Flemish voice overs: what you need to know

Flemish, sometimes called Belgian Dutch or Flemish Dutch, is a group of Dutch dialects mostly spoken in Northern Belgium (Flanders). Flemish, the same as Dutch, belongs to the West Germanic language family. Around 6 million people are native speakers of this dialect.

Apart from Northern Belgium, Flemish is also spoken in French Flanders (a region in France) and in Zeelandic Flanders (a region in the Netherlands).

Language History

The Flemish history follows in the same footsteps as its parent language – Dutch. Flemish, as a spoken variety of Dutch, developed from Old Dutch – a group of dialects spoken around 500-1150 AD.

The Middle Dutch period (1150-1500) was followed by an abundance of Dutch literature. However, there was still no standardized Dutch variant – only clusters of regional dialects.

Standard Dutch as it’s spoken today developed from two main dialects: Flanders (Flemish) and Brabantian. The Flanders (Flemish) dialect, spoken in Northern Belgium, is what we call Flemish today.

So what’s the state of Dutch and Flemish today? Well, The Netherlands and Belgium have a mutual language policy. Meaning that all variations of Dutch spoken in both countries have the same grammar system and only have regional differences.

Close Relations

Since the Flemish dialect derives from West Germanic languages, it has quite a few similarities with other Germanic languages. Most prominently – English and German. In fact, Dutch is sometimes called “the bridge” between English and German.

All three Germanic languages share very similar grammar, word order, and even some vocabulary. Flemish vocabulary is mostly Germanic and contains only around 20% of loanwords from other languages.

Because of the close proximity, the Flemish dialect has some similarities to Scandinavian languages – Swedish, Icelandic, and Norwegian. However, the similarities are pretty minor, mostly in the vocabulary department.

Accents and Voice Over Tips

Flemish is mutually intelligible with standard Dutch. However, the Flemish dialect itself has four main regional varieties: Brabantian, East Flemish, West Flemish, and Limburgish. However, there’s some linguistic debate about whether Limburgish is a regional variety or an independent language.

There are several differences between standard Dutch and Flemish that are important when recording a Flemish voice over. First, Flemish pronunciation sounds significantly more French while standard Dutch has a harder English pronunciation.

Moreover, Flemish has more loanwords from French than standard Dutch, so be prepared to encounter some words that are specifically regional. There’s also a difference in the register. While standard Dutch opts for the informal you (‘je’) even in the official situation, Flemish tends to use the formal variant – ‘U’.

So when planning the Flemish voice recording, make sure you pay attention to these little differences. After all, they make Flemish so unique!

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