133-507: Miffy ( Dutch : Nijntje , pronounced [ˈnɛiɲtɕə] ) is a fictional rabbit appearing in a series of picture books drawn and written by Dutch artist Dick Bruna . The original Dutch name, "nijntje", is a shortening of the diminutive konijntje , "little rabbit". The first Miffy book was produced in 1953 and over thirty others have followed. In total they have sold over 100 million copies. In addition, four separate television series as well as items such as clothes and toys featuring
266-561: A common ancestor with languages such as English, German, and the Scandinavian languages . All Germanic languages are subject to the Grimm's law and Verner's law sound shifts, which originated in the Proto-Germanic language and define the basic features differentiating them from other Indo-European languages. This is assumed to have taken place in approximately the mid-first millennium BCE in
399-461: A schwa . The Middle Dutch dialect areas were affected by political boundaries. The sphere of political influence of a certain ruler often also created a sphere of linguistic influence, with the language within the area becoming more homogenous. Following the contemporary political divisions they are in order of importance: A process of standardisation started in the Middle Ages , especially under
532-584: A synod taking place in Corbridge , England , where the decisions are being written down " tam Latine quam theodisce " meaning "in Latin as well as common vernacular". According to a hypothesis by De Grauwe, In northern West Francia (i.e. modern-day Belgium) the term would take on a new meaning during the Early Middle Ages , when, within the context of a highly dichromatic linguistic landscape, it came to be
665-559: A comparison between the West Germanic languages, see the sections Phonology, Grammar, and Vocabulary. Dutch dialects are primarily the dialects that are both related with the Dutch language and are spoken in the same language area as the Dutch standard language . Although heavily under the influence of the standard language, some of them remain diverse and are found in the Netherlands and in
798-461: A consequence evolve (along with Alemannic , Bavarian and Lombardic ) into Old High German. At more or less the same time the Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law, moving over Western Europe from west to east, led to the development of Old English (or Anglo-Saxon), Old Frisian and Old Saxon . Hardly influenced by either development, Old Dutch probably remained relatively close to the original language of
931-427: A happy ending. Some books have no text at all, such as Miffy's Dream . The books are printed in small format. Bruna considers it important that his audience feels that his books are there for them, not for their parents. Most Miffy books have an advisory reading level of age four to eight years. Bruna's books have been translated into more than 50 different languages, and over 85 million copies have been sold all over
1064-566: A minority language in Germany and northern France's French Flanders . Though Belgium as a whole is multilingual, three of the four language areas into which the country is divided ( Flanders , francophone Wallonia , and the German-speaking Community ) are largely monolingual, with Brussels being bilingual. The Netherlands and Belgium produce the vast majority of music , films , books and other media written or spoken in Dutch. Dutch
1197-657: A minority) and the province of Walloon Brabant . Brabantian expands into small parts in the west of Limburg while its strong influence on the East Flemish of East Flanders and eastern Zeelandic Flanders weakens towards the west. In a small area in the northwest of North Brabant ( Willemstad ), Hollandic is spoken. Conventionally, the Kleverlandish dialects are distinguished from Brabantian, but there are no objective criteria apart from geography to do so. Over 5 million people live in an area with some form of Brabantian being
1330-420: A number of closely related, mutually intelligible dialects spoken in the former Old Dutch area. Where Old Dutch fragments are very hard to read for untrained Modern Dutch speakers, the various literary works of Middle Dutch are somewhat more accessible. The most notable difference between Old and Middle Dutch is in a feature of speech known as vowel reduction , whereby vowels in unstressed syllables are leveled to
1463-566: A political border, because the traditional dialects are strongly influenced by the national standard varieties. While a somewhat heterogeneous group of Low Franconian dialects, Limburgish has received official status as a regional language in the Netherlands and Germany, but not in Belgium. Due to this official recognition, it receives protection by chapter 2 of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages . Afrikaans , although to
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#17328558087911596-558: A radiated power of 423,000 watts video and 84,600 watts audio. Its studio facilities were located at 1670 Bayview Avenue (a five-storey office building that is still standing) and its 550 feet (170 m) transmitter antenna was located at 354 Jarvis Street on the CBC tower. In 1972, the station moved its operations to a new studio facility at 2180 Yonge Street in the Canada Square Complex , where it remains. The station's broadcast name
1729-413: A result, Nederduits no longer serves as a synonym for the Dutch language. In the 19th century, the term " Diets " was revived by Dutch linguists and historians as well, as a poetic name for Middle Dutch and its literature . Old Dutch can be discerned more or less around the same time as Old English (Anglo-Saxon), Old High German , Old Frisian , and Old Saxon . These names are derived from
1862-505: A result, when West Flemings try to talk Standard Dutch, they are often unable to pronounce the g-sound, and pronounce it similar to the h-sound. This leaves, for example, no difference between " held " (hero) and " geld " (money). Or in some cases, they are aware of the problem, and hyper-correct the "h" into a voiced velar fricative or g-sound, again leaving no difference. The West Flemish variety historically spoken in adjacent parts in France
1995-531: A separate but similar network for Franco-Ontarian audiences. Before the launch of TFO, TVO aired French-language programming on Sundays. Even after TFO's launch, TVO and TFO swapped programming on Sundays well into the 1990s. TFO was separated from TVO and was incorporated under the newly formed GroupeMédia TFO , a separate Crown corporation of the Government of Ontario, in 2007. In 2017 and 2018, TVO launched four regional "hubs", featuring journalism on issues in
2128-516: A significant degree mutually intelligible with Dutch, is usually not considered a dialect but instead a separate standardised language . It is spoken in South Africa and Namibia. As a daughter language of 17th-century Dutch dialects, Afrikaans evolved in parallel with modern Dutch, but was influenced by various other languages in South Africa. West Frisian ( Westerlauwers Fries ), along with Saterland Frisian and North Frisian , evolved from
2261-695: A similar line style. The Miffy brand is popular in Japan , with strong sales of Japanese-made Miffy merchandise. In an interview for The Daily Telegraph , Bruna expressed his dislike for Hello Kitty. "'That,' he says darkly, 'is a copy [of Miffy], I think. I don't like that at all. I always think, "No, don't do that. Try to make something that you think of yourself". In 1999, Miffy was the ninth top-selling character in Japan, where licensed merchandise sold ¥37.59 billion ( $ 330 million ). In addition, on 26 August 2010, Mercis BV, representing Bruna, brought suit against Sanrio with
