What country are the Dutch from?
Dutch Crossing
Dutch Crossing is an interdisciplinary peer-reviewed academic journal devoted to all aspects of Low Countries studies: history and art history, Dutch and Flemish (and occasionally Afrikaans) literary and cultural studies, Dutch language, Dutch as a foreign language, and intercultural and transnational studies. Its stated purpose is to cover "all aspects of 'Global Dutch', not only the Netherlands and the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium but also other places where Dutch historically had or continues to have an impact, including parts of the Americas, Southern Africa, and South-East Asia." A special focus concerns exchanges between the Low Countries and the English-speaking world in all periods from the late Middle Ages to the present day. "Dutch Crossing" is the official journal of the Association for Low Countries Studies."
Dutch name
The most common Dutch surnames in the Netherlands (as of 1947) and Flanders in Belgium are listed to the right. Meertens' Dutch surname database lists 94143 different family names; the total Dutch speaking population in Europe is estimated to be about 23 million people. The most common Dutch names in Belgium are nearly all patronymic ""father-based"" names in which they are composed with the following formula "name of father + "-son"," the only exceptions being ""De Smet"" (the Smith) and - to a certain extent, because it is also a patronymic ("Thomas") - ""Maes"" (Meuse). The most common Dutch names in the Netherlands are more diverse, with names ranging from ""Visser"" (fisherman) to ""Van Dijk"" ((living along) the dike) and ""De Jong"" (the young (one)). It should be remembered however that these figures are based on the data of an entire country, and on a smaller scale other names tend to dominate certain regions.
Dutch Brazilians
Dutch Brazilians () refers to Brazilians of full or partial Dutch ancestry. Dutch Brazilians are mainly descendants of immigrants from the Netherlands.
Dutch Americans in Michigan
Dutch Michiganders are residents of the state of Michigan who are of Dutch ancestry. In the 1840s, Calvinist immigrants desiring more religious freedom immigrated. West Michigan in particular has become associated with Dutch American culture, and the highly conservative influence of the Dutch Reformed Church, centering on the cities of Holland and (to a lesser extent) Grand Rapids. Dutch is still spoken by the elderly and their children in Western Michigan. As of 2010, 5.1% of Michiganders are of Dutch descent.
Dutch people
Within the field of ethnography, it is argued that the Dutch-speaking populations of the Netherlands and Belgium have a number of common characteristics, with a mostly shared language, some generally similar or identical customs, and with no clearly separate ancestral origin or origin myth.
Dutch Burghers
The Dutch Burghers are an ethnic group in Sri Lanka, of mixed Dutch, Portuguese Burghers and Sri Lankan descent. However, they are different community when compared with Portuguese Burghers. Originally Protestant, many Burghers today are Christian, but belong to a variety of denominations. The Dutch Burghers of Sri Lanka speak English and the local languages Sinhala and Tamil.
Dutch folk dance
Many folk dances regarded as Dutch are probably of Scottish origin, like "Skotse trije", "Skotse fjouwer", "Horlepiep" of "Hakketoone".. This is, because the Dutch are a sea going nation and the fishermen brought many customs, as well as dances, from abroad. The "Horlepiep" is known to be of Scottish origin. In the East of the Netherlands dances like "Driekusman", "Hoksebarger", "Veleta", "Kruispolka" and the "Spaanse Wals" share the origin with German dances, but some are even danced in countries further away, like Poland and Lithuania. Or at least using the same melodies. The actual dances may differ. The "Veleta" used to be a common dance in many parts of Holland during the 1950s till the 1970s on weddings and even in dancings, just like the ballroom dances Waltz, Quickstep and Tango.
History of religion in the Netherlands
In 1648, the independence of the Netherlands was recognized by the Treaty of Westphalia. The Netherlands did not only include the seven relatively independent Protestant provinces of the Dutch Republic but also a Roman Catholic "Generaliteitsland", which was governed by the States-General. This area roughly includes the current provinces of North Brabant and Limburg, which remained Roman Catholic. The Netherlands became known among Anglicans, many Protestants and Jews for its relative religious tolerance and became a refuge for the persecuted and a home for many of these migrants. The proportion of first-generation immigrants from outside the Netherlands among the population of Amsterdam was nearly 50% in the 17th and 18th centuries. Jews had their own laws and formed a separate society. Many Jews, especially from Antwerp, migrated to Amsterdam. The Netherlands also hosted religious refugees, including Huguenots from France and Puritans from England (the most famous of the latter being the Pilgrims).
Dutch people
Historically Dutch also lived directly on the eastern side of the German border, most have since been assimilated (apart from ~40,000 recent border migrants), especially since the establishment of Germany itself in 1872. Cultural marks can still be found though. In some villages and towns a Dutch Reformed church is present, and a number of border districts (such as Cleves, Borken and Viersen) have towns and village with an etymologically Dutch origin. In the area around Cleves (Ger."Kleve", Du. "Kleef") traditional dialect is Dutch, rather than surrounding (High/Low) German. More to the South, cities historically housing many Dutch traders have retained Dutch exonyms for example Aachen ("Aken") and Cologne/Köln ("Keulen") to this day.
Netherlands
Since the 1990s, Dutch electronic dance music (EDM) gained widespread popularity in the world in many forms, from trance, techno and gabber to hardstyle. Some of the world's best known dance music DJs hail from the Netherlands, including Armin van Buuren, Tiësto, Hardwell, Martin Garrix, Dash Berlin, Nicky Romero, W&W, Don Diablo and Afrojack; the first four of which have been ranked as best in the world by DJ Mag Top 100 DJs. The Amsterdam Dance Event (ADE) is the world's leading electronic music conference and the biggest club festival for the many electronic subgenres on the planet. These DJs also contribute to the world's mainstream pop music, as they frequently collaborate and produce for high-profile international artists.
Netherlands national baseball team
The team is made up primarily of players from the Netherlands in Europe, and from Dutch territories and islands in the Caribbean that are part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, such as Aruba and Curaçao (which is part of the former Netherland Antilles, which have since been dissolved), where baseball is extremely popular. Some foreigners of Dutch descent have also been members of the team. While baseball only maintains a niche following throughout Europe, the Netherlands, along with Italy, are the two European countries where the sport's popularity is strongest; the team has finished in either first or second place in each of the 31 European Baseball Championships in which it has appeared.
Military history of the Netherlands
The Batavians incorrectly became regarded as the sole and eponymous ancestors of the Dutch people. The Netherlands were briefly known as the Batavian Republic. Moreover, during the time Indonesia was a Dutch colony (the Dutch East Indies), the capital (now Jakarta) was named Batavia. If the ancestry of most native Dutch people were traced back to Germanic tribes, most would lead to the Franks, Frisians and Saxons. Dutch is in fact a Low Frankish language, and is the only language (together with Afrikaans, which descends from Dutch itself) to be a direct descendant of Old Frankish, the language of the Franks.
