I'm from Bern so I speak Bärndütsch. Once I had a job where I had to go and have Workshops/classes in every Canton. In St. Gallen, Thurgau, Appenzell about 50% of the people couldn't understand and I had to switch to Hochdeutsch. In Zürich there were a lot of Germans living and working there who told me they have no problems understanding Schweizerdeutsch but they understand Züridütsch, not Bärndütsch😅. Many understand every dialect but many don't.
I am from the Berner Oberland and was working in Bern. Our Main office was in Zuerich. Well, I was talking to the Main office and the guy didn’t say anything for a long time. So, finally he asked me: vous parlez francais? Offensichtlich war mein Oberlaender dialect nicht grad einfach zu verstehen….. Schriftdeutsch hilft.
Well, Anthony, that is a new one for me. We learned French in School and I have always communicated in french with all my french customers, friends and acquaintances. . …
@@alyssia7239 so, you need to practice to really learn it. I was in the french part of Switzerland to practice my School french and I am in the US where I am practicing my School english, (which is somewhat different from the English we learned in School)
Depends where you are from... People from bilingual region do not necessarily speak english... What I have seen happen most often here is one person speaking german and the other one answering in french, because we kinda all understand french and german, we just can't necessarily speak the other language. That makes for bilingual conversations
I live in lucerne and go to geneva every weekend, and i absolutely cannot be bothered to learn french, and the people in geneva dont want to learn german, so i can confirm. Hey, at least it keeps the two cultures from mixing too much
Exactly, what I was thinking about the "Artikels". People can understand you anyway - maybe they can recognize you as a foreigner - but who cares? As a native, I know the "Artikels" make no sense at all and even I stumble form time to time - especially when I was younger - over some stupid differences between german and swiss german (die Giraffe - dr Giraff). Keep going learning German!
@@pedrobento03 True, but it would behoove you to learn Schweizerdeutsch because that is what will be spoken at government offices, the library, at school and even in court (believe me, I was there).
I’m an extremely weird case. I grew up in Canada with Swiss parents (I’m actually Swiss). I can speak decent Swiss-German and understand it perfectly. I rebelled against German School as a kid, so I never learned German. It freaks people out that I can speak passable Swiss-German but I can’t speak German. When I’m in Switzerland and I stumble with words people automatically switch to German which is worse for me. Even my relatives forget themselves and do it and then they switch back. I’m really good at a language that is only useful in central Switzerland.
its funny because in school during class we always speak german, sometimes if there is a special program (like workshops or smth like that) you know its gonna be chill if the person that leads the workshop asks if everyone understands swissgerman 😂
I studied German for years in University, even did a semester in Berlin - I just moved to Zurich and am having a TOUGH time understanding Swiss German lol!
@@jolutien0435 That could be because not all of them speak High German well and are shy. since i sometimes have to speak high german myself with swiss people ;-) so that they understand me i am used to high german
Most germans do have trouble understanding the Swiss but if you're from the south it's easier (especially when you're from the border region like me) bc the dialects are similar.
Es kommt drauf an manches Schwitzerdütsch( schreibt man das so?) kann man recht gut verstehen aber manchmal rafft man auch gar nichts , aber ich verstehe auch kein Schwäbisch...
You only need to learn English and French too?? I had to learn not only German, English and French in school but also Italian and even fxcking Latin...
Just one thing about the langage barrier. There are also biliingual ans trilingual regions in Switzerland. A french speaking person who comes from Fribourg/Freiburg will probably has a better level in german than someone who comes from Geneva, because Fribourg is a bilingual town. It's not like the four bilingual regions are nicely cut off each other.
@See you soon boi offical its only french but in reality you can have everithing in german(schools, official papers, road signs) so for me it is bilingual.
I find the Swiss people really amazing. They are a perfect example of a multilingual. I have a friend, who is Swiss, she can of course speak Swiss German, the high German, Perfect English, French, Italian (Perfectly), and could understand everything about Dutch. I mean, most of Swiss people can at least understand and speak 3 languages depending where they come from. It’s truly remarkable 🤩
I'm from switzerland as well. And because my Mom is from the philippines and my parents speak English, I grew up hearing and learning Swissgerman, German, English + a bit of Filipino (Tagalog). And then in elementary school I was being taught English (which was of course pretty easy for me) and French as well. Later on, in High School (or Gymnasium how it is called here) I chose Italian as my main subject (idk if one can call it like that) and Spanish as an additional language subject. So yeah it's really nice and I love to have had the opportunity to learn so many languages and being able to talk to so many people from so many places and countries.
No, I can assure you, most Swiss people can barely speak a secong langugae, except for english. Swissgerman speakers hate to learn french, and swissfrench speakers hate to learn german. We have to learn it in school, but I'd guess about 80% can't speak the language after that. Not even remotely. Which is why they talk in english with each other. Not to speak of italian, because that part almost always just gets forgotten by the others. 😅😂
@@killerpussy84 yeah that's actually pretty sad, I never understood all my classmates who hated french or italian. I've always loved all my language subjects..