2394-473: A somewhat different development since the late Middle Ages. Two dialect groups have been given the official status of regional language (or streektaal ) in the Netherlands. Like several other dialect groups, both are part of a dialect continuum that continues across the national border. The Dutch Low Saxon dialect area comprises the provinces of Groningen , Drenthe and Overijssel , as well as parts of
2527-424: A source language, mainly for law and history students. In Indonesia this involves about 35,000 students. Unlike other European nations, the Dutch chose not to follow a policy of language expansion amongst the indigenous peoples of their colonies. In the last quarter of the 19th century, however, a local elite gained proficiency in Dutch so as to meet the needs of expanding bureaucracy and business. Nevertheless,
2660-452: A stylized form of a rabbit. Miffy is drawn in a graphic style, with minimalist black graphic lines. Bruna chose to only use black, white, the primary colours (red, yellow, and blue), green, orange, brown, and grey. It is his use of primarily primary colors that makes Miffy instantly recognisable, and also popular with preschoolers, because of her bright and intense simplistic colours. Almost 32 Miffy titles have been published and many more for
2793-538: A unique prestige dialect and has a large dialectal continuum consisting of 28 main dialects, which can themselves be further divided into at least 600 distinguishable varieties. In the Netherlands, the Hollandic dialect dominates in national broadcast media while in Flanders Brabantian dialect dominates in that capacity, making them in turn unofficial prestige dialects in their respective countries. Outside
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#17328558087912926-531: Is kantor , handdoek "towel" in Indonesian is handuk , or bushalte "bus stop" in Indonesian is halte bus . In addition, many Indonesian words are calques of Dutch; for example, rumah sakit "hospital" is calqued on the Dutch ziekenhuis (literally "sickhouse"), kebun binatang "zoo" on dierentuin (literally "animal garden"), undang-undang dasar "constitution" from grondwet (literally "ground law"). These account for some of
3059-832: Is Sranan Tongo , spoken natively by about a fifth of the population. TVOntario TVO (stylized in all lowercase as tvo ), formerly known as TVOntario , is a Canadian publicly funded English-language educational television network and media organization serving the Canadian province of Ontario . It operates flagship station CICA-DT (channel 19) in Toronto , which also relays programming across portions of Ontario through eight rebroadcast stations . All pay television ( cable , satellite , IPTV ) providers throughout Ontario are required to carry TVO on their basic tier, and programming can be streamed for free online within Canada. TVO
3192-999: Is TVOntario. Channel 19 in Toronto, channel XX in (city/town/region)." In August 2010, TVO began broadcasting in high-definition via a direct-to-cable HD feed. TVO commenced over-the-air HD broadcasting in August 2011, in compliance with the CRTC regulations. Except for Belleville, Chatham and Cloyne, TVO's transmitters are located within mandatory markets for conversion. Not all digital transmitters are currently broadcasting in high definition. The Belleville, Chatham and Cloyne transmitters were converted to digital on new frequencies (but without high-definition, an on-channel program guide or other DTV-specific features), as channels 52 to 69 were being reallocated for wireless communication purposes. The conversion of these transmitters took place before TVO's announcement to close down its analogue transmitter network outside
3325-466: Is a calque of the aforementioned Roman province Germania Inferior and an attempt by early Dutch grammarians to give their language more prestige by linking it to Roman times. Likewise, Hoogduits ("High German") and Overlands ("Upper-landish") came into use as a Dutch exonym for the various German dialects used in neighboring German states. Use of Nederduytsch was popular in the 16th century but ultimately lost out over Nederlands during
3458-531: Is a monocentric language , at least what concerns its written form, with all speakers using the same standard form (authorised by the Dutch Language Union ) based on a Dutch orthography defined in the so-called " Green Booklet " authoritative dictionary and employing the Latin alphabet when writing; however, pronunciation varies between dialects. Indeed, in stark contrast to its written uniformity, Dutch lacks
3591-709: Is aired in English or in another language with English subtitles. French-language programs were previously shown on Sundays, from noon until sign-off, for the benefit of Franco-Ontarian viewers. The establishment of French counterpart network TFO led to the discontinuation of French-language programming on TVO by the mid-1990s. Earlier in TVO's history, all dramatic programming was required to have some educational content. Therefore actors, journalists or writers were hired to provide commentary on shows aired by TVO that would place them within an educational context. For instance, Tom Grattan's War
3724-521: Is also an official language of several international organisations, such as the European Union , Union of South American Nations and the Caribbean Community . At an academic level, Dutch is taught in about 175 universities in 40 countries. About 15,000 students worldwide study Dutch at university. In Europe, Dutch is the majority language in the Netherlands (96%) and Belgium (59%) as well as
3857-740: Is also responsible for over-the-air broadcasts of the Ontario Legislative Assembly in some remote Northern Ontario communities that do not receive cable television access to the Ontario Parliament Network . In 2002, the Ministry of Education transferred responsibility for the Independent Learning Centre —the agency which provides distance education at the elementary and secondary school level—to TVO. TVO used to operate TFO ( Télévision française de l'Ontario ),
3990-530: Is carried on Bell Satellite TV channel 265, and on Shaw Direct channel 155. The main transmitter in Toronto uses the call sign CICA-DT , with its rebroadcasters using CICO-DT followed by a number to denote their status as rebroadcasters. Many analogue transmitters used CICA-TV and CICO-TV callsigns, in addition to CICE-TV , until the shutdown of TVO's remaining analogue transmitters on July 31, 2012. TVO's transmitters are primarily located in Ontario, with
4123-578: Is found in the Salic law . In this Frankish document written around 510 the oldest Dutch sentence has been identified: Maltho thi afrio lito ("I say to you, I free you, serf") used to free a serf. Another old fragment of Dutch is Visc flot aftar themo uuatare ("A fish was swimming in the water"). The oldest conserved larger Dutch text is the Utrecht baptismal vow (776–800) starting with Forsachistu diobolae ... ec forsacho diabolae (litt.: "Forsake you
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4256-513: Is mostly Germanic; it incorporates slightly more Romance loans than German, but far fewer than English. In Belgium, the Netherlands and Suriname, the native official name for Dutch is Nederlands (historically Nederlandsch before the Dutch orthographic reforms ). Sometimes Vlaams (" Flemish ") is used as well to describe Standard Dutch in Flanders , whereas Hollands (" Hollandic ")