Black-Dutch
Over time, the term "Black Dutch" migrated with certain families of mixed ancestry from North Carolina, Kentucky, and Tennessee to Missouri and Arkansas, as well as to Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma, where its original meaning became lost. Many people born in the 20th century have claimed Black Dutch heritage, sometimes in addition to Native heritage, without having any idea who their "Black Dutch" ancestors were supposed to be. Unlike families in Pennsylvania or Virginia, most of the mixed-race "Black Dutch" families of the Deep South have English or Scots-Irish surnames, and have no German ancestry in their families.
Homophile
Netherlands
List of Moroccan Dutch people
The following is a referenced list of notable Dutch people of Moroccan origin. Some of the people listed below are immigrants; others are of the second generation. Large-scale immigration to the Netherlands started on 14 May 1969, when the Netherlands and Morocco signed a treaty allowing recruitment of mostly unschooled labourers to work in Dutch mining, industry, construction and agriculture. Most guest workers intended to earn lots of money in a relatively short period and then return home. The fact that their number has risen to over 335,000 people, or over 2 percent of the Dutch population, proves many changed their minds. When the 1973 oil crisis hit the Netherlands, demand for labour greatly diminished and many guest workers lost their jobs.
List of Dutch explorations
The Netherlands had a considerable part in the making of modern society. The Netherlands and its people have made numerous seminal contributions to the world's civilization, especially in art, science, technology and engineering, economics and finance, cartography and geography, exploration and navigation, law and jurisprudence, thought and philosophy, medicine, and agriculture. Dutch-speaking people, in spite of their relatively small number, have a significant history of invention, innovation, discovery and exploration. The following list is composed of objects, (largely) unknown lands, breakthrough ideas/concepts, principles, phenomena, processes, methods, techniques, styles etc., that were discovered or invented (or pioneered) by people from the Netherlands and Dutch-speaking people from the former Southern Netherlands ("Zuid-Nederlanders" in Dutch). Until the fall of Antwerp (1585), the Dutch and Flemish were generally seen as one people.
Dutch Argentines
Dutch Argentines are Argentine citizens of full or partial Dutch ancestry or people who emigrated from the Netherlands and reside in Argentina. Dutch immigration to Argentina has been one of many migration flows from Europe in that country, although it has not been as numerous as in other cases (they failed to account for 1% of total migration received). However, Argentina received a large contingent of Dutch since 1825. The largest community is in the city of Tres Arroyos in the south of the province of Buenos Aires.
History of the Netherlands
The Netherlands gained independence from Spain as a result of the Eighty Years' War, during which the Dutch Republic was founded. As the Netherlands was a republic, it was largely governed by an aristocracy of city-merchants called the regents, rather than by a king. Every city and province had its own government and laws, and a large degree of autonomy. After attempts to find a competent sovereign proved unsuccessful, it was decided that sovereignty would be vested in the various provincial Estates, the governing bodies of the provinces. The Estates-General, with its representatives from all the provinces, would decide on matters important to the Republic as a whole. However, at the head of each province was the stadtholder of that province, a position held by a descendant of the House of Orange. Usually the stadtholdership of several provinces was held by a single man.
Terminology of the Low Countries
Throughout the centuries the Dutch attempted to define their collective identity by looking at their ancestors, the Batavi. As claimed by the Roman historian Tacitus, the Batavi where a brave Germanic tribe living in the Netherlands, probably in the Betuwe region. In Dutch, the adjective "Bataafs" ("Batavian") was used from the 15th to the 18th century, meaning "of, or relating to the Netherlands" (but not the southern Netherlands).
Netherlands
The Netherlands' turbulent history and shifts of power resulted in exceptionally many and widely varying names in different languages. There is diversity even within languages. This holds also for English, where Dutch is the adjective form and the misnomer Holland a synonym for the country "Netherlands". Dutch comes from Theodiscus and in the past centuries, the hub of Dutch culture is found in its most populous region, Holland, home to the capital city of Amsterdam; government headquarters at The Hague; and Europe's largest port Rotterdam. Referring to the Netherlands as Holland in the English language is similar to calling the United Kingdom "England" by people outside the UK. The term is so pervasive among potential investors and tourists, however, that the Dutch government's international websites for tourism and trade are "holland.com" and "hollandtradeandinvest.com".
Netherlands at the 2004 Summer Olympics
The Dutch team featured five defending Olympic champions: swimming stars Pieter van den Hoogenband and Inge de Bruijn, road and track cyclist Leontien van Moorsel, dressage rider Anky van Grunsven along with her horse Bonfire, and middleweight judoka Mark Huizinga, who later became the Netherlands' flag bearer in the opening ceremony. Star sailor Mark Neeleman, at age 45, became the first Dutch male athlete to compete in six Olympic Games since 1980 (except the 1988 Summer Olympics, in which he was selected). Shooter Hennie Dompeling sought his fifth Olympic bid as one of the most sophisticated members of the team, having missed the medal podium in the men's skeet from Sydney four years earlier. Among the Dutch athletes of the team, several of them were born outside the Netherlands and became naturalized citizens, including sprinter Troy Douglas, who competed for three Olympics under the Bermudian flag, badminton players Mia Audina from Indonesia and Jie Yao from China, and taekwondo jin Charmie Sobers from the Netherlands Antilles.
Filipinos in the Netherlands
Filipinos in the Netherlands comprise migrants from the Philippines to the Netherlands and their descendants living there. According to Dutch government statistics, 16,719 persons of first or second-generation Philippine background lived in the Netherlands in 2011. Though Filipinos live throughout the country, Amsterdam and Rotterdam are homes to the largest Filipino communities.
Portuguese in the Netherlands
Portuguese in the Netherlands (also known as Portuguese Dutch or the Dutch Portuguese Community) are the citizens or residents of the Netherlands whose ethnic origins lie in Portugal.
Netherlands national football team
To a minor extent, the Netherlands maintains a rivalry with their other neighbours, Belgium; a Belgian-Dutch (football) duel is referred to as a Low Countries derby. More recently, the Netherlands have also developed a rivalry with Spain. This recent rivalry began in 2010, when Spain defeated the Netherlands 1-0 after extra time in the final match of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Four years later, the Netherlands routed Spain 5-1 in a rematch in the group stage of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, contributing to Spain's early exit from the tournament.
Black people
Afro-Dutch are residents of the Netherlands who are of Black African or Afro-Caribbean ancestry. They tend to be from the former and present Dutch overseas territories of Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Sint Maarten and Suriname. The Netherlands also has sizable Cape Verdean and other African communities.
Dutch people
The general situation described above is applicable to most if not all modern European ethnic groups with origins among the Germanic tribes, such as the Frisians, Germans, English and the North-Germanic (Scandinavian) peoples. In the Low Countries, this phase began when the Franks, themselves a union of multiple smaller tribes (many of them, such as the Batavi, Chauci, Chamavi and Chattuarii, were already living in the Low Countries prior to the forming of the Frankish confederation), began to incur the northwestern provinces of the Roman Empire. Eventually, in 358, the Salian Franks, one of the three main subdivisions among the Frankish alliance settled the area's Southern lands as foederati; Roman allies in charge of border defense.
