Talk:Brazilian German

Merger proposal

It has been proposed to merge Brazilian German and Riograndenser Hunsrückisch. From what I have seen, that appears to be a good idea. Apparently, the situation is as follows:

• Some form of German is the most popular language in Brazil after Portuguese. (Reason: Germans were the third largest group of immigrants. The second largest group, Italians, assimilated faster.) Not long ago it was spoken by 10%.
• Of the many different German dialects exported to Brazil, Hunsrückisch became dominant and was mixed with the other German dialects, Portuguese and indigenous languages. The result is referred to as Brazilian German or, more often, Hunsrückisch.
• As Hunsrückisch is still a local German dialect, one says Riograndenser Hunsrückisch instead, though that can also refer specifically to the variants spoken in the southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul. It is also particularly strong in that state's only neighbour state, Santa Catarina (state), where the local variant is referred to as Katharinensisch.
• It is not entirely clear to me what, exactly, "Rio Grande" signifies in this context. I think the first two of the following possibilities are the most likely, and which of them applies doesn't make a big difference:
  • Rio Grande do Sul, a Brazilian state.
  • Rio Grande, the oldest city in the above state.
  • Grande River, a river flowing through part of southern Brazil, but north of Santa Catarina.
  • A number of other, less significant Brazilian rivers even further north.

So we have Riograndenser Hunsrückisch (wide sense) = Brazilian German as the general term, with local variations Riograndenser Hunsrückisch (narrow sense, spoken in Rio Grande do Sul), Katharinensisch (spoken in Santa Catarina), and other variations spoken further north.

I think it is the best (least confusing) solution to discuss Brazilian German and its main variant Riograndenser Hunsrückisch together in a single merged article, which for clarity should be named Brazilian German, though getting a redirect from the alternative title Riograndenser Hunsrückisch. It should have a section on the Rio Grande do Sul variety, one on the Santa Catarina variety, and possibly one on the other varieties spoken in the country.

As there seems to be very little activity in this topic, I am going to boldly implement this if nobody protests very soon. Hans Adler 11:24, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Important correction: Some variants of German that are based on totally different local German dialects, esp. Pommersch, are also still spoken in Brazil, in some places with official status. While it may be that they will ultimately all be known as "Hunsrik", that does not seem to be the case yet and a merger appears premature.

I think that for the time being, Brazilian German should discuss all German-based language variants that have developed in Brazil, and Riograndenser Hunsrückisch should discuss the one that has developed out of Hunsrückisch. Hans Adler 12:03, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Spaniards are the 3rd group (they assimilated even faster than the Italians because they have more similar language, names and surnames, culture, religious traditions, etc. as they were mostly from Galicia, Andalusia and to a minor degree Catalonia), Germans are the 4th. In general those that were Protestant moved to remote lands, while the Catholics and the non-Christians were mostly present in the major urban centers and Southeastern Brazil's plantations, and the Orthodox moved to both environments. :)

Well, it is certainly not related to a river that cuts Minas Gerais, as the link points out. As the immigrants moved mostly to the serra (pampa and coast have stronger Iberian, Amerindian and African elements), it is certainly about the state, if not about a river in Santa Catarina.

At least in Rio de Janeiro and Espírito Santo we refer to the Pommersch-speakers as pomeranos. They're saw as kind of German, but not really the same Germans that speak High German, that are referred to as alemães (the same name we give to the citizens and naturals of modern Germany). Since pomerano is a wholly different identity, it wouldn't be absurd to not deal with Pommersch here, just to say that Brazilians speaking Low German dialects with ancestors coming from present Poland see themselves and are perceived by others as different from the Brazilians that speak High German.

If I'm allowed to go deep into original research... Even the country of origin and bloodline doesn't matter much when compared to native language, my great-great-grandfather was a Prussian citizen – the reason no one got Polish citizenship, he should have told himself a Pole in an embassy in the event of the 1918 Polish census, but then he was afraid of having to go to war, WWI just ended by the time and its terrible reputation was still fresh – and had some Prussian ancestry, but since he was Catholic in an AFAIK mostly Protestant area and spoke Polish (marrying a Brazilian, daughter of Portuguese mother and Portuguese stepfather – her Brazilian father had been since long deceased), my mother's family doesn't regard itself as grouped with the Germans in any way. The same is true for, in the same family (most cousins of my grandmothers were "double cousins" as almost all the adults were brothers- and sisters-in-law of themselves), the Swiss great-great-grandmother, with both surnames being German but speaking Fribourg's Franco-Provençal. She was also probably Catholic and married a Portuguese immigrant.

AFAIK in ES and RJ, generally only those that speak French or Franco-Provençal identify as Swiss. The others generally identify as German or Italian, they lived close to Pomeranians, as well Italians and Germans from in and around Switzerland so I would know. The Europeans both died with about 80 years of age, widowers since long (my maternal grandma lost her own m. g. as a child, and her paternal grandfather as a teen, but the other two only when she was already a fiancée by age 25), leaving an unbelievable number of children, 13 (him) and 15+3 (her, plus adoptive children), a more unbelievable yet number of grandchildren (their children generally had ~4 kids, below average for Brazil at the time) and some great-grandchildren, then everyone's version of the story completes the other. The only absurdly weird side is that none of the Brazilians interested in learning Polish or Franco-Provençal! When I got shocked by that, my grandma said that, arguably, people from the country wouldn't have such bourgeois interests. What I wouldn't give, to be natively bilingual, trilingual or polyglot must be so epic! 177.65.49.210 (talk) 08:30, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

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