4389-436: Is no longer the case as the broadcaster shuttered the majority of its analogue transmitters except those located in some mandatory markets, which were converted to digital in 2011 (see " Technical information " below). TVO is carried on all cable systems serving Ontario (the alternative choice for those viewers in area that has been served by one of the service's defunct analogue transmitters). On satellite systems in Ontario, it
4522-480: Is occasionally used as a colloquial term for the standard language in the central and northwestern parts of the Netherlands. English uses the adjective Dutch as a noun for the language of the Netherlands and Flanders. The word is derived from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz . The stem of this word, *þeudō , meant "people" in Proto-Germanic, and *-iskaz was an adjective-forming suffix, of which -ish
4655-614: Is operated by the Ontario Educational Communications Authority ( OECA ), a Crown corporation owned by the Government of Ontario , which since 2022 has done business as the TVO Media Education Group (or TVO.me ). TVO.me also operates TVO Today, TVO ILC , TVO Learn, and TVOKids . TVO is governed by a volunteer board of directors , and supported by a network of regional councillors from across
4788-556: Is so distinct that it might be considered as a separate language variant, although the strong significance of language in Belgian politics would prevent the government from classifying them as such. An oddity of the dialect is that, the voiced velar fricative (written as "g" in Dutch) shifts to a voiced glottal fricative (written as "h" in Dutch), while the letter "h" becomes mute (like in French). As
4921-573: Is sometimes called French Flemish and is listed as a French minority language . However, only a very small and aging minority of the French-Flemish population still speaks and understands West Flemish. Hollandic is spoken in Holland and Utrecht , though the original forms of this dialect (which were heavily influenced by a West Frisian substratum and, from the 16th century on, by Brabantian dialects ) are now relatively rare. The urban dialects of
5054-614: Is spoken in Limburg (Belgium) as well as in the remaining part of Limburg (Netherlands) and extends across the German border. West Flemish ( Westvlaams ) is spoken in West Flanders , the western part of Zeelandic Flanders and also in French Flanders , where it virtually became extinct to make way for French. The West Flemish group of dialects, spoken in West Flanders and Zeeland ,
5187-575: Is taught in various educational centres in Indonesia, the most important of which is the Erasmus Language Centre (ETC) in Jakarta . Each year, some 1,500 to 2,000 students take Dutch courses there. In total, several thousand Indonesians study Dutch as a foreign language. Owing to centuries of Dutch rule in Indonesia, many old documents are written in Dutch. Many universities therefore include Dutch as
5320-639: Is the Modern English form. Theodiscus was its Latinised form and used as an adjective referring to the Germanic vernaculars of the Early Middle Ages . In this sense, it meant "the language of the common people". The term was used as opposed to Latin , the non -native language of writing and the Catholic Church . It was first recorded in 786, when the Bishop of Ostia writes to Pope Adrian I about
5453-404: Is the case with the ( standardised ) West Frisian language . It is spoken alongside Dutch in the province of Friesland . Dutch dialects and regional languages are not spoken as often as they used to be, especially in the Netherlands. Recent research by Geert Driessen shows that the use of dialects and regional languages among both Dutch adults and youth is in heavy decline. In 1995, 27 percent of
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5586-626: Is the native language of most of the population of the Netherlands and Flanders (which includes 60% of the population of Belgium ). Dutch was one of the official languages of South Africa until 1925, when it was replaced by Afrikaans , a separate but partially mutually intelligible daughter language of Dutch. Afrikaans, depending on the definition used, may be considered a sister language , spoken, to some degree, by at least 16 million people, mainly in South Africa and Namibia , and evolving from Cape Dutch dialects. In South America, it
5719-448: Is the native language of the majority of the population of Suriname , and spoken as a second or third language in the polyglot Caribbean island countries of Aruba , Curaçao and Sint Maarten . All these countries have recognised Dutch as one of their official languages, and are involved in one way or another in the Dutch Language Union . The Dutch Caribbean municipalities ( St. Eustatius , Saba and Bonaire ) have Dutch as one of
5852-525: Is the sole official language, and over 60 percent of the population speaks it as a mother tongue . Dutch is the obligatory medium of instruction in schools in Suriname, even for non-native speakers. A further twenty-four percent of the population speaks Dutch as a second language . Suriname gained its independence from the Netherlands in 1975 and has been an associate member of the Dutch Language Union since 2004. The lingua franca of Suriname, however,
5985-519: The 2006 New Zealand census , 26,982 people, or 0.70 percent of the total population, reported to speak Dutch to sufficient fluency that they could hold an everyday conversation. In contrast to the colonies in the East Indies , from the second half of the 19th century onwards, the Netherlands envisaged the expansion of Dutch in its colonies in the West Indies . Until 1863, when slavery was abolished in
6118-564: The Bergakker inscription , found near the Dutch city of Tiel , which may represent a primary record of 5th-century Frankish. Although some place names recorded in Roman texts such as vadam (modern Dutch: wad , English: "mudflat"), could arguably be considered as the oldest single "Dutch" words, the Bergakker inscription yields the oldest evidence of Dutch morphology. However, interpretations of
6251-450: The Brussels and Flemish regions of Belgium . The areas in which they are spoken often correspond with former medieval counties and duchies. The Netherlands (but not Belgium) distinguishes between a dialect and a streektaal (" regional language "). Those words are actually more political than linguistic because a regional language unites a large group of very different varieties. Such is
6384-548: The High German consonant shift , does not use Germanic umlaut as a grammatical marker, has largely abandoned the use of the subjunctive , and has levelled much of its morphology , including most of its case system . Features shared with German, however, include the survival of two to three grammatical genders – albeit with few grammatical consequences – as well as the use of modal particles , final-obstruent devoicing , and (similar) word order . Dutch vocabulary
6517-486: The Low Countries , its meaning being largely implicitly provided by the regional orientation of medieval Dutch society: apart from the higher echelons of the clergy and nobility, mobility was largely static and hence while "Dutch" could by extension also be used in its earlier sense, referring to what today would be called Germanic dialects as opposed to Romance dialects , in many cases it was understood or meant to refer to