Dutch people
The Dutch had settled in America long before the establishment of the United States of America. For a long time the Dutch lived in Dutch colonies, owned and regulated by the Dutch Republic, which later became part of the Thirteen Colonies.
Dutch people
Northern Dutch culture is marked by Protestantism. Though today many do not adhere to Protestantism anymore, or are only nominally part of a congregation, Protestant-(influenced) values and custom are present. Generally, it can be said the Northern Dutch are more pragmatic, favor a direct approach, and display a less-exuberant lifestyle when compared to Southerners. On a global scale, the Northern Dutch have formed the dominant vanguard of the Dutch language and culture since the fall of Antwerp, exemplified by the use of "Dutch" itself as the demonym for the country in which they form a majority; the Netherlands. Linguistically, Northerners speak any of the Hollandic, Zealandic, and Dutch Low Saxon dialects natively, or are influenced by them when they speak the Standard form of Dutch. Economically and culturally, the traditional centre of the region have been the provinces of North and South Holland, or today; the Randstad, although for a brief period during the 13th or 14th century it lay more towards the east, when various eastern towns and cities aligned themselves with the emerging Hanseatic League. The entire Northern Dutch cultural area is located in the Netherlands, its ethnically Dutch population is estimated to be just under 10,000,000. Northern Dutch culture has been less influenced by French influence than the Southern Dutch culture area.
Dutch people in the United Kingdom
Dutch people in the United Kingdom, also known as Anglo-Dutch people, include British people of Dutch ancestry and people born in the Netherlands who live in the United Kingdom. The 2001 UK Census recorded 40,438 Dutch-born people residing in the UK. More recent estimates by the Office for National Statistics put the figure at 56,000 in 2013. The 2011 Census recorded 57,439 Dutch-born residents in England, 1,642 in Wales, 4,117 in Scotland and 515 in Northern Ireland.
Dutch people
As with all ethnic groups, the ethnogenesis of the Dutch (and their predecessors) has been a lengthy and complex process. Though the majority of the defining characteristics (such as language, religion, architecture or cuisine) of the Dutch ethnic group have accumulated over the ages, it is difficult (if not impossible) to clearly pinpoint the exact emergence of the Dutch people; the interpretation of which is often highly personal. The text below hence focuses on the history of the Dutch ethnic group; for "Dutch national history", please see the history-articles of the Netherlands. For Dutch colonial history, see the article on the Dutch Empire.
Arubans in the Netherlands
Arubans in the Netherlands consist of migrants from Aruba to the Netherlands and their descendants. Aruba was part of the former Netherlands Antilles until 1986 when the country seceded remaining a constituent country of Kingdom of the Netherlands. As of 2014, figures from Statistics Netherlands showed 142,953 people of Dutch Antillean origin in the Netherlands, of which 23,800 are Aruban. The largest Aruban communities in the Netherlands can be found in Amsterdam, Almere, Haarlem, The Hague, Rotterdam, Alkmaar and Amersfoort.
Dutch people
Prior to the arrival of Christianity, the ancestors of the Dutch adhered to a form of Germanic paganism augmented with various Celtic elements. At the start of the 6th century, the first (Hiberno-Scottish) missionaries arrived. They were later replaced by Anglo-Saxon missionaries, who eventually succeeded in converting most of the inhabitants by the 8th century. Since then, Christianity has been the dominant religion in the region.
Dutch Republic
The Dutch Republic or United Provinces was a republic that existed from the formal creation of a confederacy in 1581 by several Dutch provinces (which earlier seceded from Spanish rule) until the Batavian Revolution in 1795. It was the predecessor state of the modern Netherlands and the first nation state of the Dutch people.
Kingdom of the Netherlands
The Kingdom of the Netherlands (; ), commonly known as the Netherlands, is a sovereign state and constitutional monarchy with the large majority of its territory in Western Europe and with several small island territories in the Caribbean Sea, in the West Indies islands (Leeward Islands and Lesser Antilles).
Dutch Burghers
The Dutch Burghers largely descend from the Dutch people, with mixtures of Portuguese Burghers and Sri Lankans (either a Dutch father and a Sri Lankan mother, or a Sri Lankan mother of Dutch descent and a Sri Lankan father). However direct Dutch ancestry is not always the case. Many Dutch Burghers can also claim lineage from other European protestants who moved to the Netherlands and joined the Dutch East India Company fleeing Catholicism. Hence, names from Germany, Switzerland, France, Italy and so forth are common (e.g., Schockman, Slemmermann, Piachaud,and Sansoni). Some names however have since become extinct (or are on the verge of extinction) in Sri Lanka due to migration following independence and Sinhala-only nationalist movements forbidding Burghers, whose vernacular language was English from continuing the jobs they had maintained prior to independence in the civil service etc.(e.g., Blaze, Leembruggen).
Dutch East Indies
Including their 2nd generation descendants, they are currently the largest foreign born group in the Netherlands. In 2008, the Dutch Census Bureau for Statistics (CBS) registered 387,000 first and second generation Indos living in the Netherlands. Although considered fully assimilated into Dutch society, as the main ethnic minority in the Netherlands, these 'Repatriants' have played a pivotal role in introducing elements of Indonesian culture into Dutch mainstream culture. Practically each town in the Netherlands will have a 'Toko' (Dutch Indonesian Shop) or Indonesian restaurant and many 'Pasar Malam' (Night market in Malay/Indonesian) fairs are organised throughout the year.
Dutch diaspora
Dutch migrant settlers in search of a better life started arriving in Suriname (previously known as Dutch Guiana) in the 19th century with the "boeroes" (not to be confused with the South African "Boeren"), farmers arriving from the Dutch provinces of Gelderland and Groningen. Many Dutch settlers left Suriname after independence in 1975. Furthermore, the Surinamese ethnic group Creoles, persons of mixed African-European ancestry, are partially of Dutch descent.
Dutch language
Dutch is an official language of the Netherlands proper, Belgium, Suriname, the Dutch Caribbean municipal (St. Eustatius Saba & Bonaire), Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten. Dutch 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.
Dutch diaspora
The Dutch are a small unknown minority living in Japan. The first known Dutch person of Japanese descent is Ludovicus Stornebrink. Mike Havenaar is a well known Japanese professional footballer of Dutch descent.
Indians in the Netherlands
Indians in the Netherlands are residents of Indian origin in the Netherlands. Most of the people of Indian descent in the Netherlands are of Indo-Surinamese origin. More recently the flow of expats from India has increased.
Dutch people
Since World War II, Dutch emigrants have mainly departed the Netherlands for Canada, the Federal Republic of Germany, the United States, Belgium, Australia, and South Africa, in that order. Today, large Dutch communities also exist in the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Turkey, and New Zealand.
