U.S. English Foundation Research

LUXEMBOURG

Language Research

SCHOOLS

Letzeburgesh is best represented in primary education, which is clearly governed by Article of the Education Act: "The teaching of Luxembourgian shall be compulsory in Luxembourg primary-school curricula".

It is for this reason that Letzeburgesh is the compulsory and principal language for children in nursery schools (with the exception of a few private schools).

In all primary schools (six years of education) Letzeburgesh is a compulsory subject (half a period a week) as well as the medium of instruction in some classes for various subjects. A relatively large number of textbooks are available in Letzeburgesh for each age range. The presence of the language has increased significantly over the past ten years.

Letzeburgesh is also taught experimentally in Belgian and French schools in the border area and is offered at evening classes and language institutes.

ADMINISTRATION

Letzeburgesh may be used in the courts and is used for oral communications in particular. Documents sent through correspondence between authorities are usually written in German or French. Since the 1984 Languages Law, the use of Letzeburgesh has also been permitted in administrative acts and municipal ordinances. Although only French, as the language of Luxembourg legislation, has full and exclusive legal validity.

Article (Language of legislation) of the 1984 Languages Law reads:

"Legislative instruments and their implementing regulations shall be drafted in French. Where legislative instruments and regulations are accompanied by a translation, only the French text shall be authentic"....

As Letzeburgesh is the national language, parties summoned to appear in court may always express themselves in that language, although in criminal proceedings the judge will address the accused in Letzeburgesh only where the accused is a Luxembourger. Witnesses testify in Letzeburgesh. All other parties speak Letzeburgesh or French. Prosecution and defense pleadings and proceedings are in French. After the judgment is pronounced, the record of proceedings is drafted in French or German, however.

Even if counsel is a Letzeburgesh speaker, he may address the court in French or Letzeburgesh. Most Luxembourg judges also have a command of the language. Oral or written requests and statements in Letzeburgesh are admissible and legally valid. Documents in court proceedings are drafted in either French or German.

Letzeburgesh is not used a great deal in communications between the central government and the people. Most documents are in French and/or German, though Letzeburgesh is sometimes used as the third language. Articles 3 and 4 of the Languages Law ("Languages of administration and the courts") read as follows (extracts):

"In contentious or non-contentious administrative matters and in judicial matters, French, German or Luxembourgian may be used without prejudice to the special provisions governing certain matters."

"When an application is written in Luxembourgian, French or German, wherever possible the authority shall reply in the language used by the applicant."

Letzeburgesh is permitted without question in communications between the regional government and the people. It is the main language in oral communications. The same principle applies at the local government level. The services offered in Luxembourg are generally monolingual (French). The telephone directory is in German and French but contains a trilingual list of place names. Electricity bills and signs in the local hospital, local post office and local police station are usually only in French.

The situation in regards to road signs in Luxembourg is as follows: the signs at the entrance to the local town council are monolingual (French), as are the signs to the local school. The names of towns and adjacent towns on road signs are in French and Letzeburgesh. Since the 1970s many French road names have been replaced by Letzeburgesh names.

MASS MEDIA

Letzeburgesh is permitted by law in the mass media and is officially supported by financial or other forms of aid. The press is multilingual in theory but is very much dominated by German. German, French and Belgian television stations can be picked up in Luxembourg. RTL "Hei Elei" (a private TV station) broadcasts entirely in Letzeburgesh for about two hours a day and about four hours on Sundays. Television films are produced in Luxembourgian as well.

Top of page

Updated (April 2004)

BROADCASTING

Luxembourg can be described as a multilingual country where most of the population (approx. 420,000 people) speaks at least three languages fluently: French, German, and the local Luxembourgish language ("Lëtzebuergesch").

The people born in Luxembourg are able to switch from one language to the other without any problems. The most important newspapers carry a mix of articles in German and French without translations and in the newscasts, there is neither translation nor subtitling for French or German speakers.

Due to the fact that a large proportion of the Luxembourgish population (37.3 percent) is of foreign origin, French is used as a common language, even more frequently than Lëtzebuergesch. This explains endeavor of Luxembourg's authorities to promote the use of the national language.