6650-529: The Low Franconian languages, paired with its sister language Limburgish or East Low Franconian. Its closest relative is the mutually intelligible daughter language Afrikaans. Other West Germanic languages related to Dutch are German , English and the un-standardised languages Low German and Yiddish . Dutch stands out in combining some Ingvaeonic characteristics (occurring consistently in English and Frisian and reduced in intensity from west to east over
6783-526: The Randstad , which are Hollandic dialects, do not diverge from standard Dutch very much, but there is a clear difference between the city dialects of Rotterdam , The Hague , Amsterdam and Utrecht . In some rural Hollandic areas more authentic Hollandic dialects are still being used, especially north of Amsterdam. Another group of dialects based on Hollandic is that spoken in the cities and larger towns of Friesland , where it partially displaced West Frisian in
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#17328558087916916-526: The Southern Netherlands (now Belgium and Luxembourg), developments were different. Under subsequent Spanish , Austrian and French rule , the standardisation of Dutch language came to a standstill. The state, law, and increasingly education used French, yet more than half the Belgian population were speaking a variety of Dutch. In the course of the 19th century, the Flemish Movement stood up for
7049-489: The antonym of *walhisk (Romance-speakers, specifically Old French ). The word, now rendered as dietsc (Southwestern variant) or duutsc (Central and Northern Variant), could refer to the Dutch language itself, as well as a broader Germanic category depending on context. During the High Middle Ages " Dietsc / Duutsc " was increasingly used as an umbrella term for the specific Germanic dialects spoken in
7182-471: The continental West Germanic plane) with dominant Istvaeonic characteristics, some of which are also incorporated in German. Unlike German, Dutch (apart from Limburgish) has not been influenced at all by the south to north movement of the High German consonant shift and had some changes of its own. The cumulation of these changes resulted over time in separate, but related standard languages with various degrees of similarities and differences between them. For
7315-434: The differences in vocabulary between Indonesian and Malay. Some regional languages in Indonesia have some Dutch loanwords as well; for example, Sundanese word Katel or "frying pan" origin in Dutch is " ketel ". The Javanese word for "bike/ bicycle " " pit " can be traced back to its origin in Dutch " fiets ". The Malacca state of Malaysia was also colonized by the Dutch in its longest period that Malacca
7448-630: The pre-Roman Northern European Iron Age . The Germanic languages are traditionally divided into three groups: East (now extinct), West , and North Germanic. They remained mutually intelligible throughout the Migration Period . Dutch is part of the West Germanic group, which also includes English, Scots , Frisian , Low German (Old Saxon) and High German . It is characterised by a number of phonological and morphological innovations not found in North or East Germanic. The West Germanic varieties of
7581-512: The 14th to 15th century onward, its urban centers ( Deventer , Zwolle , Kampen , Zutphen and Doesburg ) have been increasingly influenced by the western written Dutch and became a linguistically mixed area. From the 17th century onward, it was gradually integrated into the Dutch language area. Dutch Low Saxon used to be at one end of the Low German dialect continuum . However, the national border has given way to dialect boundaries coinciding with
7714-531: The 16th century and is known as Stadsfries ("Urban Frisian"). Hollandic together with inter alia Kleverlandish and North Brabantian , but without Stadsfries, are the Central Dutch dialects . Brabantian is named after the historical Duchy of Brabant , which corresponded mainly to the provinces of North Brabant and southern Gelderland , the Belgian provinces of Antwerp and Flemish Brabant , as well as Brussels (where its native speakers have become
7847-455: The 600 MHz band between 2019 and 2020 as part of the related spectrum pack . On April 17, 2020, the CRTC granted TVO permission to decrease its Chatham transmitter's maximum effective radiated power (ERP) from 2,250 to 1,000 watts. Even though this would reduce over-the-air access to viewers in the Chatham area, the CRTC approved TVO's request so that it could "reduce the costs associated with
7980-668: The 7th century. It was replaced in France by Old French (a Romance language with a considerable Old Frankish influence). However, the Old Franconian language did not die out at large, as it continued to be spoken in the Low Countries, and subsequently evolved into what is now called Old Low Franconian or Old Dutch in the Low Countries. In fact, Old Frankish could be reconstructed from Old Dutch and Frankish loanwords in Old French. The term Old Dutch or Old Low Franconian refers to
8113-510: The Amsterdam sex crimes case . The police had been alerted following a December 2010 broadcast in the Netherlands on the television show Opsporing Verzocht ("Investigation Requested") of images originating from the United States of Mikelson and an unnamed child with a stuffed toy known as Miffy . As Miffy is originally a Dutch product, the investigators suspected the child to be Dutch. After
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#17328558087918246-562: The CICA callsign was derived from the last two letters in the OECA acronym . CBC operated the CICA transmitter, while the OECA was in charge of programming. OECA assumed all operations of the station, independent of the CBC, when the provincial government declared the Authority an independent corporation in a 1973 Order-in-Council. CICA signed on the air on September 27, 1970, on UHF channel 19 operating at
8379-472: The CRTC. In many cases, TVO rebroadcasters were operating from CBC-owned transmitter sites and were shut down along with the CBC's analogue transmitters. Where TVO owned sites, it provided local communities the option of taking ownership of the towers and transmitters. On June 6, 2012, TVO dropped its signal from cable and satellite providers outside Ontario, due to a carriage dispute over compensation for distributing its signal to its subscribers outside
8512-726: The Danish political drama Borgen and the British police procedural New Tricks . TVO's first original drama series was Hard Rock Medical , a medical drama set in Sudbury, which aired from 2013 to 2018. Public affairs programming includes the flagship daily current affairs show The Agenda and an overnight rebroadcast of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario's Question Period from the Ontario Parliament Network. All TVO programming
8645-417: The Dutch adult population spoke a dialect or regional language on a regular basis, but in 2011, that was no more than 11 percent. In 1995, 12 percent of children of primary school age spoke a dialect or regional language, but in 2011, that had declined to four percent. Of the officially recognised regional languages Limburgish is spoken the most (in 2011 among adults 54%, among children 31%) and Dutch Low Saxon
8778-409: The Dutch government remained reluctant to teach Dutch on a large scale for fear of destabilising the colony. Dutch, the language of power, was supposed to remain in the hands of the leading elite. After independence, Dutch was dropped as an official language and replaced by Indonesian , but this does not mean that Dutch has completely disappeared in Indonesia: Indonesian Dutch , a regional variety of