Anti-Dutch sentiment
Anti-Dutch sentiment, also known as Dutchphobia, is a spectrum of negative feelings, fears and dislikes towards Netherlands, Dutch people and Dutch culture. Historically, dislike or hatred toward the Netherlands. The Dutch people and their culture has arisen from the colonization undertaken by the Netherlands, and from the roles it has played in European wars. This sentiment is reflected in various expressions that have entered the English language.
Dutch New Zealanders
The 2013 census recorded 19,815 people born in the Netherlands and 28,503 people claiming Dutch ethnicity. The Netherlands Embassy in Wellington estimated that there were approximately 45,000 Dutch citizens residing in New Zealand. This number includes persons with dual New Zealand and Dutch nationality. As many as 100,000 New Zealanders are estimated to be of Dutch descent.
Demography of the Netherlands
A large number of immigrants come from countries in Western Europe, mostly from the neighbouring countries of Germany and Belgium. There were five subsequent waves of immigration to the Netherlands in recent history.
Dutch Americans
According to the 2000 United States Census, more than 5 million Americans claim total or partial Dutch heritage. They are particularly concentrated around Grand Rapids, Michigan; Rock Rapids, Iowa; Sioux City, Iowa; Des Moines, Iowa; Fulton, Illinois, Celeryville, Ohio, and Little Chute, Wisconsin. These areas are surrounded with towns and villages that were founded by Dutch settlers in the 19th century, such as Holland, Michigan and Zeeland, Michigan; Pella, Iowa, and Orange City, Iowa. Other Dutch enclaves include Lynden, Washington, Ripon, California, and places in New Jersey. It is estimated that, by 1927, as many as 40,000 Dutch settlers, primarily from Noord Brabant and Limburg, had immigrated to the United States, with the largest concentrations in the area near Little Chute, Wisconsin. By the early twentieth century, Little Chute was the largest Catholic Dutch community in the United States.
Demography of the Netherlands
In 2007, there were 117,000 immigrants (including 7000 Germans, 6000 Poles, 5000 Bulgarians, 3000 Turks and 2000 Moroccans) and 123,000 emigrants. Nearly half the emigrants were native Dutch, followed at a distance by nearly 5000 Poles and more than 3000 Germans. There was an observable increase in net immigration from the former USSR, Bulgaria and Romania.
History of the Netherlands
The History of the Netherlands is the history of seafaring people thriving on a lowland river delta on the North Sea in northwestern Europe. Records begin with the four centuries during which the region formed a militarised border zone of the Roman Empire. This came under increasing pressure from Germanic peoples moving westwards. As Roman power collapsed and the Middle Ages began, three dominant Germanic peoples coalesced in the area, Frisians in the north and coastal areas, Low Saxons in the northeast, and the Franks in the south.
Dutch diaspora
The first big wave of Dutch immigrants to leave the Low Countries were from present day Northern Belgium as they wanted to escape the heavily urbanised cities in Western Flanders. They arrived in Brandenburg in 1157. Due to this, the area is known as ""Fläming"" ("Fleming") in reference to the Duchy that these immigrants came from. Because of a number of devastating floods in the provinces of Zeeland and Holland in the 12th century, large numbers of farmers migrated to The Wash in England, the delta of the Gironde in France, around Bremen, Hamburg and western North Rhine-Westphalia. Until the late 16th century, many Dutchmen and women (invited by the German margrave) moved to the delta of the Elbe, around Berlin, where they dried swamps, canalized rivers and build numerous dikes. Today, the Berlin dialect still bears some Dutch features.
Batavianization
The term "Batavianization", derives its name from the Batavi, a Germanic tribe living in the Netherlands, and long regarded as the mythical ancestors of the Dutch people. The term "Dutchification" is mostly used in English publications by Dutch authors, less so by native English-speakers. This likely has to do with the fact that "Dutch" isn't a Latin-derived term and hence sounds somewhat childish to some ears in combination with the (Latinate) suffix "-fication". As for "Belgianization", "Belgae" was the standard term in Latin to refer to the Dutch (compare the Leo Belgicus, United Belgian States and Belgic Confession for example) in the Late Middle Ages. After the establishment of Belgium, its use generally shifted to mean Belgicism.
History of the Netherlands national football team
The Netherlands national football team famously plays in bright orange shirts. Orange is the historic national colour of the Netherlands, originating from the coat of arms of the Dutch founding father William of Orange-Nassau. The current Dutch away kit is dark blue, with the traditional crest of the Dutch Lion, which was the official crest of the national team up to 1996, in orange. The crest was reintroduced to celebrate the 125th years anniversary of the Dutch FA (KNVB). The crest replaces the logo of the KNVB which was introduced in 1996.
Germany–Netherlands relations
German–Dutch relations refer to interstate relations between Germany and the Netherlands. Relations between the modern states started after 1871, even though the German people and Dutch people have had centuries of interactions. Both countries have had their respective territories governed by various states such as the Western Roman Empire, the Frankish Empire, and the Holy Roman Empire. An important factor in Dutch-German relations is the fact that William the Silent, Prince of Orange – leader of the Dutch Revolt and Vader des Vaderland of the Netherlands – belonged to the German House of Nassau.
Netherlands
Dutch society is egalitarian and modern. The Dutch have an aversion to the non-essential. Ostentatious behaviour is to be avoided. The Dutch are proud of their cultural heritage, rich history in art and involvement in international affairs.
Dutch manners are open and direct with a no-nonsense attitude; informality combined with adherence to basic behaviour. According to a humorous source on Dutch culture, "Their directness gives many the impression that they are rude and crude — attributes they prefer to call openness." A well known more serious source on Dutch etiquette is "Dealing with the Dutch" from Jacob Vossestein: "Dutch egalitarianism is the idea that people are equal, especially from a moral point of view, and accordingly, causes the somewhat ambiguous stance the Dutch have towards hierarchy and status." As always, manners differ between groups. Asking about basic rules will not be considered impolite. "What may strike you as being blatantly blunt topics and comments are no more embarrassing or unusual to the Dutch than discussing the weather."
Dutch people
Afrikaners are dominated by two main groups, the Cape Dutch and Boers, which are partly defined by different traditions of society, law, and historical economic bases. Although their language (Afrikaans) and religion remain undeniably linked to that of the Netherlands, Afrikaner culture has been strongly shaped by three centuries in South Africa. Afrikaans, which developed from Middle Dutch, has been influenced by English, Malay-Portuguese creole, and various African tongues. Dutch was taught to South African students as late as 1914 and a few upper-class Afrikaners used it in polite society, but the first Afrikaans literature had already appeared in 1861. The Union of South Africa granted Dutch official status upon its inception, but in 1925 Parliament openly recognised Afrikaans as a separate language. It differs from Standard Dutch by several pronunciations borrowed from Malay, German, or English, the loss of case and gender distinctions, and in the extreme simplification of grammar (e.g. "voël" becomes "vogel", and "reën" becomes "regen"). The dialects are no longer considered quite mutually intelligible.