The privately owned radio station, Radio Latina, broadcasting in Portuguese, French, Italian, Spanish and in Lëtzebuergesch, can be heard in most parts of the country; however, its frequency does not guarantee national coverage. There are also a few local radio stations broadcasting programs in Portuguese (Radio Amizade in the city of Esch-sur-Alzette and Radio Interculturelle in the village of Gilsdorf) and in English (Sunshine Radio).

On the other hand, currently there are no local television transmitting programs in French, Portuguese, Italian and Spanish except for the main daily newscast of the RTL television channel, which is rebroadcast with a French translation on the second audio channel. The cost of this translation (roughly 300,000 Euros per year, according to the latest information available) is paid for by the Luxembourgish State.

Source: Minority-language Related Broadcasting and Legislation in the OSCE, Program in Comparative Media Law and Policy (PCMLP), Center for Socio-Legal Studies, Wolfson College, Oxford University & Institute for Information Law (IViR) (http://www.ivir.nl/index-english.html), Universiteit van Amsterdam (Study commissioned by the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities), April 2003, edited by T. McGonagle (IViR), B. Davis Noll & M. Price (PCMLP), http://www.ivir.nl/publications/mcgonagle/Minority-language%20broadcasting.pdf

Top of page

Updated (November 2006)

A LINGUISTIC CHARACTERISTIC OF LUXEMBOURG

The linguistic situation in Luxembourg is characterized by the fact that several languages may be spoken and written at the same time in the same place. For example, the names of streets, shops, travel tickets, hotel registries and menus are generally in French. Some street and place names are, however, added in Luxembourgish. Furthermore, newspapers printed in the Grand Duchy are mostly in German, but some cultural articles, many advertisements and most social announcements are in French. Similar situation is also in other countries where several languages are spoken, but they usually are limited to specific regions, to the exclusion of other tongues, whereas in Luxembourg, the various languages are superimposed in an almost hierarchical manner.

On all levels of society, only one language is used in oral communication – Luxembourgish ("Lëtzebuergesch"). This is the everyday spoken language of the people, and the symbol of their national identity. Although this language is of Germanic origin, it has sufficiently differentiated itself from its parent language. It is relative easy for German native speakers to understand, especially to read Luxembourgish, but it might be quite difficult for them to speak it due to the use of non-Germanic words and phrases.

The Luxembourgish language is taught in schools and in language courses mostly addressed to the resident foreigners. Whilst it is an extremely practical and useful means of everyday conversation, it is a poor culture-bearer. As soon as a conversation reaches out into the higher levels of abstraction or refined sentiment, the limits of the vocabulary and grammatical constructions available are too apparent and it becomes necessary to borrow from other languages.

This switchover to foreign languages, namely French and German, is a necessity in written communication. A number of attempts have been made to establish Luxembourgish as a written language. The first real orthography for use in schools was set up in 1914 by the then Education Minister - Nicolas Welter. At that time, Luxembourgish was firstly taught as a school subject (Education Law of 1912). Nevertheless, this system never became official, though a generation of Luxembourg schoolchildren became familiar with it, and the system was used by the Resistance in the World War II for the publication of their leaflets and later the newspaper D'Union, which for about three years after 1945 was published entirely in Luxembourgish. However, this system became unmanageable, and the Luxembourgers had to revert to standard German.

At the same time as this was going on, the Education Minister Nicolas Margue commissioned Jean Feltes, a phonetician, to invent a new orthography. Again, the new Lëzebuurjer Ortografi was not popular in schools, albeit it was made official under an Arreté ministériel of 5 June 1946.

A more successful standard eventually emerged from the work of the committee of specialists who created the Luxemburger Wörterbuch. It was published in 5 volumes between 1950 and 1977. The orthographic conventions, adopted in this decades-long project, provided the basis of the standard orthography that became official on 10 October 1975. Modifications to this standard were proposed by the Conseil permanent de la langue luxembourgeoise and adopted officially in the spelling reform of 30 July 1999.

Since the Language Law of 1984, all signs, notices appearing in Luxembourgish have to be in this official orthography. If civil servants don't know it, there are courses to teach them, as it is no longer possible to write in any old system. This is what many Luxemburgers find annoying, that for the first time they can be found guilty of misspelling their own language, a burden other nations have suffered from for centuries.

