German language
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German (Deutsch (help·info)) is a Germanic tongue. It's a member of the western group of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family and one of the world's major languages. Spoken by more than 120 million people in 38 countries of the world, German is — like English and French — a pluricentric language with Germany, Austria and Switzerland as the three main centers of usage.
Worldwide, German accounts for the most written translations into and from a language. Furthermore it belongs to the three most learned and to the ten most spoken languages worldwide (according to the Guinness Book of Records).
Geographic distribution
German is spoken primarily in Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, in two-thirds of Switzerland, in two-thirds of the South Tyrol province of Italy (in German, Südtirol), in the small East Cantons of Belgium, and in some border villages of the South Jutland County (in German, Nordschleswig, in Danish, Sønderjylland) of Denmark.
In Luxembourg (in German, Luxemburg), as well as in the French régions of Alsace (in German, Elsass) and parts of Lorraine (in German, Lothringen), the native populations speak several German dialects, and some people also master standard German (especially in Luxembourg), although in Alsace and Lorraine French has for the most part replaced the local German dialects in the last 40 years.
Some German-speaking communities still survive in parts of Romania, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and above all Russia and Kazakhstan, although massive relocations to Germany in the late 1940s and 1990s have depopulated most of these communities. It is also spoken by German-speaking foreign populations and some of their descendants in Portugal, Spain, United Kingdom, Netherlands, and Scandinavia.
Outside of Europe and the former Soviet Union, the largest German-speaking communities are to be found in the U.S., Brazil and in Argentina where millions of Germans migrated in the last 200 years; but the great majority of their descendants no longer speak German. Additionally, German-speaking communities are to be found in the former German colony of Namibia, as well as in the other countries of German emigration such as Canada, Paraguay, Uruguay, Chile, Peru, Venezuela (where Alemán Coloniero developed), South Africa, and Australia. See also Plautdietsch.
In the USA, the largest concentrations of German speakers are in Pennsylvania (Amish, Hutterites and some Mennonites speak Pennsylvania Dutch (a High German dialect) and Hutterite German), Texas (Texas German), Kansas (Mennonites and Volga Germans), North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, Wisconsin and Indiana. Early twentieth century immigration was often to St. Louis, Chicago, New York, and Cincinnati. Most of the post Second World War wave are in the New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago urban areas, and in Florida. In Brazil the largest concentrations of German speakers are in Rio Grande do Sul (where Riograndenser Hunsrückisch was developed), Santa Catarina, Paraná, and Espírito Santo. Generally, German immigrant communities in the USA have lost their mother tongue more quickly than those who moved to South America, possibly due to the fact that for German speakers, English is easier to learn than Portuguese or Spanish.
In Canada there are people of German ancestry throughout the country and especially in the west as well as in Ontario. There is a large and vibrant community in the city of Kitchener, Ontario.
German is the main language of about 100 million people in Europe (as of 2004), or 13.3% of all Europeans, being the second most spoken native language in Europe after Russian, above French (66.5 million speakers in 2004) and English (64.2 million speakers in 2004). German is the third most taught foreign language worldwide, also in the USA (after Spanish and French); it is the second most known foreign language in the EU (after English; see [1]) It is one of the official languages of the European Union, and one of the three working languages of the European Commission, along with English and French.
History
The history of the German language begins with the High German consonant shift during the Migration period, separating South Germanic dialects from common West Germanic. The earliest testimonies of Old High German are from scattered Elder Futhark inscriptions, especially in Alemannic, from the 6th century, the earliest glosses (Abrogans) date to the 8th and the oldest coherent texts (the Hildebrandslied, the Muspilli and the Merseburg Incantations) to the 9th century. Old Saxon at this time belongs to the North Sea Germanic cultural sphere, and Low German should fall under German rather than Anglo-Frisian influence during the Holy Roman Empire.
As Germany was divided into many different states, the only force working for a unification or standardisation of German during a period of several hundred years was the general preference of writers trying to write in a way that could be understood in the largest possible area.
When Martin Luther translated the Bible (the New Testament in 1522 and the Old Testament, published in parts and completed in 1534) he based his translation mainly on this already developed language, which was the most widely understood language at this time. This language was based on Eastern Upper and Eastern Central German dialects and preserved much of the grammatical system of Middle High German (unlike the spoken German dialects in Central and Upper Germany that already at that time began to lose the genitive case and the preterit tense). In the beginning, copies of the Bible had a long list for each region, which translated words unknown in the region into the regional dialect. Roman Catholics rejected Luther's translation in the beginning and tried to create their own Catholic standard (gemeines Deutsch) — which, however, only differed from 'Protestant German' in some minor details. It took until the middle of the 18th century to create a standard that was widely accepted, thus ending the period of Early New High German.