Bamboo wife
The origin of the English term "Dutch wife" is thought via folk etymology to be from the (former) Dutch colony of Indonesia, where Dutch traders would spend long periods away from their wives. A more likely explanation is the link with Dutch courage, Dutch auction or to go Dutch. Here the use of the word Dutch was something dodgy or not regular. It arose in the 17th century when there were a series of Anglo-Dutch wars and the Dutch were seen as untrustworthy by the English. This then carried over to America and the colonies and sees this use of Dutch applied in other circumstances such as in the phrase "you can trust me or I am a Dutchman".
Belgium–Netherlands relations
Belgian–Dutch relations refer to interstate relations between the Belgium and the Netherlands. It can be seen as one of the closest international relationships in existence, marked by shared history, culture, institutions and language, extensive people-to-people links, aligned security interests, sporting tournaments and vibrant trade and investment cooperation. Relations were established after Belgium became independent from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1839. Both nations are great allies with cultural similarities and close cooperation between both governments. The language spoken in Belgium is known as "Nederlands/Dutch", is the most-spoken language in both countries. Approximately 35,000 Belgian nationals live in the Netherlands, while there are around 111,000 Dutch nationals in Belgium.
Netherlands
The fertility rate in the Netherlands is 1.78 children per woman (2013 estimate), which is high compared with many other European countries, but below the rate of 2.1 children per woman required for natural population replacement. Life expectancy is high in the Netherlands: 83.2 years for newborn girls and 78.9 for boys (2013 estimate). The country has a migration rate of 2.0 migrants per 1,000 inhabitants per year. The majority of the population of the Netherlands is ethnically Dutch. According to a 2005 estimate, the population was 80.9% Dutch, 2.4% Indonesian, 2.4% German, 2.2% Turkish, 2.0% Surinamese, 1.9% Moroccan, 0.8% Antillean and Aruban, and 7.4% others. Some 150,000 to 200,000 people living in the Netherlands are expatriates, mostly concentrated in and around Amsterdam and The Hague, now constituting almost 10% of the population of these cities.
Demography of the Netherlands
As the result of immigration from overseas, the Netherlands have a sizeable minority of non-indigenous peoples. There is also a considerable level of emigration, in majority consisting of former immigrants. In 2005, some 121,000 people left the country, while 94,000 entered it. Out of a total of 101,150 people immigrating into the Netherlands in 2006, 66,658 were from Europe, Oceania, the Americas or Japan, and 34,492 were from other (mostly developing) countries. Out of a total of 132,470 emigrants, 94,834 were going to Europe, Oceania, the Americas or Japan and 37,636 to other countries.
Military history of the Netherlands
The new Republic took its name from the Batavi, a Germanic tribe who had lived in the area of the Netherlands in Roman times and who were then romantically regarded as the ancestors of the Dutch nation.
Dutch Americans
A significant number of Dutchmen emigrating to the United States after World War II arrived from Indonesia via the Netherlands. After Indonesia, formerly known as the Dutch East Indies, gained independence its Indo-European (Eurasian) population known as "Indies Dutchmen" (Dutch: Indische Nederlanders) repatriated to the Netherlands. Around 60,000 continued their diaspora to the United States. This particular group is also known as "Dutch-Indonesians", "Indonesian-Dutch", or "Amerindos".
Dutch language
Dutch is a West Germanic language spoken by around 23 million people as a first language and 5 million people as a second language, constituting the majority of people in the Netherlands (where it is the sole official language) and Belgium (as one of three official languages). It is the third most widely spoken Germanic language, after its close relatives English and German.
Germanic-speaking Europe
In Europe, Dutch is spoken in the Netherlands (≈96%) and Flanders, the northern part of Belgium (≈59%). In French Flanders, in northern France, some of the older generation still speaks the local Dutch dialect. Outside Europe, Dutch is official in Suriname, Aruba and the Netherlands Antilles. In Indonesia, Dutch is spoken by the Indo people. Afrikaans, the third most spoken language in South Africa, in terms of native speakers (≈13.3%), and the most widely understood in Namibia, evolved from Dutch and was standardised in the early 20th century. Both languages are still largely mutually intelligible.
Dutch Bantam
Diminutive chickens of similar coloration to today's Dutch Bantams have been seen in the Netherlands for hundreds of years, but the exact origin of the breed is unclear. It is likely that the ancestors of the Dutch Bantam were Southeast Asian bantams brought back by sailors from the Dutch East Indies. Historically, it is supposed that these tiny chickens were selectively bred because only small eggs could be kept by peasant farmers, while larger ones were required to be sent to the kitchens of the landed gentry. The first written reference to the Dutch Bantam as a distinct breed is in the "Hand- en standaardboek" of R.T. Maitland, director of the of The Hague, published in 1882; he referred to them as , "partridge bantams". The Nederlandse Hoender Club, the Dutch national poultry club, recognized the breed in 1906. A breeders' association, the Hollandse Krielenfokkers Club, was formed in 1946.
Dutch Empire
In some Dutch colonies there are major ethnic groups of Dutch ancestry descending from emigrated Dutch settlers. In South Africa the Boers and Cape Dutch collectively known as the Afrikaners. The Burgher people of Sri Lanka and the Indo people of Indonesia as well as the Creoles of Suriname are mixed race people of Dutch descent.
Baan Hollanda
The term “Wilanda” was used by the Siamese in the past to mean those from the Netherlands, or the Dutch. It was derived from the Malay “Orang Belanda”, used to denote the Dutch in Java and elsewhere in the East Indies. “Belanda” itself was possibly derived from the Portuguese “Hollanda” (Holland).
The Real Football Factories International
The Dutch are famous for their tolerant culture and liberal attitude to sex and drugs. Dyer begins his journey in Amsterdam, where he takes in the cosmopolitan life of the capital. But Danny soon learns that the Netherlands has a dark underbelly as he starts his journey into its fierce and secretive hooligan culture. Whilst in Amsterdam he has a secret meeting with the F -Side Firm of AFC Ajax. He learns about Ajax’s long-standing rivalry with Feyenoord hooligans from Rotterdam which has seen bombings and even murder. He then travels to Rotterdam, where he experiences De Klassieker (The Classic) derby, Feyenoord against Ajax – the biggest game in Holland. We see how drugs and weapons have fueled their rivalries, which have seen the firms battle around the football ground and even at clubs and raves.