8911-415: The Dutch standard language is largely absent, and speakers of these Dutch dialects will use German or French in everyday speech. Dutch is not afforded legal status in France or Germany, either by the central or regional public authorities, and knowledge of the language is declining among younger generations. As a foreign language , Dutch is mainly taught in primary and secondary schools in areas adjacent to
9044-466: The Dutch standard language, it is not mutually intelligible with Dutch and considered a sister language of Dutch, like English and German. Approximate distribution of native Dutch speakers worldwide: Dutch is an official language of the Netherlands proper (not enshrined in the constitution but in administrative law ), Belgium, Suriname, the Dutch Caribbean municipalities (St. Eustatius, Saba and Bonaire), Aruba , Curaçao and Sint Maarten . Dutch
9177-408: The Dutch, was still spoken by about 500,000 half-blood in Indonesia in 1985. Yet the Indonesian language inherited many words from Dutch: words for everyday life as well as scientific and technological terms. One scholar argues that 20% of Indonesian words can be traced back to Dutch words, many of which are transliterated to reflect phonetic pronunciation e.g. kantoor "office" in Indonesian
9310-488: The Franks. However, the language did experience developments of its own, such as very early final-obstruent devoicing . In fact, the find at Bergakker indicates that the language may already have experienced this shift during the Old Frankish period. Attestations of Old Dutch sentences are extremely rare. The language is mostly recorded on fragmentary relics, and words have been reconstructed from Middle Dutch and loan words from Old Dutch in other languages. The oldest recorded
9443-412: The Movies continued to follow this format long after the requirement was dropped because of the popularity of its host, Elwy Yost . TVO is Canada's oldest educational television service. It established the country's first UHF television station in 1970, based in Toronto. TVO used to have the largest over-the-air coverage in Ontario, reaching 98.5% of the province with 216 transmitters ; however this
9576-568: The Netherlands and Flanders . In French-speaking Belgium , over 300,000 pupils are enrolled in Dutch courses, followed by over 23,000 in the German states of Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia , and about 7,000 in the French region of Nord-Pas-de-Calais (of which 4,550 are in primary school). At an academic level, the largest number of faculties of neerlandistiek can be found in Germany (30 universities), followed by France (20 universities) and
9709-412: The Netherlands and Belgium, the dialect spoken in and around the German town of Kleve ( Kleverlandish ) is historically and genetically a Low Franconian variety. In North-Western France, the area around Calais was historically Dutch-speaking (West Flemish), of which an estimated 20,000 are daily speakers. The cities of Dunkirk , Gravelines and Bourbourg only became predominantly French-speaking by
9842-530: The Netherlands, although there are recognisable differences in pronunciation, comparable to the pronunciation differences between standard British and standard American English. In 1980 the Netherlands and Belgium concluded the Language Union Treaty . This treaty lays down the principle that the two countries must gear their language policy to each other, among other things, for a common system of spelling. Dutch belongs to its own West Germanic sub-group,
9975-461: The USA. The show added several new characters, such as Melanie's African family and the family of Boris' and Barbara's common cousin, Umik. The series was produced by Pedri Animation BV, a Dutch stop-motion animation company. It was voiced simply by a feminine storytelling narrator. Miffy is sometimes assumed to be a Japanese character, because Sanrio 's Hello Kitty , introduced in 1974, is rendered using
10108-655: The United Kingdom (5 universities). Despite the Dutch presence in Indonesia for almost 350 years, as the Asian bulk of the Dutch East Indies , the Dutch language has no official status there and the small minority that can speak the language fluently are either educated members of the oldest generation, or employed in the legal profession such as historians, diplomats, lawyers, jurists and linguists/polyglots, as certain law codes are still only available in Dutch. Dutch
10241-544: The United States (in fact, various TVO productions wound up being aired on PBS stations). This model was later emulated by provincial educational broadcasters Télé-Québec in Quebec and Knowledge Network in British Columbia. The majority of TVO's funding is provided by the Government of Ontario through the Ministry of Education, which provides $ 39 million annually, with additional funding provided by charitable donations. TVO
10374-603: The West Indies, slaves were forbidden to speak Dutch, with the effect that local creoles such as Papiamento and Sranan Tongo which were based not on Dutch but rather other European languages, became common in the Dutch West Indies. However, as most of the people in the Colony of Surinam (now Suriname ) worked on Dutch plantations, this reinforced the use of Dutch as a means for direct communication. In Suriname today, Dutch
10507-652: The area known as the Low Countries goes back further in time, with the Romans referring to the region as Germania Inferior ("Lower" Germania). It is a reference to the Low Countries' downriver location at the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta near the North Sea . From 1551, the designation Nederlands received strong competition from the name Nederduytsch (literally "Low Dutch", Dutch being used in its archaic sense covering all continental West Germanic languages). It
10640-602: The books are her family: Miffy's parents, her Grandma and Grandpa, her Auntie Alice, and 'Uncle Bob,' a family friend, who appears in Miffy Goes Flying . A new brother or sister for Miffy is introduced in Miffy And The New Baby . She also has many friends, Boris and Barbara Bear, who first appeared in 1989 and are boyfriend and girlfriend, Poppy Pig, who appeared in 1977, and her niece Grunty, Snuffy, who appeared in 1969, and other bunnies such as Aggie and Melanie. In
10773-614: The borders of other standard language areas. In most cases, the heavy influence of the standard language has broken the dialect continuum . Examples are the Gronings dialect spoken in Groningen as well as the closely related varieties in adjacent East Frisia (Germany). Kleverlandish is a dialect spoken in southern Gelderland , the northern tip of Limburg , and northeast of North Brabant (Netherlands), but also in adjacent parts of North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany). Limburgish ( Limburgs )
10906-504: The boy's grandfather realized the boy was his grandson, the police were directed to the child's sitter , Robert Mikelson. Dutch language Dutch ( endonym : Nederlands [ˈneːdərlɑnts] ) is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family , spoken by about 25 million people as a first language and 5 million as a second language and is the third most spoken Germanic language. In Europe, Dutch
11039-472: The case with the Gronings dialect , which is considered a variety of the Dutch Low Saxon regional language, but it is relatively distinct from other Dutch Low Saxon varieties. Also, some Dutch dialects are more remote from the Dutch standard language than some varieties of a regional language are. Within the Netherlands, a further distinction is made between a regional language and a separate language, which
