French Flemish

French Flemish
Spoken in:	French Region Nord-Pas-de-Calais, near border of Flanders, Belgium.
Number of speakers:	France - 20 000 (mostly elder) - 60 000 (1999)
Language Family:	Indo-European languages  Germanic languages   West Germanic    Franconian     Dutch      West Flemish       French Flemish
Offiicial Status
France	Half official
Language Code
ISO 639-3:	vls

File:Kaartfransvlaanderen.jpg

Historic regression of Dutch in the Western periphery.
The blue line indicates the situation in the 7th-8th century; the red line marks the situation during the 20th century; the black line is the current French-Belgian border.

Flemish (green) and French (red/brown) as spoken in the arrondissement of Dunkirk in 1874 and 1972

French Flemish (Dutch: Frans-Vlaams, and flamand français or Fransch vlaemsch in France) is the West Flemish language as spoken in the north of contemporary France. Place names attest to Flemish having been spoken since the 8th century in the area that was ceded to France in the 17th century and which became known as French Flanders. Its dialect subgroup, called French Flemish, meanwhile, became a minority dialect that survives mainly in Dunkirk (Duinkerke in Dutch/Duunkerke in West Flemish = dune church), Bourbourg (Broekburg in Dutch), Calais (Kales), Saint-Omer (Sint-Omaars) with an ethnic enclave Haut-Pont (Haute-Ponte) known for its predominantly Flemish community and Bailleul (Belle). French-Flemish has about 20,000 daily users, and twice that number of occasional speakers. There has been an active movement to retain the West Flemish language in the region for the last three decades.

Education

French Flemish is taught in a few schools in the French Westhoek. The ANVT-ILRF was given permission to carry out experimental lessons in four public schools (in Esquelbecq, Noordpeene, Volckerinckhove, Wormhout) for the school years of 2007-08 until 2010-11, after which it would be evaluated. Afterwards, all requirements were met but it was only allowed to continue them, but not to expand to other schools or to the collège. On the other hand, the private Catholic education began teaching Dutch in collèges in Gravelines and Hondschoote.

Word List

• fr
• Potjevleesch

See also

• Burgundian Netherlands
• French Flanders
• French Netherlands
• Isogloss
• Nord-Pas de Calais
• Seventeen Provinces

External links

• Akademie voor Nuuze Vlaemsche Taele tries to regulate this language
• Flemish in France site UOC, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Open University of Catalonia), subsite Euromosaic - Research Centre of Multilingualism.
• fvlinhetnederlands.actieforum.com