Netherlands
The Netherlands were able to remain neutral during World War I, in part because the import of goods through the Netherlands proved essential to German survival, until the blockade by the British Royal Navy in 1916. That changed in World War II, when Nazi Germany invaded the Netherlands on 10 May 1940. The Rotterdam Blitz forced the main element of the Dutch army to surrender four days later. During the occupation, over 100,000 Dutch Jews were rounded up and transported to Nazi extermination camps; only a few of them survived. Dutch workers were conscripted for forced labour in Germany, civilians who resisted were killed in reprisal for attacks on German soldiers, and the countryside was plundered for food. Although there were thousands of Dutch who risked their lives by hiding Jews from the Germans, over 20,000 Dutch fascists joined the Waffen SS, fighting on the Eastern Front. Political collaborators were members of the fascist NSB, the only legal political party in the occupied Netherlands. On 8 December 1941, the Dutch government-in-exile in London declared war on Japan, but could not prevent the Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia). In 1944–45, the First Canadian Army, which included Canadian, British and Polish troops, was responsible for liberating much of the Netherlands. Soon after VE Day, the Dutch fought a colonial war against the new Republic of Indonesia.
In 1954, the Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands reformed the political structure of the Netherlands, which was a result of international pressure to carry out decolonisation. The Dutch colonies of Surinam and Curaçao and Dependencies and the European country all became countries within the Kingdom, on a basis of equality. Indonesia had declared its independence in August 1945 (recognised in 1949), and thus was never part of the reformed Kingdom. Suriname followed in 1975. After the war the Netherlands left behind an era of neutrality and gained closer ties with neighboring states. The Netherlands was one of the founding members of the Benelux, the NATO, Euratom and the European Coal and Steel Community, which would evolve into the EEC (Common Market) and later the European Union.
Dutch East Indies
The majority of Dutchmen that repatriated to the Netherlands after and during the Indonesian revolution are Indo (Eurasian), native to the islands of the Dutch East Indies. This relatively large Eurasian population had developed over a period of 400 years and were classified by colonial law as belonging to the European legal community. In Dutch they are referred to as Indo (short for Indo-European). Of the 296,200 so called Dutch 'repatriants' only 92,200 were expatriate Dutchmen born in the Netherlands.
Dutch Australians
Dutch Australians refers to Australians with full or partial Dutch ancestry. They form one of the largest groups of the Dutch diaspora outside Europe.
Dutch Americans
"Nine tenths of the so called Europeans (in the Dutch East Indies) are the offspring of whites married to native women. These mixed people are called "Indo-Europeans"… They have formed the backbone of officialdom. In general they feel the same loyalty to Holland as do the white Netherlanders. They have full rights as Dutch citizens and they are Christians and follow Dutch customs. This group has suffered more than any other during the Japanese occupation." Official U.S. Army publication for the benefit of G.I.'s, 1944.
Curaçaoans in the Netherlands
Curaçaoans in the Netherlands consist of migrants from Curaçao to the Netherlands and their descendants. Until 2010, Curaçao and the other Dutch islands in the Caribbean were called the Netherlands Antilles. As of 2014, figures from Statistics Netherlands showed 142,953 people of Dutch Antillean origin in the Netherlands, which the vast majority are from Curaçao.
Dutch people
The origins of the word "Dutch" go back to Proto-Germanic, the ancestor of all Germanic languages, "*theudo" (meaning "national/popular"); akin to Old Dutch "dietsc", Old High German "diutsch", Old English "þeodisc" and Gothic "þiuda" all meaning "(of) the common (Germanic) people". As the tribes among the Germanic peoples began to differentiate its meaning began to change. The Anglo-Saxons of England for example gradually stopped referring to themselves as "þeodisc" and instead started to use "Englisc", after their tribe. On the continent "*theudo" evolved into two meanings: "Diets" (meaning "Dutch (people)" (archaic) and "Deutsch" (German, meaning "German (people)"). At first the English language used (the contemporary form of) "Dutch" to refer to any or all of the Germanic speakers on the European mainland (e.g. the Dutch, the Frisians and the -various- Germans). Gradually its meaning shifted to the Germanic people they had most contact with, both because of their geographical proximity, but also because of the rivalry in trade and overseas territories: the people from the Republic of the Netherlands, the Dutch.
Arabs in the Netherlands
Arab Dutch ("Arabische Nederlanders"), also referred to as Dutch Arabs ("Nederlandse Arabieren"), are citizens or residents of the Netherlands whose ancestry traces back to the Arab World. Many of them might not actually be ethnically Arab due to the general confusion between the meaning of Arab and other ethnic groups coming from the same area (such as the case of Kurds, Berbers, Turkmen, Assyrians, Roma, etc.); therefore, the exact number of the actual Arab population in the Netherlands may be greatly biased and incorrect.
New Netherlander
The population of New Netherland was not all ethnically Dutch, but had a variety of ethnic and linguistic backgrounds, including: other European ethnic groups (Germans, Scandinavians, French, Scots, English, Irish, Italians, and Croats); indigenous Amerindian tribes such as Algonquians and Iroquoians; Sephardic Jews (Jews of Spanish and Portuguese backgrounds) both from the Netherlands itself and the then recently lost colony of Dutch Brazil; and West Africans, the last mostly having been brought as slaves.
Dutch Americans
Between 1820 and 1900, 340,000 Dutch emigrated from the Netherlands to the United States of America. In the aftermath of World War II, several tens of thousands of Dutch immigrants joined them, mainly moving to California and Washington. In several counties in Michigan and Iowa, Dutch Americans remain the largest ethnic group. Nowadays, most Dutch Americans (27%) live in California, followed by New York, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
Dutch
Dutch may also refer to:
Netherlands
The Dutch are the tallest people in the world, with an average height of for adult males and for adult females in 2009. People in the south are on average about shorter than those in the north.
According to Eurostat, in 2010 there were 1.8 million foreign-born residents in the Netherlands, corresponding to 11.1% of the total population. Of these, 1.4 million (8.5%) were born outside the EU and 0.43 million (2.6%) were born in another EU Member State. On 21 November 2016, there were 3.8 million residents in the Netherlands with at least one foreign-born parent ("migration background"). Over half the young people in Amsterdam and Rotterdam have a non-western background. Dutch people, or descendants of Dutch people, are also found in migrant communities worldwide, notably in Canada, Australia, South Africa and the United States. According to the United States Census Bureau (2006), more than 5 million Americans claim total or partial Dutch ancestry. There are close to 3 million Dutch-descended Afrikaners living in South Africa. In 1940, there were 290,000 Europeans and Eurasians in Indonesia, but most have since left the country.
Indians in the Netherlands
In December 2001 the High Level Committee on Indian Diaspora estimated the population of PIO's and Indian citizens at 215,000. According to the Dutch governmental institution Statistics Netherlands (CBS), in January 2016, 32,682 people had their origin from immigrants from India. The Embassy of India states that the Netherlands has the "second largest population of people of Indian origin in Europe (next only to UK)" and that it is "home to about 220,000 Indian and Surinamese Hindustani Diaspora." The Netherlands India Chamber of Commerce & Trade (NICCT) states the there are about 25,000 Indians or persons of Indian origin, excluding the Surinamese Hindustanis.