11172-461: The character followed. On 30 January 2013, a feature-length film, Miffy the Movie , was released in theaters and stars Eva Poppink in the title role. Four television series based on the character have been produced: Dick Bruna's Miffy Storybook Classics from 1984; Miffy: Colors, Numbers, and Shapes from 1996; Miffy and Friends from 2003; and Miffy's Adventures Big and Small from 2015. Miffy
11305-607: The claim that one of Hello Kitty's companion characters, a rabbit named Cathy, infringes on the copyright and trademark of Miffy. On 2 November 2010, a Dutch court ruled against Sanrio and ordered the company to stop marketing Cathy products in Belgium , Luxembourg , and the Netherlands. On 7 June 2011, following the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Sanrio and Mercis reached an out-of-court settlement requiring Sanrio to halt production of merchandise that features Cathy. Instead of continuing
11438-553: The close of the 18th century, with (Hoog)Duytsch establishing itself as the Dutch exonym for German during this same period. In the 19th century Germany saw the rise of the categorisation of dialects, with German dialectologists terming the German dialects spoken in the mountainous south of Germany as Hochdeutsch ("High German"). Subsequently, German dialects spoken in the north were designated as Niederdeutsch ("Low German"). The names for these dialects were calqued by Dutch linguists as Nederduits and Hoogduits . As
11571-413: The course of fifteen centuries. During that period, they forced Old Frisian back from the western coast to the north of the Low Countries, and influenced or even replaced Old Saxon spoken in the east (contiguous with the Low German area). On the other hand, Dutch has been replaced in adjacent lands in present-day France and Germany. The division into Old, Middle and Modern Dutch is mostly conventional, since
11704-536: The court battle, the two companies announced that they would donate the legal fees to help the earthquake victims. In Bruna's hometown, Utrecht , there is a square named after nijntje, the Nijntjepleintje (lit: Little Nijntje Square, to retain the rhyme) and in 2006, the Centraal Museum opened a permanent exhibition, the dick bruna huis (Dick Bruna house). Miffy celebrated her fiftieth birthday in 2005. This
11837-446: The decision, including the group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting , said that the changes would affect people who have no other options for accessing content. TVO formally applied to the CRTC on January 25, 2017, to remove its eight transmitters outside Toronto from service. In response to feedback from the towns and cities affected by the planned shutdown, as well as TVO donors and other groups, TVO reversed its decision to shut down
11970-535: The declaration of independence of Indonesia, Western New Guinea , the "wild east" of the Dutch East Indies , remained a Dutch colony until 1962, known as Netherlands New Guinea . Despite prolonged Dutch presence, the Dutch language is not spoken by many Papuans, the colony having been ceded to Indonesia in 1963. Dutch-speaking immigrant communities can also be found in Australia and New Zealand. The 2011 Australian census showed 37,248 people speaking Dutch at home. At
12103-585: The development of a separate Dutch language. It was spoken by the descendants of the Salian Franks who occupied what is now the southern Netherlands , northern Belgium , part of northern France, and parts of the Lower Rhine regions of Germany. The High German consonant shift, moving over Western Europe from south to west, caused a differentiation with the Central and High Franconian in Germany. The latter would as
12236-469: The devil? ... I forsake the devil"). If only for its poetic content, the most famous Old Dutch sentence is probably Hebban olla vogala nestas hagunnan, hinase hic enda tu, wat unbidan we nu ("All birds have started making nests, except me and you, what are we waiting for"), is dated to around the year 1100, written by a Flemish monk in a convent in Rochester , England . Since the sentence speaks to
12369-550: The early 1990s, an image of Miffy holding an adjustable spanner coyly behind her back appeared on flyers produced by people taking direct action against the UK government's road building program. This unauthorised use of the character spread and Miffy became a mascot for groups involved in radical ecological direct action. Miffy appeared in her first TV show in 1984, called Dick Bruna's Miffy Storybook Classics: The Original Series . Directed by veteran animator Gene Deitch , each episode
12502-621: The elementary and secondary school level, and for GED testing, was transferred from the Ministry of Education to TVO. The positions of Chair of the Board and CEO were divided in 2005 TVO airs a mixture of original children's programming, documentaries, scripted dramas, and public affairs programs. Children's programming is aired daily during a daytime television block branded as TVOKids , with general-audience programming airing during prime time and overnight hours for adult viewers. Scripted dramas are typically foreign imports, past selections include
12635-482: The end of the 19th century. In the countryside, until World War I , many elementary schools continued to teach in Dutch, and the Catholic Church continued to preach and teach the catechism in Dutch in many parishes. During the second half of the 19th century, Dutch was banned from all levels of education by both Prussia and France and lost most of its functions as a cultural language. In both Germany and France,
12768-415: The imagination, it is often erroneously stated as the oldest Dutch sentence. Old Dutch naturally evolved into Middle Dutch . The year 1150 is often cited as the time of the discontinuity, but it actually marks a time of profuse Dutch writing; during this period a rich Medieval Dutch literature developed. There was at that time no overarching standard language ; Middle Dutch is rather a collective name for
12901-685: The influence of the Burgundian Ducal Court in Dijon ( Brussels after 1477). The dialects of Flanders and Brabant were the most influential around this time. The process of standardisation became much stronger at the start of the 16th century, mainly based on the urban dialect of Antwerp . The 1585 fall of Antwerp to the Spanish army led to a flight to the northern Netherlands, where the Dutch Republic declared its independence from Spain. This influenced
13034-548: The language now known as Dutch. In the Low Countries Dietsch or its Early Modern Dutch form Duytsch as an endonym for Dutch gradually went out of common use and was gradually replaced by the Dutch endonym Nederlands . This designation (first attested in 1482) started at the Burgundian court in the 15th century, although the use of neder , laag , bas , and inferior ("nether" or "low") to refer to
13167-618: The least (adults 15%, children 1%). The decline of the West Frisian language in Friesland occupies a middle position (adults 44%, children 22%). Dialects are most often spoken in rural areas, but many cities have a distinct city dialect. For example, the city of Ghent has very distinct "g", "e" and "r" sounds that greatly differ from its surrounding villages. The Brussels dialect combines Brabantian with words adopted from Walloon and French . Some dialects had, until recently, extensions across
