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by mtrimpe
3056 days ago
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Having grown up with 1/4 Belgian and 3/4 Dutch culture I can very much confirm. For me, the main thing is that the Dutch simply don't layer their speech whereas in most other cultures there is huge difference between what's being said and what is really meant by that. In Dutch culture that basically doesn't exist except at levels where it's inevitable (politics, upper management) and even there it's much less subtle than it would be elsewhere and you need to carefully calibrate to see if your conversation partner picks up on it or not. Given that there is no such double/hidden layer to use it's no surprise that we inevitably became more blunt and direct. Perhaps it's a result from our long history as traders and the realization we can't possibly manage double/hidden layers for all the cultures we interacted with and thus ended up throwing out the concept altogether. |
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That was my thought as well. Trade languages are always intentionally simplified and essentially impossible to use for dropping indirect hints. I believe this is very much a feature, not a bug. It substantially reduces opportunities for cross cultural misunderstandings and faux pas.
Apropos of nothing, I really liked the Dutch proverb in the article "Just be normal. That's crazy enough."