Nederlandse Taalkunde - Volume 23, Issue 2, 2018

This paper discusses how the phonologies of Dutch, West-Frisian and Afrikaans are represented in Taalportaal, a digital grammar of the three West-Germanic languages. These languages have similar consonant inventories, but differ in the vowel phonemes that they use. The phonological processes and phonotactic restrictions that refer to laryngeal properties are comparable in the three languages, but for other processes and phonotactic restrictions, it is not quite clear in how far they occur in all three languages or in how far they are unique for one individual language. This part seems to be incomplete in Taalportaal. For Dutch, West-Frisian, and Afrikaans, we find different descriptions of word stress assignment and it is therefore difficult to find the underlying generalisations. Also, the part on phonological processes at morpheme boundaries and other cases of phonology-morphology interaction lack a full description in Taalportaal. Nevertheless, this platform will be highly appreciated by linguists and other researchers who are interested in the sound systems of the languages represented in Taalportaal.

The Taalportaal website is a highly accessible webpage for those interested in Dutch, Afrikaans, and Frisian. The Dutch phonology part can be used by both researchers and teachers. Both groups, however, might be confused by certain transcription conventions, because underlying principles are not explained. Language variation and social connotations also deserve more attention. In general, explanations might be added, so that pronunciation theory and actual usage become less conflated.

In this paper we review the phonological component of Dutch in Taalportaal, a website discussing the language systems of Dutch, Frisian and Afrikaans. We examine the website from the perspective of language variation, with special attention to (varieties of) Belgian Dutch. The discussion on Dutch phonology is comprehensive, including segmental as well as suprasegmental topics. Language variation is certainly not ignored, but seems to be dealt with in a rather ad hoc way. This is linked to the fact that Taalportaal takes ‘the Dutch standard variety as it functions in the Netherlands’ as its starting point, rather than giving equal attention to the three national language varieties, being Dutch Dutch, Belgian Dutch and Surinamese Dutch. In three case studies – on diphthongs, voice assimilation and vowel reduction – we show that there are interesting differences between Dutch and Belgian Dutch varieties which are not yet discussed on the website. We therefore plead for the addition of a critical reflection on the position of language variation in Taalportaal (and on the question which variation to include or to leave aside), and for taking the pluricentric character of Dutch as a starting point.

This paper evaluates the morphological part of the Taalportaal website, which gives access to a comprehensive, scientific grammar of Dutch, Frisian and Afrikaans. More particularly, we investigate how separable verbs are dealt with in Taalportaal. We evaluate the structure of that part of the website, and try to find an answer to three questions regarding this type of verbs, viz. (i) what are separable verbs, (ii) what is their grammatical status and (iii) what are their semantic properties? By doing so, we are able to identify strengths and weaknesses of the Taalportaal website, which are related to consistency and accessibility of the information as well as to the quality of the illustrations and the explanation for non-native speakers. In general, we conclude that Taalportaal provides an introduction to Dutch morphology rather than giving an exhaustive overview of the different word formation possibilities in Dutch.

In this article we investigate what the Taalportaal has to offer concerning Dutch word formation. We note that the Taalportaal is not yet able to provide a large group of users with relevant information in an accessible manner. This is partly due to the fact that the Taalportaal has not yet been made suitable for the Internet, for another part the grammatical information makes ample use of scientific jargon so that it is not readable for the layperson. Finally, on the basis of a few case studies, we check to what extent the Taalportaal can function as a ‘scientific grammar’.

P.J. Meertens’ appointment in 1930 as secretary of the Dialect Committee and head of its bureau has been described as a key step in his unfolding career as a folklorist. Whereas histories of the study of folklore are plentiful, those on the Dialect Committee and its bureau are scant. J. Daan’s history of dialect geography in the Netherlands includes misrepresentations and omissions involving Meertens, van Ginneken and Kloeke, which have been amplified in later publications. For example, van Ginneken’s machinations purportedly thwarted Kloeke’s nomination to direct a Dialect institute. Daan does not mention that the government’s refusal in 1927 and 1928 to fund an institute had required changing the original plans, nor does she mention the role of the medical doctor and experimental phonetician Kaiser, whose status as an exact scientist influenced the government to reverse position, and in 1929 announce funding. Using extensive archival research, and focusing especially on the production of an atlas of dialects in the Northern and Southern Netherlands, this article describes the history of the Dialect Committee from its early initiatives in 1926 until 1948 when the committees for dialects, folklore and onomastics formed a Central Committee.

High degree adverbs, or so-called intensifiers, constitute a large and apparently ever growing set of words in Dutch, even to the degree that each generation appears to recruit their own set of them. We address the question of what exactly determines the strength of an intensifier by investigating which factors influence their (perceived) strength. The results of an experiment among over 300 high school students show that intensifiers are perceived as stronger when they are (perceived as) more frequent and also when they are (perceived as) more modern. This explains the ongoing extension and renewal of the set of intensifiers in Dutch.