13300-537: The main attraction for the new partnership in celebration of the Lunar New Year of the Rabbit. In October 2023, the fifth series was announced and will premiere in 2025 on Canal+ in France. It will be produced by StudioCanal , Mercis and Superprod Animation. This series will also feature the debut of Miffy's younger brother, Bun. It was images of Miffy that helped Dutch police track down sex offender Roberts Mikelson in
13433-497: The mandatory markets. Download coordinates as: On January 25, 2017, TVO announced it would be shutting down eight of its nine remaining transmitters (a mere 5½ years after converting them to digital), leaving only CICA-DT at Toronto's CN Tower in operation to maintain their current license. CEO Lisa de Wilde announced that shutting down the transmitters would save the broadcaster an estimated $ 1 million per year, but would also lay off seven transmitter maintenance jobs. Critics of
13566-437: The modern standard languages . In this age no standard languages had yet developed, while a perfect West Germanic dialect continuum remained present; the division reflects the contingent future contribution dialect groups would have to the later languages. The early form of Dutch was a set of Franconian dialects spoken by the Salian Franks in the 5th century. These happened to develop through Middle Dutch to Modern Dutch over
13699-495: The official languages. In Asia, Dutch was used in the Dutch East Indies (now mostly Indonesia ) by a limited educated elite of around 2% of the total population, including over 1 million indigenous Indonesians, until it was banned in 1957, but the ban was lifted afterwards. About a fifth of the Indonesian language can be traced to Dutch, including many loan words . Indonesia's Civil Code has not been officially translated, and
13832-537: The only exception being its Ottawa transmitter, CICO-DT-24, which is based at Camp Fortune in Chelsea, Quebec . There, it shares its site with its Quebec counterpart, Télé-Québec, and with most of the region's television and FM radio signals. From the 1970s through the 1990s, TVO ran top-of-the-hour bumpers where an announcer would mention the channel allocation of the service's flagship station in Toronto, along with an allocation for one of its rebroadcast transmitters: "This
13965-470: The original Dutch language version dating from colonial times remains the authoritative version. Up to half a million native speakers reside in the United States, Canada and Australia combined, and historical linguistic minorities on the verge of extinction remain in parts of France and Germany. Dutch is one of the closest relatives of both German and English, and is colloquially said to be "roughly in between" them. Dutch, like English, has not undergone
14098-422: The other characters. Bruna has produced a total of 124 picture books for children. The Miffy books each contain twelve pages of story. Each page has one illustration and four lines of verse, the last word of the second line rhymes with the last of the fourth. They are written about things that children can understand, and situations they will face such as going to the hospital and going to school, and they always have
14231-517: The predominant colloquial language out of the area's 22 million Dutch-speakers. Limburgish , spoken in both Belgian Limburg and Netherlands Limburg and in adjacent parts in Germany, is considered a dialect in Belgium, while having obtained the official status of regional language in the Netherlands. Limburgish has been influenced by the Ripuarian varieties like the Colognian dialect , and has had
14364-411: The province, provided that we're fairly compensated. Since cable or satellite distributors receive subscriber revenues driven by having TVO as part of their offering, we feel it's reasonable to be compensated. Unfortunately, we could not come to an agreement with Bell to compensate TVO for carrying our signal outside of Ontario, and the decision was made to cease offering our signal outside of Ontario." As
14497-677: The province. TVO also reports to the Ontario legislature through the Minister of Education , in accordance with the Ontario Educational Communications Authority Act. Instead of following the model of the federally owned Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC)'s television services, which shows commercial advertisements, TVO chose a commercial-free model similar to the Public Broadcasting Service ( PBS ) in
14630-414: The province. The network reached an agreement with Vidéotron , and then entered negotiations with Shaw Communications and Telus , but failed to reach an agreement with Bell Canada . TVO cited that: "...we believe that we have a responsibility to earn revenues from the sale of our service outside of our home province. TVO is willing to consent to cable and satellite distributors carrying our signal outside
14763-411: The provinces of Gelderland , Flevoland , Friesland and Utrecht . This group, which is not Low Franconian but instead Low Saxon and close to neighbouring Low German, has been elevated by the Netherlands (and by Germany) to the legal status of streektaal ( regional language ) according to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages . It is regarded as Dutch for a number of reasons. From
14896-569: The required channel change by re-using its existing antenna" as part of Canada's 600 MHz spectrum repack. TVO announced it would make the change as of May 1, 2020. TVO similarly reduced the ERP of its other retransmitters required to move out of the 600 MHz band. On July 31, 2012, TVO permanently shut down its remaining 114 analogue transmitters (14 full-power and 100 low-power) without converting them to digital; these were in areas of Ontario not considered "mandatory markets" for digital conversion by
15029-509: The rest of the text lack any consensus. The Franks emerged in the southern Netherlands ( Salian Franks ) and central Germany ( Ripuarian Franks ), and later descended into Gaul . The name of their kingdom survives in that of France. Although they ruled the Gallo-Romans for nearly 300 years, their language, Frankish , became extinct in most of France and was replaced by later forms of the language throughout Luxembourg and Germany in around
15162-423: The rights of Dutch speakers, mostly referred to as "Flemish". However, the dialect variation was a serious disadvantage in the face of the standardised francophony . Since standardisation is a lengthy process, Dutch-speaking Belgium associated itself with the standard language that had already developed in the Netherlands over the centuries. Therefore, the situation in Belgium is essentially no different from that in
15295-572: The rights to the Miffy character are not sold. Miffy's Adventures Big and Small premiered 2 October 2015. It currently has a total of six seasons. It airs on the Nick Jr. Channel in the USA. On 16 February 2017, Dick Bruna died at the age of 89. In 2021, Miffy collaborated with Converse to capsule menswear collection in the Netherlands to celebrate the creator of Miffy, Dick Bruna. In December 2022, Tommy Hilfiger announced its new collection with Miffy as
15428-517: The same branch of the West Germanic languages as Old English (i.e. Anglo-Frisian ) and are therefore genetically more closely related to English and Scots than to Dutch. The different influences on the respective languages, however, particularly that of Norman French on English and Dutch on West Frisian, have rendered English quite distinct from West Frisian, and West Frisian less distinct from Dutch than from English. Although under heavy influence of
