WIKITONGUES: Dominique speaking Alsatian

My name is Dominique Lang,
I live here in Molsheim,

a little city about 25 km from Strasbourg.

To be true, I’m not entirely Alsatian,
I was born in Alsace

I was born in Mulhouse,
Upper Alsace, Haut-Rhin,

have spent my childhoood near Paris
and came back later in Alsace

for my Medicine studies in 1974
and have been staying here since.

I’ve always stayed here,
always worked here and still work here

in Molsheim, I’m an MD, working with
elderlies in the Molsheim hospital.

What can I say? About Alsatian…
Alsatian is a very special dialect,

a language could we say since
it doesn’t exactly come from today’s German,

it is an heir of the “Mittelhochdeutsch”,
which is a medieval language

that was spoken in the Middle Ages
in Germany and has become Alsatian

through the centuries whereas
German evolved on its own side.

Hence the many differences
between German and Alsatian.

The pronunciation is not the same,
the Germans have today the “Hochdeutsch”,

we have Alsatian and what we can
still say is that Alsatian is really different

between North and South, the dialects
are totally different; in Southern Alsace,

the language is much closer to the
Swiss German, the “Schwiztg’r Düetsch”,

which is really particular; the Northern
dialect resembles the German dialect

of Saarland or Baden-Württenberg.

In Alsace, we also have many wines,
the best ones being produced in the South,

the Haut-Rhin, where we have
the best types of vine from Alsace.

The Alsatian wine is really particular,
there are almost only white wines,

we have some rosés and only
one real red wine, the Rouge d’Ottrott,

produced a couple of km from here,
that means in the Bas-Rhin.

We have some good wines
in the Bas-Rhin, also very special

and the Rouge d’Ottrott comes
from the Bas-Rhin. So.

Now, how did I come to
Alsatian language? Well. As said,

I spent my childhood in Paris and
came back to my roots in Alsace in 1974

At this time, I began to work with elderlies
in the hospital and, at this time

the elderlies were almost only
speaking Alsatian or German.

I hence have been obliged to learn
Alsatian and, since I also speak German,

it has been let’s say natural for me
to switch from German onto Alsatian.

And afterwards, speaking, as I further
talked to the people, year after year,

it entered.