Dutch Low Saxon

group of Low Saxon dialects spoken in the northeastern Netherlands

Key facts

Native to: Netherlands , Germany
Native speakers: 2.15 million (2005)
Language family: Indo-European Germanic West Germanic North Sea Germanic Low German Low Saxon Dutch Low Saxon
Iso 639 3: –
Glottolog: None

via Wikipedia infobox

Article

Dutch Low Saxon (Nederlaands Leegsaksies [ˈneːdərlaːnts ˈleːxsɑksis] or Nederlaands Nedersaksies; Dutch: Nederlands Nedersaksisch) are Low Saxon dialects from the Low German language that are spoken in the northeastern Netherlands and are mostly, but not exclusively, written with local, unstandardised orthographies based on Standard Dutch orthography.

The UNESCO Atlas of endangered languages lists the language as vulnerable. The percentage of speakers among parents dropped from 34% in 1995 to 15% in 2011. The percentage of speakers among their children dropped from 8% to 2% in the same period. According to a 2005 study 53% indicated to speak Low Saxon or Low Saxon and Dutch at home and 71% they could speak Low Saxon in the researched area, accounting for a total of 1.6 million speakers at home and 2.15 million total, ranging from "reasonably" to "very well" in terms of proficiency.