Dutch Americans
Prominent Dutch American political figures include Presidents Martin Van Buren, Warren G. Harding and Theodore and Franklin D. Roosevelt and U.S. Senators Philip Schuyler, Nicholas Van Dyke, Hamilton Fish, John C. Ten Eyck, Daniel W. Voorhees, Arthur Vandenberg, Peter G. Van Winkle, Alan Simpson, Fred Thompson, John Hoeven and Christopher Van Hollen. Two of the Founding Fathers of the United States, Egbert Benson and John Jay, were also of Dutch descent. Governors John Hickenlooper of Colorado, Harold G. Hoffman and Thomas Kean of New Jersey, George Bell Timmerman Jr. of South Carolina and Cornelius P. Van Ness of Vermont were also born to Dutch American families.
Prostitution in the Netherlands
Until the 1970s, prostitutes in the Netherlands were predominantly white lower-class women from the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Northern Germany. During the 1970s, in the wake of the sex trips to South-East Asia by Dutch men, the sex operators brought in women from Thailand and the Philippines. In the 1980s there was a second wave from Latin America and Africa. In the 1990s, after the fall of the Soviet Union, women came from Eastern Europe. Foreign prostitutes are economically motivated to come to the Netherlands, and they tend to travel to engage in sex work between the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, and other European societies.
Turks in the Netherlands
10,000-30,000 people from Bulgaria live in the Netherlands. The majority, of about 80%, are ethnic Turks from Bulgaria; most of them have come from the south-eastern Bulgarian district of Kardzhali ("Kırcaali") and were the fastest-growing group of immigrants in the Netherlands in 2009.
Pennsylvania Dutch Country
The term "Dutch" is from an archaic sense of the English word "Dutch", which once referred to any people speaking a non-peripheral continental West Germanic language on the European mainland. The German-speaking settlers came from a variety of countries and religious backgrounds, but most became assimilated to Anglo-American language and culture beginning in the later 19th century with English language evangelism efforts and the outlawing of German language schooling. The assimilation process continued soon after the turn of the 20th century with World War I, consolidated schools, and the advent of mandatory public education until the age of 16, with added pressures from increased mobility, the influence of English-language media, communications, and urbanization. Also, many German-Americans hid their ethnicity with the spread of Anti-German sentiment and negative propaganda against the German people.
List of Dutch inventions and innovations
The Netherlands had a considerable part in the making of modern society. The Netherlands and its people have made numerous seminal contributions to the world's civilization, especially in art, science, technology and engineering, economics and finance, cartography and geography, exploration and navigation, law and jurisprudence, thought and philosophy, medicine, and agriculture. Dutch-speaking people, in spite of their relatively small number, have a significant history of invention, innovation, discovery and exploration. The following list is composed of objects, (largely) unknown lands, breakthrough ideas/concepts, principles, phenomena, processes, methods, techniques, styles etc., that were discovered or invented (or pioneered) by people from the Netherlands and Dutch-speaking people from the former Southern Netherlands ("Zuid-Nederlanders" in Dutch). Until the fall of Antwerp (1585), the Dutch and Flemish were generally seen as one people.
Demography of the Netherlands
Immigrants from foreign countries are divided into several ethnic groups. For example, there are both Russians and Chechenians from Russia, Turks and Kurds from Turkey, Serbs and Albanians from Serbia and immigrants from Iran are divided into Persians, Azeris and Kurds.
History of the Netherlands
The Catholic kings of Spain took strong measures against Protestantism, which polarised the peoples of present-day Belgium and the Netherlands. The subsequent Dutch revolt led to splitting the Burgundian Netherlands into a Catholic French and Dutch-speaking "Spanish Netherlands" (approximately corresponding to modern Belgium and Luxembourg), and a northern "United Provinces", which spoke Dutch and were predominantly Protestant with a Catholic minority. It became the modern Netherlands.
History of the Dutch language
Among the words with which Dutch has enriched the English vocabulary are: "brandy, coleslaw, cookie, cruiser, dock, easel, freight, landscape, spook, stoop, and yacht". Dutch is noteworthy as the language of an outstanding literature, but it also became important as the tongue of an enterprising people, who, though comparatively few in number, made their mark on the world community through trade and empire. Dutch is also among some of the earliest recorded languages of Europe. Countries that have Dutch as an official language are Belgium, the Netherlands, Suriname, Aruba and Curacao.
Dutch nationality law
"Jus soli" is the right of anyone born in the territory of a state to nationality or citizenship of that state. Dutch law has no provisions for the automatic granting of the Dutch nationality based on the actual place of birth, however a child is Dutch if it was born to at least one parent, having his or her main residence in the Netherlands, Curaçao, Sint Maarten or Aruba (or the Netherlands Antilles) at the times of the births of that parent and of the child, provided the child itself has at birth its main residence in one of those countries too.
Eurasian (mixed ancestry)
Dutch Eurasians of part Indonesian descent, also called Indos or Indo-Europeans, have largely assimilated in the Netherlands arriving in the Netherlands following the end of World War II until 1965, their diaspora a result of Indonesia gaining its independence from Dutch colonial rule. Statistics show high inter marriage rates with native Dutch (50–80%). With over 500,000 persons, they are the largest ethnic minority in the Netherlands. So-called Indo rockers such as the Tielman Brothers introduced their blend of rock and roll music to Dutch audiences, whereas others gained fame as singers and TV presenters, such as Rob de Nijs and Sandra Reemer. There are also famous Indo soccer players such as Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Robin van Persie. Well-known politicians, such as Christian democrat Hans van den Broek and politician Geert Wilders, are also of Indo descent.
Dutch diaspora
Both the Leeward (Alonso de Ojeda, 1499) and Windward (Christopher Columbus, 1493) island groups were discovered and initially settled by the Spanish. In the 17th century, the islands were conquered by the Dutch West India Company after the defeat of Spain to the Netherlands in Eighty Years' War and were used as bases for the slave trade. Very few Dutch people settled the Caribbean; most were traders or (former) sailors. Today most Dutch people living in the Dutch Antilles are wealthy and recent arrivals, often middle-aged, and are mostly attracted by the tropical climate.
Flag of the Netherlands
The flag of the Netherlands has been said to be the origin of the Indonesian flag. To symbolise the intention of forcing out the Dutch, the Indonesian nationalists would rip apart the Dutch flag. They tore off the bottom third of the flag, and separated the red and white colours from the blue colour.
Turks in the Netherlands
The official estimates of the Turkish immigrant population in the Netherlands do not include Turkish minorities whose origins go back to the Ottoman Empire. In the Netherlands, there are also Bulgarian Turks and Western Thracian Turks. These populations, which have different nationalities, share the same ethnic, linguistic, cultural and religious origins as Turkish nationals.
