig@uantwerpen.be<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Aber”, “weil”, “da” and “also”: these tiny words in a piece of academic writing can reveal the … <\/p>\n

“Germans say “da”, Dutch use “weil””<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":3455,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[108,357,64,100,210],"coauthors":[58],"class_list":["post-3446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-toegepaste-taalkunde","tag-doctoraatsonderzoek","tag-helena-wedig","tag-taalkunde","tag-toegepaste-taalkunde","tag-trics"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGermans say "da", Dutch use "weil" - bladspiegel<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.uantwerpen.be\/bladspiegel\/germans-say-da-dutch-use-weil\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"nl_BE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Germans say "da", Dutch use "weil" - 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