• In the language itself: Stellingwarfs
• ISO 639-3 standard: stl

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• Classification: Indo-Europees > Germanic > Nothwest Germanic > West-Germanic > North Sea Germanic > Altsächsisch > Middle-Modern Low German > Low German > West Low German > Westphalic > Stellingwerfs . For more information, see stel1238 at Glottolog
• Script: Latin

Just after the second world war, the Stellingwerf writer H.J. Bergveld made a standardized spelling for the Stellingwerf langauge/dialect.
In the 90s of last century, a writersgroup was established: “streektaalvereniging Stellingwarver Scrieversronte” (Regional association Stellingwerfs writersgroup)¹⁾.

In 1976, Bergvelds spelling was officially taken as Stellingwerfs spelling by the board of the “Stellingwarver Scrieversronte”.

The spelling was also taken into the “Stellingwarfs Woordeboek”(Stellingwerfs dictionary). The first of four parts of the dictionary was published in 1994, the other three were published in 1997, 2001 and 2004, respectively . In 2005, a shorter, manual dictionary has been published by Henk Bloemhof.²⁾

With this standerdized spelling, the population of the Stellingwerfs region started to write and read more in the dialect.

Stellingwerfs is spoken is the southern regions of the province Fryslân of the Netherlands as well as contected parts of the province of Drenthe and Overijsel. The Stellingwerfer municipalities in Fryslân are Weststellingwerf and Ooststellingwerf. In the other provinces there are the municipalities of Steenwijkerland and Westerveld that speak Stellingwerfs.

The map shows the area, in red, where Stellingwerfs is spoken, with the dark blue lines showing the province borders. Wikipedia. ³⁾.

The Stellingwerf dialect has around 27.300 speakers⁴⁾.

Language count 2005 ⁵⁾

Table 1: Count of people in the Stellingwerf area on being able to use or using Stellingwerfs.

This table shows the proficiency scores of Stellingwerfs in three different municipalities. We see that Stellingwerfs is still very much spoken at home in Weststellingwerf and Steenwijkerland, this percentage is much lower in Oostellingwerf. The other notible percentages in this table are that of reading proficiency. This percentage is significantly high, even higher than the percentage of people that speak Stellingwerfs at home frequently.

In 1988 the Frisian region of the Stellingwerf area changed the manditory course of Frisian to a course about, and thought in the Stellingwerf dialect “heemkunde”, for primairy education.

From 2013 till 2016, a project was done on the culture education of Stellingwerfs called KEK!(Kultueredukaasje mei Kwaliteit/ Culture-education with quality). This project has led to another project: Veerkieker. This is a project that focusses on “heemkunde” for all primary schools in Oost- and Weststellingwef. From 2019, the project started to include the regional language as a focuspoint.

Please describe legislation concerning education of the language.

Feel free to add points, or to structure your information using chapter headings, e.g.:

The Netherlands has signed and retified the ECRML(European charter of regional and minority languages). So, Stellingwerfs seen as a dialect of the Lower-Saxon languages is signed under Part II of the ECRML, Article 7 ⁶⁾.

Although Lower-Saxon is signed under Part II of the Charter, the people speaking a Lower-Saxon language are not recognised as a minority.

The Dutch government has education laws in place that allow for a minority or regional language to be used as a medium of instruction for pre-school besides the use of Dutch⁷⁾.

The Dutch government also has a law for the use and stipulation of the Frisian language in the province of Fryslân⁸⁾. Because the municipalities of Oost- and Weststellingwerf is within the province of Fryslân, this Stellingwerf region is granted exemption for teaching the Frisian language, which is supstituted by teaching Stellingwerfs. This law makes that Stellingwerfs is tought in primary schools ⁹⁾.

Questions that may be discussed in this section:

• is there any legal acts, recognition, or language policy on the local level?

In 1996, the Stellingwerfs dialect was acknowledged as a Nedersaksen variant¹⁰⁾.

• In which ways is the quality of language education is inspected and stimulated?

If information is available, please discuss whether:

The institution that focusses on the education of Stellingwerfs is the “Stichting Stellingwarver Schrieversronte” (Association Stellingwerf Writersgroup), established in 1972. They develop education materials for primary schools in the Stellingwerf area.

They also offer an online cursus on Instagram, with the use of a workbook. Where people can learn Stellingwerfs ¹¹⁾.

The Dutch government gives susidies for the Stellingwerf dialect and culture.

The learning materials are made by the Association for Stellingwerfs and they make materials for primary education.

e.g:

• Is there training available for language teachers?
• Are there sufficient teachers and they are competent?
• Is a teacher's union present, or an institution where teachers can get advice or additional training?
• Is teacher training subsidised by the regional or national government?

To what extent is language education available in the area under scrutiny:

Can you say anything about to what extent education of the language helps to preserve it:

• Does learning the language at school stimulate the its use outside school, or perhaps quite the opposite?
• Does the fact that the language is being taught in school add to its prestige, and the speakers' self-esteem?

Feel free to structure your information using chapter heading, e.g.:

There are no known data on how much Stellingwerfs is used in preschool education, although institutions strive towards the use of Stellingwerfs in preschool education ¹²⁾.

Stellingwerfs is taught inside primary schools in all grades 1 through 8. It is thaught as a course 'heemskunde' which teaches students about their language and culture as well as history and nature.

This education is given in the municipalities of Oost- and Weststellingwerf.

Stellingwerfs is not being taught in secondary educattion.

Stellingwerfs in not taught in higher education or on an universitair level.

There is an online cursus for learning Stellingwerfs on Instagram.

Please provide links to online learning resources. Feel free to add points, and to structure your information using chapter heading, e.g.: