Is Dutch still part of the German dialects?

[Hevo]

I wonder what Dexter would say about this.

People in the Western Netherlands(who never studied German) can't understand German at all. I can't understand Dutch Low Saxon either but these are my personal experiences of course.

[gregorius]

When I cross the border I can still use the local dialect we use here and they understand me 100% over the border. But when I go to Bremen I cant understand them anymore lol.

Also in places like Koln etc, I can speak ABN (nondialect Dutch) and they'll understand me.

[Ultra]

So ... that means you can understand some German, but not Dutch?

Yes I can only pick up on a few words in Dutch when I hear it. For German it's much, much easier. I can understand the context most of the times in daily life I think.

However in written form Dutch and German seem much, much more similiar... Hmm.

When I cross the border I can still use the local dialect we use here and they understand me 100% over the border. But when I go to Bremen I cant understand them anymore lol.

Also in places like Koln etc, I can speak ABN (nondialect Dutch) and they'll understand me.

Wow that's really cool. Maybe my vote is better as 'Yes' then now when you say so.

[Hevo]

Also in places like Koln etc, I can speak ABN (nondialect Dutch) and they'll understand me.

They didn't understand me when i was on vacation in Sauerland.

[Wolf]

No it is not.

Do you have some reasonable arguments?

Good map which clearly shows the German continuum between Netherlands and Germany.

That's really interesting, isn't it?

When I cross the border I can still use the local dialect we use here and they understand me 100% over the border.

That's because they speak Low Franconian there, called "Niederrheinisch".

Link: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niederrheinisch

But when I go to Bremen I cant understand them anymore lol.

In Bremen they speak/spoke Low Saxon not Low Franconian.

[Visitor_22]

Of course Dutch and its dialects are (or at least should be) part of the German culture area!

Low Saxon, Plattdeutsch more generally speaking, could have become a distinct culture but didn't because of Martin Luther. The Netherlands followed Jean Calvin's Reformation instead and from then on drifted away from the rest of Germany.

But this is not just by mere chance that Holland (and Flanders) didn't develop any mentionsworthy literature until modern time (they choose to specialise in painting instead, quite successfully BTW). Still in the mid-19th century Dutch scholars wrote their works in Latin... or High German!

You seem to be smart person.

[Zincite]

One could say that the German language is a family of languages then with a lot of variants such as Dutch, Flemish, High German, Low German, Austrian German, Swiss German and it's numerous dialects.

It seems to me, that there are less differences between Low German and Dutch than between Low German and High German.

Agreed. I don't see how so many answered no the title's question.

That's the point, but Austrian German and Swiss German are on no account seperate languages.

Exactly. If Dutch is to be considered outside of the "German dialects", then so would Swiss German by the same logic, which obviously makes no sense. Those who speak Low German will find it harder (probably a lot harder) to understand Swiss German than Dutch.

[FeederOfRavens]

True Dutch and Flemish peoples are Frankish. The Dutch who speak Saxon aren't Dutch at all but Saxons.