Dutch is the English name for the dominant language of the Netherlands, and in English we often name people after their language. The Netherlands is also called Holland in English, even though Holland is just the most economically-dominant sub-region of the Netherlands, and the location of its main trading ports, rather than the whole country. Which makes sense if you are an English sailor who only knows the Netherlands through its trading ports and has little need to go inland.
Comment on What's the rule for which 'national identity adjective' suffix to use?
gerryflap@feddit.nl 3 weeks agoDutch is such a weird one. We don’t call ourselves “Dutch” in Dutch, we call ourselves “Nederlands”. This would be something like “Netherlandish” in English. We do call Germans “Duits” though, and they call themselves “Deutsch”. Somehow in English German and Dutch got a bit messed up. The reason is probably that during the middle ages we did refer to our language as “Dietsch”, so that probably stayed around.
sailingbythelee@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
gerryflap@feddit.nl 3 weeks ago
But we also don’t call our language “Dutch”, we call it Nederlands. It’s a relic of an old time, but actually German should be called Dutch and Dutch should be Netherlandish. It’d help a lot with the confusion of young German and Dutch people learning English for the first time haha. Would also resolve the confusion around “Pennsylvanian Dutch” being German.
SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Also resolve the confusion around the “dutch angle” in film… it was actually a thing that was started in Germany.
sailingbythelee@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Yes, you are right. I had never put it together that Dutch and Deutch are so close, but it’s obvious now that you pointed it out. Thanks for the info.
CoggyMcFee@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
It’s because Germany wasn’t a unified place until not that long ago, so different neighbors came up with their own way to refer to them.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_Germany