Music of the Netherlands
The Netherlands has also spawned many Eurodance acts, such as 2 Unlimited, Alice Deejay, the Venga Boys, the Two Brothers on the 4th Floor and Twenty Four Seven. Many of the world's top trance DJs are Dutch, such as Armin van Buuren, Ferry Corsten and DJ Tiësto. The DJ Magazine Top 10 has been dominated by the Dutch for many years. In 2012 five of the 10 DJ's were Dutch. DJ Tiesto has been awarded best Dj for three times in a row by DJ Magazine and is still present in the top 10. Armin van Buuren (also Dutch) has taken over his first place, doing this for four years in a row.
Many foreign DJs live in and operate from the Netherlands. Drum and bass is also popular in the Netherlands, artists including Noisia and Black Sun Empire. The Netherlands is home to many of the largest trance events on earth, including Sensation and Trance Energy.
Indo people
The Indo people or Indos are Eurasian people living in or connected with Indonesia. In its narrowest sense, the term refers to people in the former Dutch East Indies who held European legal status but who were of mixed descent, that are descendants of various indigenous peoples of Indonesia and Dutch settlers. In the broadest sense, an Indo is anyone of mixed European and Indonesian descent. Indos are associated with colonial culture of the former Dutch East Indies, a Dutch colony in Southeast Asia and a predecessor to modern Indonesia after its proclamation of independence shortly after World War II. The term was used to describe people acknowledged to be of mixed Dutch and Indonesian descent, or it was a term used in the Dutch East Indies to apply to Europeans who had partial Asian ancestry. The European ancestry of these people was predominantly Dutch, but also included Portuguese, British, French, Belgian, German, and others.
Languages of the Netherlands
The official language of the Netherlands is Dutch, spoken by almost all people in the Netherlands. Dutch is also spoken and official in Aruba, Bonaire, Belgium, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Maarten and Suriname. It is a West Germanic, Low Franconian language that originated in the Early Middle Ages (c. 470) and was standardised in the 16th century.
Shia Islam in the Netherlands
Shia form a minority within the Muslim community of the Netherlands with Twelver adherents forming a majority. Most of the Twelver or Ithnā 'Asharīs in the Netherlands are political refugees. They come from different nations, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. They come from Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, in addition to a small group from Pakistan and Lebanon, while the Turkish Ithnā 'Asharīs are guest workers. The majority of them came to the Netherlands in the 1990s as political refugees. The number of Twelver Shia alone who possess Dutch nationality as of 1 January 2005 was 108,728, being Iraqis, Afghanis, and Iranians excluding the figure of other Shiite sects and also of those who do not possess Dutch nationality. These groups came mainly because of political unrest in the region, such as the Iranian revolution, and the war between Iraq and Iran.
Culture of the Netherlands
The official language of the Netherlands is Dutch, spoken by almost all people in the Netherlands. Dutch is also spoken and official in Aruba, Brussels, Curaçao, Flanders, Sint Maarten and Suriname. It is a West Germanic, Low Franconian language that originated in the Early Middle Ages (c. 470) and was standardized in the 16th century. West Frisian is also a recognized language and it is used by the government in the province of Friesland. Several dialects of Low Saxon ("Nedersaksisch" in Dutch) are spoken in much of the north and east and are recognized by the Netherlands as regional languages according to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. Another Dutch dialect granted the status of regional language is Limburgish, which is spoken in the south-eastern province of Limburg. However, both Dutch Low Saxon and Limburgish spread across the Dutch-German border and belong to a common Dutch-Low German dialect continuum.
Netherlands
'Netherlands' literally means 'lower countries', referring to its low and flat topography, with only about 50% of its land exceeding above sea level and nearly 17% being below sea level. Most of the areas below sea level, known as "polders", are the result of land reclamation beginning in the 16th century. With a population of 17.25 million living within a total area of roughly —of which the land area is —the Netherlands is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Nevertheless, it is the world's second-largest exporter of food and agricultural products after the United States, owing to its fertile soil, mild climate, and intensive agriculture.
Low Countries
The name of the country of the Netherlands has the same etymology and origin as the name for the region Low Countries, due to "nether" meaning "low". In the Dutch language itself "De Lage Landen" is the modern term for Low Countries, and "De Nederlanden" (plural) is in use for the 16th century domains of Charles V, the historic Low Countries, while "Nederland" (singular) is in use for the country of the Netherlands. However, in official use, the name of the Dutch kingdom is still Kingdom of the Netherlands, " (plural). This name derives from the 19th-century origins of the kingdom which originally included present-day Belgium.
History of the Netherlands
Dutch writers in the 17th and 18th centuries saw the rebellion of the independent and freedom-loving Batavians as mirroring the Dutch revolt against Spain and other forms of tyranny. According to this nationalist view, the Batavians were the "true" forefathers of the Dutch, which explains the recurring use of the name over the centuries. Jakarta was named "Batavia" by the Dutch in 1619. The Dutch republic created in 1795 on the basis of French revolutionary principles was called the Batavian Republic. Even today "Batavian" is a term sometimes used to describe the Dutch people. (This is similar to use of "Gallic" to describe the French and "Teutonic" to describe the Germans.)
Stuff Dutch People Like
Stuff Dutch People Like (est. in 2011) is an English-language website about Dutch culture. The website describes in a humorous way typical Dutch customs, traditions and habits, seen from the eyes of a foreigner.
Stuff Dutch People Like was created in 2011 by Canadian Colleen Geske. The blog was originally created for the entertainment of expats and internationals living in the Netherlands, but has since became especially popular among Dutch people. It covered such topics as Dutch chocolate sprinkles (hagelslag), liquorice, herring, Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet, unique Dutch swear words, Dutch greetings (three kisses) and Dutch birthday celebrations. In 2013, Stuff Dutch People Like published their first book in the series.
Overseas Indonesians
Indonesia was a colony of the Netherlands from 1605 until 1945. In the early 20th century, many Indonesian students studied in the Netherlands. Most of them lived in Leiden and were active in the Perhimpoenan Indonesia (Indonesian Association). During and after the Indonesian National Revolution, many Moluccans and Indo people, people of mixed Dutch and Indonesian ancestry migrated to the Netherlands. Most of them were ex-KNIL army. In this way around 360,000 Indo people (Indo's)and Totok's (white people) and 12,500 persons from Maluke ancestry were settled in the Netherlands. Giovanni van Bronckhorst, Denny Landzaat, Roy Makaay, Mia Audina, and Daniel Sahuleka are notable people of Indonesian ancestry from the Netherlands. These 372,500 first generation people and their 2nd, 3rd and 4th generation offspring account for some 1.6 million Dutch passport-holders. This is as much as about 10% of the overall population of the Netherlands.
Outline of the Netherlands
The Netherlands (; , ) comprises the mainland located in Northwest Europe and several islands located in the Caribbean that, together with Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten in the Caribbean Sea, constitute the sovereign Kingdom of the Netherlands. The Netherlands is a parliamentary democratic constitutional monarchy. Its European mainland is bordered by the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east.