I mean we have the opportunity to learn other languages but most people are just not interested in really learning and speaking another language, you know, well
@@killerpussy84 Really? This is something new I am hearing. I thought everyone knew the official languages. (at least the three) Thank you for letting me know about this. 😄
There are no official rules for Swiss German (because it‘s only a spoken language), but there are a lot of *patterns* . F. e. tenses: - only 1 past tense: present perfect simple - no future tense: present simple + when/time Etc. 😊 Greetings from Switzerland 🇨🇭
one of the big differences between german in switzerland and german in germany is that in switzerland we use so many french words instead of german ones: for example a bicycle is typically called a velo (french) here in switzerland. In germany it's Fahrrad. They're called Helvetismen if u are more interested in it. Swiss german on the other hand is the wild west.
people I Switzerland also mess with themselves because many cities have different Swiss German accents. and even for me, who lived his whole live in Switzerland, there are still accents that. are hard to understand for me
@@jurilamprecht3643 Es gelingt den wenigsten Ausländern die Schweizer-Dütsche Sprache wirklich korrekt sprechen zu können. Jeder echte Schweizer merkt es rasch einmal, dass es offensichtlich seine Muttersprache sein kann. - Selbst Deutsche aus Deutschland haben damit Mühe und so selbige es dennoch versuchen, so klingt das für uns Schweizer eher fürchterlich dämlich und schon fast lächerlich. - Aber keine Sorge, wir verstehen das sehr gut.
And further east it's called a Grumpra/Grundbira = Grundbirne = ground pear. Everyone seems to have looked at potatoes and had the same thought: "It's looks kinda like this fruit we have a lot of and it grows underground"
I live in the french speaking part of Switzerland (more precisely in Neuenburg), and all of the residents of the french speaking part has to learn german. I have studied it since 10 years, and I still hate it.
Well, I can assure you swiss germans feel the same about french. A terrible language to speak and to pronounce the words. The writing is made by Lucifer himself with all the silent letters and the total misspronouncing of the vowels. I mean my wife is from a french speaking african country and I chose to learn and speak their native language over french...
@@waynebrady1819 I'm from Vaud, my native language is French and it's really a pain in the ass. I struggle a lot with German but it's quite an easy language to speak
I can only imagine how frustrating the article thing must be, because there's no rhyme or reason to it, you just have to brute force learn them, so to speak.
in old German they did make sense: just like today in modern Italian these words had suffices from which it was easy to determine the article used in them. such features survive to this day in some spoken dialects and in a small selection of words.
Not really. It kinda clicks in you're head after some years spent with the language. Similar to slavik languages you just need to remember that words have genders, most of which make some sense. ...unlike English language where you need to remember not only the meaning of the world, but also it's spelling, which can be completely unnecessary complicated - that's frustrating
Cool Video. I really enjoyed watching it, even more because we live in the same town. Don't worry about the articles too much. We will understand you, even if you don't use them correcly... or just add a "li" as others have already mentioned and it turns neutral.
I can understand your frustration - German can be a very difficult language to learn. I went to Germany at age 17 from the States. However, I was always very curious about sound and meanings, written words (adverts, newspapers, magazines etc.) and just tried to figure them out from the context. At one point I shared an apartment with 2 German friends and one day at breakfast they said..."It is too difficult to speak in English - you have to learn German"... I cried!!! But it was the best favor they could have done for me - they spoke only German to me and within a month or two I could speak general conversational German. I also watched a lot of tv and read comic books (simple language constructions) and soap operas on tv are also very useful. It can be a difficult language but it's not "awful" - it has quite a lot of beauty in it when you get to know it better. Good luck!!
I would recommend to learn swiss german first and not make a very common mistake to learn "high german" first. It seems logic to learn "high german" instead of swiss german with the explanation in the video. However, i can tell you from experience with many people all over the world working in Switzerland that those who first started learning swiss german, were much quicker and more succesful in their approach to learn german. I guess there are a few reasons for that: for one, swiss german is less complicated and has less rules eg. times and therefore makes it easier to learn. Second, to learn german after swiss german is easier. The best examples are the swiss themselfes, where we have no problem understand german, but the germans have trouble understaning swiss german (not only single words, but the way the language is spoken). And third, it is much easier to find somebody to talk to if you speak the language that the actual people surrounding you are talking.