German used to be the language of commerce and government in the Habsburg Empire, which encompassed a large area of Central and Eastern Europe. Until the mid-19th century it was essentially the language of townspeople throughout most of the Empire. It indicated that the speaker was a merchant, an urbanite, not their nationality. Some cities, such as Prague (German: Prag) and Budapest (Buda, German: Ofen), were gradually Germanized in the years after their incorporation into the Habsburg domain. Others, such as Bratislava (German: Pressburg), were originally settled during the Habsburg period and were primarily German at that time. A few cities such as Milan (German: Mailand) remained primarily non-German. However, most cities were primarily German during this time, such as Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, Zagreb (German: Agram), and Ljubljana (German: Laibach), though they were surrounded by territory that spoke other languages.
Until about 1800, standard German was almost only a written language. At this time, people in urban northern Germany, who spoke dialects very different from Standard German, learnt it almost like a foreign language and tried to pronounce it as close to the spelling as possible. Prescriptive pronunciation guides used to consider northern German pronunciation to be the standard. However, the actual pronunciation of standard German varies from region to region.
Media and written works are almost all produced in standard German (often called Hochdeutsch in German) which is understood in all areas where German is spoken, except by pre-school children in areas which speak only dialect, for example Switzerland. However, in this age of television, even they now usually learn to understand Standard German before school age.
The first dictionary of the Brothers Grimm, the 16 parts of which were issued between 1852 and 1860, remains the most comprehensive guide to the words of the German language. In 1860, grammatical and orthographic rules first appeared in the Duden Handbook. In 1901, this was declared the standard definition of the German language. Official revisions of some of these rules were not issued until 1998, when the German spelling reform of 1996 was officially promulgated by governmental representatives of all German-speaking countries. Since the reform, German spelling has been in an eight-year transitional period where the reformed spelling is taught in most schools, while traditional and reformed spelling co-exist in the media. See German spelling reform of 1996 for an overview of the heated public debate concerning the reform with some major newspapers and magazines and several known writers refusing to adopt it.
After the spelling reform of 1996 led to so much public controversy and some of its changed rules introduced new ambiguities or were simply perceived as "ugly", the transitional period (initially scheduled to end on Dec. 31, 2005) was extended until at least the end of 2006, and some parts of the reform were changed again in March 2006. This new "reform of the reform" tries to remove the ambiguities introduced in 1996. To date (April 2006), it is yet to be accepted by all German-speaking countries.
Classification and related languages
German is a member of the western branch of the Germanic family of languages, which in turn is part of the Indo-European language family.
Neighboring languages
In these modern days Germany is surrounded by language borders, in the north by the Frisian and Danish; in the east Polish, Sorbian, Czech, Slovak, and Hungarian; in the south Slovenian, Italian, Friulian, Ladin, and Romansh; in the west French and Dutch. Except for Frisian and Dutch, none of these languages are West Germanic, and so they are clearly distinct from German. Frisian, after Scots, the closest related living language to English; and Dutch, the closest related living language to German (after Yiddish) are not mutually intelligible with German. Although a dialect continuum still exists at certain places along the Dutch-German language border this is rapidly fading away because of centuries of standardisation in both countries,today only limited to only a few villages.
Official status
Standard German is the only official language in Liechtenstein and Austria; it shares official status in Germany (with Danish and Sorbian as minority languages), Switzerland (with French, Italian and Romansh), and Luxembourg (with French and Luxembourgish). It is used as a local official language in German-speaking regions of Belgium, Italy, Denmark, and Poland. It is one of the 20 official languages of the European Union.
It is also a minority language in Poland, Canada, France, Russia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Togo, Cameroon, the USA, Namibia, Brazil, Paraguay, Hungary, Slovakia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Croatia, Ukraine, Argentina, and Australia.
German was once the lingua franca of central, eastern and northern Europe and remains one of the most popular foreign languages taught world-wide, and is more popular than French as a foreign language in Europe. 32% of citizens of the EU-15 countries say they can converse in German. [2] This is assisted by the availability of German TV by cable or satellite, where series like Star Trek are shown dubbed into German.
German is also the second language of the Internet. More than 8% of websites are written in German, English 50%, French 6%, Japanese 5%, Spanish 3% and Portuguese 2%.
