Linguistic makeup of Brussels without Belgian independence

Exactly, they are not mutually intelligible. Standard French and Walloon are distinct languages. Related, yes, but the situation is similar to Mandarin/Cantonese.

er... I can speak French and I just read a text in Walloon, it's actually pretty understable. It's like saying that English and Scots are two different languages.
 
If Belgium doesn't secede from the Netherlands, I think the south of this Greater Netherlands will try to keep a cultural specificity. I mean, they're not Protestant and the elite is still widely influenced by France. Brussels would be certainly Flemish-speaking but French would be largely present, just like it is in Luxembourg city: the natives speak Luxembourgish as a 1st language but they're all perfectly able to speak French (without an accent).
Oh yes, that I can see. Brussels is close to the language border. Being able to speak French would be useful, even if your native language is Dutch. Actualy, i would say that the amount of French speakers will be larger in all of the Netherlands. Currently I think 10%, maybe 15% of the Dutch speak French (or think they can speak French, the people being able to actualy speak French is probably even lower). If a large part of the Netherlands speaks French, the knowledge of French will probably be considerably larger.
 
If you can read that text in wallon then you are pretty skilled because I can't read it.
http://rifondou.walon.org/cirnaiviaedje.html#ariane
Of course there are few words I can make out or guess but that's all.
Can you understand someone speaking Wallon? I know there exists a big difference between a written dialect and a spoken dialect. For example, I grew up in Limburg, but since my parents came from another part of the Netherlands, I can't speak the local dialect. I can understand it when they speak it, though. But if they write it down, it is almost incomprehensible to me. For people who aren't familiar with the dialect, they can't understand it when written or spoken.
 
Can you understand someone speaking Wallon? I know there exists a big difference between a written dialect and a spoken dialect. For example, I grew up in Limburg, but since my parents came from another part of the Netherlands, I can't speak the local dialect. I can understand it when they speak it, though. But if they write it down, it is almost incomprehensible to me. For people who aren't familiar with the dialect, they can't understand it when written or spoken.
No I can't understand Wallon.
 
Anyway, after the detour about the mual intelligabilty of Wallon and French, lets return to the lingistic situation in a united Netherlands.

I believe that in Wallonia during the 20th century the situation will basicly be this:
The upper class speaks French and is able to speak Dutch
The lower class speaks Wallon/the local dialect and is able to speak French

In the late 20th century and in the (early) 21st century most of the Walloons speak French and a large number will be able to speak Dutch. A minority will still speak a Wallon (or related) dialect. Some people (including some seperatists) will try to encourage the Wallons to speak their slowly declining dialects.

The situation in Brussels will be that almost everyone speaks Dutch, but many will be able to speak French, partly because some will work in Wallonia or at least to increase their chances to find work in Wallonia if nescessary.

More people in the Netherlands will be able to speak French, probably on the level the Flemish are able to speak French. the closer you are to the language border, the more people are able to speak French.

I do not expect a language struggle like one that happened in Belgium, because I believe that the potential of industrialisation in the Walloon areas will give a large amount of influence to the French speaking population in the Netherlands. They will not consider themselves second rate citizens. No "en voor de Walen hetzelfde", although people who can only speak the Wallon dialect will not be considered equals. You will need to speak either French or Dutch to rise on the social ladder. Although to be fair, this will probably be exactly the same for people who can only speak Frisian or Dutch dialects like Limburgish.
 
If you can read that text in wallon then you are pretty skilled because I can't read it.
http://rifondou.walon.org/cirnaiviaedje.html#ariane
Of course there are few words I can make out or guess but that's all.

A lot of that is the phoneticised spelling, which is by design an attempt to distinguish and distance from another closely related language. English and Scots is a decent comparison though the difference seems wider here.

I would bet you'd had a hard time reading English if the spelling was strictly phonetic.
 
Isn't the situation more similar to Dutch and Limburgish? Limburgish is considered a dialect of Dutch, but unless you are familiar with Limburgish, you won't understand it if you can only speak Dutch. The same is true for many dialects in the Netherlands.

I chose the Chinese languages because that would probably be clearer to more people. (Also I don't know about that situation with Limburgish :p)

er... I can speak French and I just read a text in Walloon, it's actually pretty understable. It's like saying that English and Scots are two different languages.

Not quite, as has been seen above. I have grown up bilingual in Canada since I was 4. I find it easier to read Occitan than written Walloon.

Can you understand someone speaking Wallon? I know there exists a big difference between a written dialect and a spoken dialect. For example, I grew up in Limburg, but since my parents came from another part of the Netherlands, I can't speak the local dialect. I can understand it when they speak it, though. But if they write it down, it is almost incomprehensible to me. For people who aren't familiar with the dialect, they can't understand it when written or spoken.