Herd öpfel is actually the french style directly translatet... herd = earth öpfel = apple thats why. its DER herdöpfel (der apfel) french : pomme de terre (apple of/from earth) the articles are actually more of a "feeling" thing you have to get, but mostly determined by the ending of the word.. female endings : -in / -heit / -schaft / -ei / -keit / -ung / -ion male -ig / -ling / -ich time/date and weather related things are mostly male(except die Wolke =the cloud) Lastly the MOST IMPORTANT in German : No rule withouts exception ! just too complicated :))
this is the best rendition of our language I have listened to ..... You really hit it just perfect. Schwyzer duetsch isch ae schwaery Sprach.... And my dialect is one of the hard one to understand...
😂😂. My husband (American) and I (Swiss) had quite the same discussion about the articles. And side note, we do understand eachothers dialects 😉 unless it's very specific words that are only locally used but this you have in every country and their dialects
After living in La France depuis 20 years...Accepte that...C’est Comme Ça...I started buying 2 baguettes because there was no problem avec deux baguettes
Linguistically the swiss german dialects are part of the alamannic dialects which used to be spoken until quite recently everwhere in the Southwest of Germany, in Alsace and in Western Austria and of course in nowadays Switzerland. In fact it is a mixture between middle high german and early new high german. These dialects are therefore older than standard German (new high German) which started to develop in the late 14-hundreds.
Swiss German is a dialect. In Ticino, like in Italy, we have many differents dialects. We speak Italian, but dialect too. A man from Milano, who speaks dialect, can't understand a man from Genova or Napoli.
You can‘t compare Italian to Swissgerman and say it’s a dialect tho- Swissgerman as a whole has again a lot of dialects which literally is why Swissgerman is a language.
@@AnaS-of8ri I think he's talking about the Lombard language (often referred to as dialect) which has several dialects and is quite different than standard Italian In Romandie we also have our own local language (Arpitan) closely related to French, but not mutually intelligible with it, and unfortunately it's been massacred. It's only spoken by a few thousand in the Valais. Still quite alive in Aosta, Italy tho and struggling in the parts of France where it's been spoken historically
Since you mentioned "Heidi": That's pretty special: In the Swiss German dialects, the name "Heidi" is neuter, despite it's a girl's name. It's " 's Heidi" (das Heidi) in Swiss German dialect, not "d' Heidi" (die Heidi). In the famous "Heidi"-novels of Johanna Spyri, it was "das Heidi", at least in the original version. I know a similar case in my parent's dialect (Bregenzerwald, Vorarlberg, Austria): The girl's name "Mikle" (short for "Maria Katharina") is also neuter. I know of girl of this name. She moved to Vienna. She got tired of explaining "das Mikle" to each new acquaintance, so she is called "die Mikle" in Vienna now and still "das Mikle" in her home country and by relatives.
I think in this particular case it is das heidi because she is ein mädchen which has das as an article. If we only knew Heidi in her grown up form we would call her die Heidi.
I've been learning german for over 10 years and still get the articles mixed up. This video really represents how I feel about German. Eager to learn but pretty much hopeless
It is very difficult for a non-Swiss to learn and understand Schwyzerdütsch. Strictly speaking, even the Germans can't really do that and are completely overtaxed. Besides, it even sounds rather embarrassing for us Swiss sometimes, such a foreigner tries to speak Schwyzerdütsch. Very few people manage to speak a Schwyzerdütsch dialect without an accent. As a Swiss I can even find out where one or the other of them comes from, i.e. where they originally grew up.
Great Channel and videos! Hope your success will increase ! You just understood what is painfull for Swiss french speaking part of the country to learn this awfull and difficult german ! We start ton learn it when we are 10 years old but it’s so frustrating to always majong mistakes ! Include the gender part which is also existing in french. For exemple the sun in french is male (le soleil) but female in german. Invert for the moon. But the worst are those cut-verbs with particules that you never know with witch verb it belongs... a nightmare ! So swiss-german citizen dislike the « clean-german » from germany so its hard when a Swiss french-speaker try to speak the german and that your swiss-german fellow answer in how dialect or better in french ( because They prefer french instead of german). So bit by bit the english become the 5th non-official language beetween swiss citizen. If you want a place to sleep to discover the Suisse Romande please contact me you’ll be welcome ! I will be your guide !
A comment on the “der” “Herdöpfel/potato”, the article changes because “Herdöpfel” is a form of “Erdapfel” which is a combination of the words “Erde” and “Apfel” so it means literally ‘apple from the ground’, however in the Swiss German and regular German the article for words consisting of two or more words will always address the last word in the combination. So it is “die Kartoffel” but “der Herdapfel/Erdapfel”, because it is “der Apfel” even tho it would be “die Erde”... side note: the word “Erdapfel” is an old German word, however it is these days only used in Switzerland as “Hardöpfel” or “Herdöpfel” or “(Erd)bolle”...
Austrians also use Erdäpfel, but in some part of the country it turns into 'Grumbirn' which is a combination of Grund=ground and Birne,which is pear.Since a pear is female in german, the 'Grumbirn' turns female. :-) Most people ,though, use Kartoffel which is male in Austria.