Dialects
German and Germanic
The term "German" in German dialects is not to be mistaken for "Standard German". German, in this context, refers to the ancestor of all continental West Germanic languages (excluding Frisian); it is just coincidence that "Standard German" and German in the sense described above share the same name. A little-known fact to most non-linguists is that not High German (and its Upper and Central dialects) but Low German dialects and the Dutch language are the most closely related languages to this 'German' language, as they did not participate in the High German consonant shift. "Germanic" is used, to help non-linguists grasp this tricky concept—not that the term is false in any sense though. High and Low German languages are the only Germanic languages able to be identified as such. 'German' as explained previously could also be described as "The ancestor of all West Germanic languages excluding the Anglo-Frisian group".
Dialects in Germany
The variation among the German dialects is considerable, with only the neighbouring dialects being mutually understandable. Some dialects are not understandable for someone who knows standard German. However, all German dialects belong to the dialect continuum of High German and Low German (Platt) languages. In the past (roughly till the end of the second world war) there was a dialect continuum of all the continental West Germanic languages because nearly any pair of neighbouring dialects were perfectly mutually intelligible.
The dialect continuum of the continental West Germanic languages is typically divided into Low Germanic languages and High Germanic languages.
Low Germanic / Low German
Low Germanic is defined as the varieties that were not affected by the High German consonant shift. They consist of two subgroups, Low Franconian and Low German. Low Franconian includes Dutch and Afrikaans, spoken primarily in the Netherlands, Belgium, Surinam and South Africa. It also used to be spoken in the Lower Rhine area of Germany (Cleves, Duisburg); Low German includes dialects spoken primarily in the German Lowlands and in the eastern Netherlands. The Low German varieties (spoken on German territory) are considered dialects of the High German language by some, but a separate language by others; the Low Franconian varieties are not considered a part of the German language, in fact the Dutch language (chief member of the Low Franconian group) is dated older than the High German language.
High Germanic / High German
High Germanic is divided into Central German and Upper German. Central German dialects include Ripuarian, Moselle Franconian, Rhine Franconian, Hessian, Thuringian and Upper Saxon. It is spoken in the southeastern Netherlands, eastern Belgium, Luxembourg, parts of France, and in Germany approximately between the River Main and the southern edge of the Lowlands. Modern Standard German is mostly based on Central German, but it should be noted that the usual German term for modern Standard German is Hochdeutsch, High German.
The Moselle Franconian varieties spoken in Luxembourg have been officially standardized and institutionalized and are therefore usually considered a separate language known as Luxembourgish.
Upper German dialects include Alemannic (for instance Swiss German), Swabian, East Franconian, and Austro-Bavarian. They are spoken in parts of the Alsace, southern Germany, Liechtenstein, Austria, and in the German-speaking parts of Switzerland and Italy.
The High German varieties spoken by Ashkenazi Jews (mostly in the former Soviet Union) have several unique features, and are usually considered as a separate language, Yiddish. It is the only Germanic language that does not use the Latin alphabet as its standard script.
The dialects of German which are or were primarily spoken in colonies or communities founded by German-speaking people resemble the dialects of the regions the founders came from. For example, Pennsylvania German resembles dialects of the Palatinate, and Hutterite German resembles dialects of Carinthia, while Venezuelan Alemán Coloniero is a Low Alemannic variant.
In Brazil the largest concentrations of German speakers (German Brazilians) are in Rio Grande do Sul, where Riograndenser Hunsrückisch was developed, especially in the areas of Santa Catarina, Paraná, and Espírito Santo.
Standard German
In German linguistics, only the traditional regional varieties are called dialects, not the different varieties of standard German.
Standard German has originated not as a traditional dialect of a specific region, but as a written language. However, there are places where the traditional regional dialects have been replaced by standard German (especially in major cities of Germany, and to some extent in Vienna).
Standard German differs regionally, especially between German-speaking countries, especially in vocabulary, but also in some instances of pronunciation and even grammar. This variation must not be confused with the variation of local dialects. Even though the regional varieties of standard German are to a certain degree influenced by the local dialects, they are very distinct. German is thus considered a pluricentric language.
In most regions, the speakers use a continuum of mixtures from more dialectical varieties to more standard varieties according to situation.
In the German-speaking parts of Switzerland, mixtures of dialect and standard are very seldom used, and the use of standard German is almost entirely restricted to the written language. Therefore, this situation has been called a medial diglossia. Standard German is rarely spoken, for instance when speaking with people who do not understand the Swiss German dialects at all, and it is expected to be used in school.
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