15561-451: The set of Franconian dialects (i.e. West Germanic varieties that are assumed to have evolved from Frankish ) spoken in the Low Countries during the Early Middle Ages , from around the 5th to the 12th century. Old Dutch is mostly recorded on fragmentary relics, and words have been reconstructed from Middle Dutch and Old Dutch loanwords in French. Old Dutch is regarded as the primary stage in
15694-534: The time are generally split into three dialect groups: Ingvaeonic (North Sea Germanic), Istvaeonic (Weser–Rhine Germanic) and Irminonic (Elbe Germanic). It appears that the Frankish tribes fit primarily into the Istvaeonic dialect group with certain Ingvaeonic influences towards the northwest, which are still seen in modern Dutch. The Frankish language itself is not directly attested, the only possible exception being
15827-463: The transition between them was very gradual. One of the few moments when linguists can detect something of a revolution is when the Dutch standard language emerged and quickly established itself. The development of the Dutch language is illustrated by the following sentence in Old, Middle and Modern Dutch: Among the Indo-European languages , Dutch is grouped within the Germanic languages , meaning it shares
15960-485: The transmitters on February 17, 2017. According to TVO, the Government of Ontario agreed to increase TVO's annual funding by $ 1 million to offset the amount that would have been saved by shutting down the transmitters. On March 1, 2017, TVO formally withdrew its CRTC application to delete its eight retransmitters from its licence. In April 2017, ISED required TVO to move its newly-digital retransmitters serving Belleville, Chatham, Cloyne, Kitchener, and Windsor from out of
16093-477: The urban dialects of the province of Holland . In 1637, a further important step was made towards a unified language, when the Statenvertaling , the first major Bible translation into Dutch, was created that people from all over the new republic could understand. It used elements from various, even Dutch Low Saxon , dialects but was predominantly based on the urban dialects of Holland of post 16th century. In
16226-527: The various regions of Ontario, on its website. Hubs are currently based in Thunder Bay for the Northwestern Ontario region, Sudbury for Northeastern Ontario , Kingston for Eastern Ontario , and London for Southwestern Ontario . In 2019, the service also launched an Indigenous hub to cover First Nations issues throughout the province. The Ontario Educational Communications Authority (OECA)
16359-616: The world. It is also translated in dialects, including in Zeelandic by Engel Reinhoudt . Dick Bruna has won many awards for his books, such as the Golden Brush in 1990, for Boris Bear and the Silver Brush for Miffy In The Tent in 1996. In 1997, he was awarded the Silver Slate for Dear Grandma Bunny , a book where Miffy's grandmother was sick and died. The other characters that appear in
16492-513: Was "OECA", sharing the name of its parent organization, but began using the on-air brand "TVOntario" (and later just TVO) beginning in 1974. When the Global Television Network was originally approved, it was with a proposal that OECA would broadcast across southern Ontario during the daytime using Global's six transmitters, as Global's own programming only ran from 5 p.m. to midnight. However, when Global launched in 1974, this proposal
16625-502: Was added, Studio 2 was replaced by The Agenda , and More to Life and Vox were cancelled. The move to digitize services represents a transition; The Globe and Mail quoted TVO CEO Lisa de Wilde saying "while television will remain an important medium for TVO, the days of defining ourselves as only a broadcaster are past." In 2002, the Independent Learning Centre, which is responsible for distance education at
16758-455: Was appointed chairman and Lisa de Wilde became CEO. On June 29, 2006, the provincial Ministry of Education announced a major overhaul of TVO: its production capabilities would be upgraded to fully digital systems by 2009 (ministry funding would be allocated for this); and TFO would be spun off into a separate organization. Moreover, programming changes were announced later that day: thirteen hours of new weekly children's educational programming
16891-544: Was bookmarked by segments hosted by Andrea Martin that would use scenes from the series to discuss filmmaking techniques. Episodes of The Prisoner were hosted by journalist Warner Troyer whose segments included interviews with the actors and a discussion of various psychological, philosophical or sociological themes regarding the series. Similarly, Doctor Who was hosted by science fiction author Judith Merril who would discuss each week's episode to explore various themes in science and science fiction. Saturday Night at
17024-411: Was created in 1953 after Bruna had been telling his one-year-old son, Sierk, stories about a little rabbit they had seen earlier in the dunes, while on holiday at Egmond aan Zee . Miffy became a female after Bruna decided that he wanted to draw a dress and not trousers on his rabbit. At first Miffy looked like a toy animal with floppy ears, but by 1963, her design was changed to her current incarnation,
17157-495: Was created in June 1970 by then Education Minister Bill Davis . At that time, the OECA produced children's and educational programming which was aired on commercial television stations. The CBC, acting on behalf of OECA, applied for and won a licence for the ministry's television station in Toronto. CICA, with the mandate of "[using] electronic and associated media to provide educational opportunities for all people in Ontario". The "CA" in
17290-546: Was marked in cities across the globe, for example, at the Manchester Art Gallery in England. She also serves a "celebrity character spokesperson" for UNICEF . Miffy's namesakes include a new species of booklouse from Peru . The insect was given the scientific name Trichadenotecnum miffy in 2008, because its epiproct, an appendage on its abdomen, resembles a small rabbit. In July 2014, Bruna announced his retirement;
17423-577: Was not implemented. In the latter half of the 1970s, TVO began adding rebroadcast transmitters in other Ontario communities. Its first rebroadcast transmitter, CICO (now CICO-24), signed on from Ottawa on October 25, 1975. In 1987, TVOntario launched La Chaîne française , a French-language public television network which became TFO in 1995. The Ontario government under Mike Harris promised to privatize TVOntario. They never carried through on this plan, but did cut its budget. The positions of chair and CEO were divided in 2005. Film producer Peter O'Brian
17556-705: Was traditionally animated and ran for approximately five minutes. The show aired in the Netherlands on KRO , in the United Kingdom on ITV , in Canada on TVOntario in Australia on ABC , and in the USA on Cartoon Network's Small World block with VHS releases from Geneon USA, episodes of the show were later included as Bonus Features on Miffy and Friends DVDs. From 2003 to 2007, Miffy and Friends aired on children's television channels such as Treehouse in Canada, and Noggin in
17689-467: Was under foreign control. In the 19th century, the East Indies trade started to dwindle, and with it the importance of Malacca as a trading post. The Dutch state officially ceded Malacca to the British in 1825. It took until 1957 for Malaya to gain its independence. Despite this, the Dutch language is rarely spoken in Malacca or Malaysia and only limited to foreign nationals able to speak the language. After
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