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What’s with this “Wren” thing?
The oldest extant version of the fable
we
are presenting here appeared in 1913 in the first volume of a two-volume anthology
of Low
Saxon folktales (Plattdeutsche
Volksmärchen “Low German Folktales”)
collected by Wilhelm Wisser (1843–1935). Read
more ...
Indonesian
Tempo
doeloe ... A show of brotherly
affection in the halls of power ...
Indonesian
rubbed shoulders
with
Dutch for over 300 years.
Language
information:
Indonesian is the common language of all of Indonesia. It is based on Indonesian
Coastal Malay varieties with influences from Javanese, Sundanese and other
local languages, as well as from Indian languages, Dutch, Arabic, Minnan (Hokkien)
Chinese and English.
Indonesian has many
native speakers and is used by many others as a second language.
Indonesian (Bahasa
Indonesia) is
basically
a variety of Malay with Sundanese, Javanese and other Indonesian influences. As such it is
largely mutually intelligible with other Malay varieties, including Malaysian
Malay (Bahasa Malaysia) and also with Brunei Malay. The only occasional Indonesian stumbling blocks
for other Malay speakers are Dutch loanwords which tend to correspond to Malay
words or English
loanwords in their varieties. Examples of these are Indonesian handuk (< Dutch handdoek) vs Malaysian tuala (< Portuguese toalha) ‘towel’, Ind. karcis (< Dutch kaartjes ‘cards’, ‘tickets’) vs Mal. tiket ‘ticket’, Ind. plafon (< D. plafond) vs Mal. siling ‘ceiling’, Ind. rekening (< D. rekening) vs Mal. bil ‘bill’, Ind. resleting (< D. ritssluiting) vs Mal. zip ‘zipper’, Ind. sekrup (< D. schroef) vs Mal. skru ‘screw’, Ind. tas (< D. tas) vs Mal. beg ‘bag’, Ind. mantel (< D. mantel) vs Mal. baju kot ‘(over)coat’, and Ind. arbei (< D. aardbei) vs Mal. strawberi ‘strawberry’. However,
a number
of
Dutch
loanwords
in
Indonesian
came
to
be
introduced to or at least accepted by Malaysian, such as bengkel ‘workshop’ (< Dutch winkel ‘shop’ < ‘nook’), kantor ‘office’ (< Dutch kantoor ‘office’), and (kacang) buncis ‘green beans’ (< Dutch boontjes ‘beans’, diminutive).
In the days of Dutch
rule it was not uncommon for Dutch residents of “The Islands,” especially for those that grew up there, to be proficient in Indonesian, Javanese,
Sundanese or
other
Indonesian
languages, while Indonesian house staff and public servants tended to be proficient
in Dutch.
Indonesian has long
been written with the Roman script, though at times it used to be written using
the Arabic script. Under
Netherlands
colonial
rule (1602–1949),
Indonesian was written with a Dutch-based orthography,
using oe for u, j for y, and tj for c, for example. Soon after independence,
Indonesians strove to create a non-Dutch-based orthography, and in more recent
times they coordinated their system with that
used for Malaysian.
On rare occasions,
far more rarely than in the case of Malay proper,
Indonesian has been written using Pegon, a Malay adaptation of the Arabic script referred to as “Jawi” in Malaysia.
Not
only does Indonesian (and Malay in general) have numerous dialects but a good
number of new language varieties have been
developed
from it as well, for example the following:
Ambonese
Malay (Bahasa Ambon)
Dutch-
and Portuguese-influenced creole of Ambon Island as well as Buru, Seram,
Geser-Gorom and South-West Maluku islands, Indonesia,
Baba
Malay (Bahasa Baba-Nyonya) or Peranakan Malay (Bahasa Peranakan)
Malay-based
language varieties with numerous Chinese, Indic and Western elements,
spoken by descendants of “Straits Chinese” in Malaysia, Singapore and
Indonesia (Baba Malay of Java has strong Javanese influences as as well.)
Bachanese
Malay (Bahasa Bacan)
Malay-based
language with numerous admixtures used in the Bachan islands of Northern
Maluku, Indonesia
Bandanese
Malay(Bahasa Banda)
Dutch-
and Portuguese-influenced creole of the Banda Islands, Indonesia
Batavian
Malay (Bahasa Betawi)
mostly
used by the Batavian (Betawi) people of Jakarta (formerly called Batavia), descendants of a conglomeration
of Southeast Asians; considered a dialect of Indonesian
Bazaar
Malay (Pasar Melayu, Bahasa Melayu Pasar)
pidgin
language, non-natively spoken simplified Malay varieties that have been
developed for intercultural interaction (It is very often these varieties
with which non-Malays learn to get around and then proclaim that Malay
(including Indonesian) is “simple” and “easy.”)
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