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Chapter 8. Peripheral performances

The languagecultural practices of Dutch-Limburgian world star André Rieu
  • Irene Stengs
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The Sociolinguistics of Place and Belonging
This chapter is in the book The Sociolinguistics of Place and Belonging

Abstract

This contribution focusses on the languagecultural politics played out in performances of André Rieu, the World’s King of the Waltz. At stake are stereotypical oppositions made within the Netherlands between ‘the nation’s center’ (‘Holland’) and the ‘peripheral’ province of Limburg. During his concerts in the Limburgian capital Maastricht, Rieu’s hometown, Rieu negates the Hollanders-centered, taken-for-granted, perspective that foregrounds Standard Dutch and its speakers as the normative neutral. Presenting himself as a global-cum-local performer alternating local language with English, Rieu marginalizes Standard Dutch as irrelevant, in the Dutch language-scape usually the position of dialects. Rieu’s languagecultural political messages are persuasive because of his strategic, jocular use of various linguistic and cultural resources, all to highlight his belonging to Maastricht.

Abstract

This contribution focusses on the languagecultural politics played out in performances of André Rieu, the World’s King of the Waltz. At stake are stereotypical oppositions made within the Netherlands between ‘the nation’s center’ (‘Holland’) and the ‘peripheral’ province of Limburg. During his concerts in the Limburgian capital Maastricht, Rieu’s hometown, Rieu negates the Hollanders-centered, taken-for-granted, perspective that foregrounds Standard Dutch and its speakers as the normative neutral. Presenting himself as a global-cum-local performer alternating local language with English, Rieu marginalizes Standard Dutch as irrelevant, in the Dutch language-scape usually the position of dialects. Rieu’s languagecultural political messages are persuasive because of his strategic, jocular use of various linguistic and cultural resources, all to highlight his belonging to Maastricht.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Chapter 1. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. Interpersonal relations, place, and belonging
  5. Chapter 2. The boundaries of belonging 17
  6. Chapter 3. Language socialization and making sense of place 27
  7. Chapter 4. Cité Duits 55
  8. Chapter 5. Us, them and all the others 89
  9. Part II. Parodic performances from the margins
  10. Chapter 6. Playing against peripheralization 115
  11. Chapter 7. The politics of place-making and belonging through language choice within center-periphery dynamics in Limburg, The Netherlands 125
  12. Chapter 8. Peripheral performances 149
  13. Chapter 9. What’s up in town 177
  14. Part III. Agency in linguistic place-making
  15. Chapter 10. Language, place, agency 207
  16. Chapter 11. Place-making and dialect 213
  17. Chapter 12. Alternative place naming in the diverse margins of an ideologically mono-lingual society 239
  18. Chapter 13. Yooperisms in tourism 261
  19. Subject index 287
https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.45.08ste

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Chapter 1. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. Interpersonal relations, place, and belonging
  5. Chapter 2. The boundaries of belonging 17
  6. Chapter 3. Language socialization and making sense of place 27
  7. Chapter 4. Cité Duits 55
  8. Chapter 5. Us, them and all the others 89
  9. Part II. Parodic performances from the margins
  10. Chapter 6. Playing against peripheralization 115
  11. Chapter 7. The politics of place-making and belonging through language choice within center-periphery dynamics in Limburg, The Netherlands 125
  12. Chapter 8. Peripheral performances 149
  13. Chapter 9. What’s up in town 177
  14. Part III. Agency in linguistic place-making
  15. Chapter 10. Language, place, agency 207
  16. Chapter 11. Place-making and dialect 213
  17. Chapter 12. Alternative place naming in the diverse margins of an ideologically mono-lingual society 239
  18. Chapter 13. Yooperisms in tourism 261
  19. Subject index 287
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