As the above brief historical overview shows, neither the artificial creation of an official orthography, nor the efforts of the linguists have been able to displace German, which - thanks to its close relationship to the vernacular - is favored by the popular classes, or French which by virtue of its evident quality and long tradition has been the means of expression of those who see themselves as the intellectual elite. This situation is reflected whenever the use of languages exceeds the requirement of daily conversation. French is used as much as possible; German where it is indispensable; in fact, whenever the less-educated public has to be reached. It does not mean that a German speaker is less well-educated, but many of those who grew up in Luxembourg during and immediately after the World War II somehow lost out on French education, as only German was allowed during the War and afterwards.

In this way, French is the official language of the authorities. Parliamentary documents, proposed bills, procedures in courts, administrative and judicial acts, are held and written in French, but the synoptic accounts of parliamentary debates (themselves carried out in Luxembourgish or in French) are printed in German (Analytischer Kammerbericht) because they are distributed to all households in the country. Speeches at political rallies and other public occasions are Luxembourgish. Certain texts are multilingual, depending on the need to make sure that information is brought to all levels of the population. Thus, for example, when a new law relating to rents (the equivalent of the British "Landlord & Tenant Act") was brought into force, the texts of the new law were printed in the newspapers in 5 different languages (Luxembourgish, French, German, Portuguese and Spanish). The latter two were included, since many immigrants from these countries live and work in Luxembourg (some 36% of the country's population, and a staggering 48% of the country's workforce hold a foreign passport).

Historic tradition, economic necessity, and above all genuine desire to counteract any linguistic (or other) imperialism on the part of the powerful neighbors have brought about this peculiar situation. Whilst this places a heavy burden on the educational system, it does, however, give the students a unique opportunity to learn many languages.

From the second year of primary school onwards, French is added to the general education program that, at this stage, is still taught in German. Over the years, however, and particularly in secondary education, the status of French increases until it completely replaces German as the language of instruction. At this stage, German is limited to the specialized courses in the German language and literature. English too, it should be added, is required as a compulsory language throughout secondary education, and students choosing language studies also have the option to add Latin and/or ancient Greek.

It appears, therefore, that the Luxembourg intellectual is mainly orientated towards French cultural values through his education; most of the students usually attend universities either in Belgium or in France (attendance at German Universities is statistically in the third place). Tradition, natural sympathy and education all concur to put the Luxembourg elite within the French cultural orbit: French books and publications are widely read; written communication is mostly in French. Most of the Luxembourg periodicals aimed at the intellectual are almost entirely written in French, and so are the literary reviews and student magazines. The knowledge and understanding of German and the root relationship existing between German and the local dialect, however, add a dimension of wealth and objectivity, which make for a unique situation indeed. Luxembourg is thus prepared to be widely open to foreign culture, especially because the small size of the country (999 square miles) and its population (399 239 inhabitants) hardly allows for a rich national cultural life of high standard.

An open-minded attitude to foreign culture permits Luxembourg to escape the narrowness of provincial thought and life. In fact, the intensity and diversity of cultural life in Luxembourg is surprising. The theatre season regularly brings to Luxembourg outstanding performances by the best companies of France, Germany and Belgium. The more popular cinemas play throughout the year the whole range of the international film productions in their original language. A favorable geographic location brings into the Luxembourg homes radio and television programs from France, Germany and Belgium in addition to the Luxembourg national ones.

As with all questions of languages, borders are not so easily drawn. Hence, it should come as no surprise that the political boundaries of the Grand Duchy do not sharply delimit the situation depicted above. Indeed, in the surrounding areas of Luxembourg, many people have grown up with a variant of Luxembourgish language: the "Platt" of Lorraine is similarly connected to middle-high German [Rhinefrankish, Moselfrankish and Lëtzebuergesch], yet the area nowadays is part of France; many inhabitants of the so-called "Areler Land" just inside Belgium also grew up speaking Luxembourgish influenced by French. Since many of these adjacent regions are similarly shaped by both German and French culture, the whole area around Luxembourg can truly be called a Franco-German Cultural Melting Pot.

Source: Languages in Luxembourg at http://www.luxembourg.co.uk/lingua.html

Top of page