Here's a spoken example, which I cannot understand. Some words I can make out, but not enough to understand the poem.
 

JJohnson

Banned
If Belgium doesn't secede from the Netherlands, I think the south of this Greater Netherlands will try to keep a cultural specificity. I mean, they're not Protestant and the elite is still widely influenced by France. Brussels would be certainly Flemish-speaking but French would be largely present, just like it is in Luxembourg city: the natives speak Luxembourgish as a 1st language but they're all perfectly able to speak French (without an accent).

How would you keep Belgium from seceding and keep the country together to today?
 
How would you keep Belgium from seceding and keep the country together to today?
I believe that the most often used POD here is OTL king Willem II dieing at Waterloo.

Actualy there are various way of avoiding it. Best way is to simply treat the Belgians better. Other ways are to keep Willem II away from Brussels and screwing up. Or faster intervention by the Dutch king in the early stages of the revolt. Or France does not get involved. Or Prussia/Austria/Russia support the Dutch during the revolt. Probably a couple of others.
 
On the French-Walloon comparison remember its easier to understand writing than speech. For example my German is mediocre and while I can read a Der Spiegel article (slowly) I couldn't understand it if it's read out to me fast by a native German speaker.
 
On the French-Walloon comparison remember its easier to understand writing than speech. For example my German is mediocre and while I can read a Der Spiegel article (slowly) I couldn't understand it if it's read out to me fast by a native German speaker.
That's generally the case but I see the point about that text in Walloon being unreadable because of the phonetic spelling and the fact that we're not familiar with what each character (or combination thereof) is conventioned to represent phonetically.
That article starts with "Gn a ddja pont d' må, mins on nd a souwé ene, di tchmijhe !" Gn?? Nd?? WTF? Vowels, please! And what's with the å? Is Walloon Swedish now? :eek:
 
I believe that the most often used POD here is OTL king Willem II dieing at Waterloo.

Actualy there are various way of avoiding it. Best way is to simply treat the Belgians better. Other ways are to keep Willem II away from Brussels and screwing up. Or faster intervention by the Dutch king in the early stages of the revolt. Or France does not get involved. Or Prussia/Austria/Russia support the Dutch during the revolt. Probably a couple of others.

Actually one can argue about the general treatment of the Belgians. Yes Willem I made mistakes, but OTOH the population in what would become Belgium and what stayed the Netherlands was not generally treated differently. For instance any argument that Willem I was somewaht autocratic applies to the entire kingdom. Not to mention that Willem I championed the industrialization of the Southern Netherlands (later Belgium); in fact he still owned a large share in the Societe General after Belgium was independent:). Or that the industry of the Southern Netherlands profited from the colonies, which were inherited from predecessors of the North. OTOH the North, which was focused on trade, preferred free trade, whereas the industrialized South seemed to prefer protectionism.

In fact in some regards the Flemish region was better of in the kingdom of the United Netherlands than they later were in Belgium. For example education in Dutch. This was however also opposed by the Francophone Flemish elite, even though the majority of the population there did speak Dutch (dialects).

Anyway yes giving the Southern and Northern Netherlands equal representation, even though the population in the South was larger was unfair; however OTOH any reversal would also be bad. So yes, more Southern representatives would have been fairer, but they should never have been that large that they could just impose their will on the North.
Maybe
The Southern Netherlands (later Belgium) had to share the burden of the debt of the former Dutch Republic (Batavian Republic and kingdom of Holland), which in an union would have been unavoidable. IIRC Belgium even had accept a share after their independence.

Willem I also didn't handle the Roman Catholic faith quite well, though that is broader than just the Southern Netherlands, the North also had a sizeable Catholic minority (in some parts of the North even a majority).
Catholics also were underrepresented in many institutions, but that was a bit of a two way street. On the one hand there might very well have been some discrimination, but on the other certain Catholic bishops also discouraged Catholics from working for the regime.

Anyway once in South the Catholics and Liberals managed to agree upon an unlikely political alliance Willem I was in trouble. That combined with the 'bad luck' of a famine, which proofed to be the final straw.
 
Regarding the schoolstrijd (part of the religion question then): Willem I could ofcourse allow the schools to teach their version of the Christian faith - so either Catholicism or a version of Protestantism - while forbidding them to propagate hate towards the others. Also sign into law the right for Catholic schools to be opened in the entire country, and Protestant schools also.


Regarding the language problem in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands: Perhaps Willem I could instead of forbid the use of French by the institutions from January 1st, 1823 onwards, just discourage it. In the 'French' bit of the Kingdom Willem I could introduce a dual language school system as to slowly phase out French (also encourage them to move across the nation so as to force them to integrate into the new (dutch language) surroundings)


Also by granting noble titles to people but at court use mostly Dutch so these new nobles - often invited to come - have to learn Dutch also.
 
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