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Death of a Dialect
| Article
# : |
15627 |
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Section : |
CULTURE
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| Issue
Date : |
2 / 1989 |
3,232 Words |
| Author
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Per Schelde
Per Schelde is an anthropologist and free-lance writer based
in New York. His latest book, Ibsen's Forsaken Merman:
Folklore in the Late Plays, published by New York University
Press, has been received with acclaim. Dr. Schelde, a native
of Denmark, has written for American and European publications
and is currently working on a volume of short stories. |
Located in the Baltic Sea between the coast of Germany and the Danish island of Fyn, Æroe is the pearl and pride of a group of scattered islands and atolls that the Danes--with a healthy dose of self-irony--call "the South Sea Islands."
Yachters and tourists flock to the island every year during the short summer months. Approximately five hundred thousand people visit during the tourist season, which is not bad for an island that had a population of eighty-seven hundred in 1980. The attractions are manifold: Æroe is beautiful, flat, and fertile, with neat and rectangular fields of wheat, rye, and oats rolling gently toward the ubiquitous blue of the ocean. Gorgeous beaches and wooded retreats complete the picture. The Æroeans are gentle, charming, and laid back--and one can hear their funny, singsongy Danish dialect.
German tourists come in search of nature, build huge sand castles on the beaches and parade sun-crimsoned, nearly nude bodies in and out of the water. Danes from Copenhagen or Odense come in search of "cute"--and "cute" they get, especially in Æroeskoebing, the largest of Æroe's towns with twelve hundred inhabitants. The center of the town stands today exactly as it did in the 1680s, sporting quaint and beautiful old houses painted in subtle pastels, lining narrow, winding, cobblestoned streets. Numerous are the spouses, giggling children, and Auntie Ruths who have posed, hiding coyly behind a pink hollyhock that stretches its neck in an attempt to peek into the low windows.
The island, approximately 86 square kilometers, 31 kilometers long and 8 to 11 kilometers wide, is accessed by ferry. Three ferry routes connect the island with the peninsula of Jutland (via the island of Als), the larger island of Langeland, and with Fyn, another island.
The history of the island is checkered. Æroe's geographical location--midway between Denmark and Germany--and the oft-troubled relationship between those two countries have had a seesaw effect upon it. Sometimes Æroe was under the Danish crown, sometimes under the Brandenburg dukedom, sometimes under Schleswig-Holstein. Allegiance to Denmark and to the Danish language, however, has been unflagging. The people of Æroe have always felt Danish, not paying too much attention to such minor details as who their taxes went to and which language was spoken in the governor's chambers in Æroeskoebing.
The contrast between the gentle landscape, tamed by the farmer's plow, and
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