West Flemish

Common card · No. 283481

West-Flemish (West-Vlams or West-Vloams or Vlaemsch (in French Flanders), Dutch: West-Vlaams, French: flamand occidental) is a Low Franconian language spoken in western Belgium and the neighbouring areas of France and the Netherlands. Vlaemsch, or West-Flemish, despite minor regional differences, is classified by many linguistic authorities, including the country of France, UNESCO, Glottolog and Ethnologue, as a distinct language (ISO 639-3: vls) within the Low Franconian branch of the West-Germanic family, rather than a dialect of Dutch. It is recognized as a separate entity due to its significant phonological, lexical, and grammatical differences from Standard Dutch, such as its unique monophthongization and negative concord systems. Its mutual intelligibility with Standard Dutch is limited, similarly to Afrikaans. West-Flemish (Vlaemsch) is spoken by about a million people in the Belgian province of West Flanders, and a further 50,000 in the neighbouring Dutch coastal district of Zeelandic...

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