@@mick-berry5331 'Grumbrin' sounds so harsh, I like it! thanks for your answer, I like those small details within similar speaking countries! Greets from Switzerland :)
@@benotyourboss Grumbirn sollte es sein, von Birne... Es ist immer wieder erstaunlich,wieviele Dialekte sich auch in kleinen Ländern herausbilden. Ich habe das auch z.B.in Haiti gesehen.
@@mick-berry5331 Ah ja macht Sinn, hab da wohl etwas schnell gelesen :-) Definitiv, das glaube ich Ihnen gerne. Ich finde es einfach herrlich und edel sich damit auseinander zusetzen, weil sich gerade eben viele, vor allem jüngere Leute, nicht so damit beschäftigen. Als Beispiel zählen da bsp.weise Flurnamen und so.
hahaha that was hilarious! It is "die Schaltfläche", but it is "der Button" if you use the English word. Yes that's right. The German articles have also taken over the English language.
Hi, Germanspeaker here relocated to Switzerland. About your question why the article for "Kartoffel" in german is "die Kartoffel" is because of an old tradition. The farmers have the tradition to name their potato variety (eg. sweet potato, soft potato ..) by the name of their daughter. You can google all the German "Kartoffelsorte" and you will find potato variity such as Linda, Sieglinde and so on. Thats the reasion why in German it is DIE Kartoffel. I hope this answers your question.
I come from the Italian speaking part of Switzerland (Canton Ticino). During the middle school and high school years we learned French and German (Hochdeutsch). Romansh is not a language taught, at least in my region. Now I work in Italian and I have little to no contact with the other regions. I speak fluent French but with my Swiss German friends I only speak English 😂
Hello, thank you for your video. It is worth noting, that Swiss German (i.e Bernese Deutsch, Zürich Deutsch have their own grammar. A typical example of this matter is that the dialects only have one past, that is, for example present perfekt. Also, Berndeutsch for example has also a few aspects in common with the English language, for example "Tue nid so dumm! " which means almost literally do not behave so stupid if freely translated. It is to say that many folks find actually Swiss German easier to learn instead of High German. Berndeutsch shares also many french words for ex. merci, adieu etc. Also, Walliserdeutsch is one of the oldest Swiss German dialects. It is true that, depending of the location where you are coming from, you will or will not understand Walliserdeutsch. We Bernese and the people from Wallis understand each other without problems, if one is willing to so. In Berndeutsch and Züri-Deutsch there are even dictionaries and grammar books available. Greetings from Bern, Beato
I can unterstand your troubel with the articels in german. I am swiss and i love your video. Specally the part with the potato. 👍 I have also a problem in english. Do you have any rules for the pronaunciation of your vocals? I don‘t get it all theese years. 😅
yo i feel you dude 😂i moved to switzerland when i was 10 years old, first i focused on learning german, then when i mastered it i began to speak in like a mix of swiss german and german until after like 6 years i finally began speaking swiss german fluently
Ahahah! Your videos are amazing. I was born and grew up in Ticino, so I speak italian, swiss-italian (dialekt!), german and understand swiss-german, french and english. To be a polyglot it's good! :-D
It's so funny to see this as a swiss person😂but when we get in school it's not like german is a completly foreign language, because we hear german all the time in the TV for example.
I disagree. We learn it from such a young age and we have it so much around that we are thought to not count it as a foreogn language but really I think they all just fuck with us cause I can definitely remember having to study standard German. Heck even when I went to business school my classmates struggled with German class to learn the grammar rules. It's a pitty that swiss German isn't recognized aas its own language so we don't get credit for having to learn standard German but just take it a s a given while the difference is very compareable with how different Portuguese is from Spanish.
6:23 haha well yeah, it's because "Apfel" (Apple) is written with "der". And "Erdapfel" just means "Earth Apple" if you will. So an apple that grows beneath the ground/earth. It's similar to french "pommes de terre" which means the same. So maybe there's a french influence here, idk. But well....I don't know either who came up with the articles. Sometimes they're important because the meaning of the words can change depending on which article you use. I can't think about examples right now where the words are written exactly the same, except for one, but I can give some examples of phonetically similar words: • Der Wal (The Whale) - Die Wahl (The Vote/Choice/Election/...) • Das Rad (The Wheel) - Der Rat (The Advice/Council) • Die Leiter (The Ladder) - Der Leiter (The Conductor) But at least the article for plural is always the same (Die Leitern, Die Räder, Die Wale, Die Wahlen,....) But sadly it gets problematic again when you are confronted with the cases: • Der Mann, aber... Das Haus *des* Mann*es* • Der Mann, aber... Das Auto gehört *dem* Mann • Der Mann, aber... Ich rede über *den* Mann It's tough 🥲 but most of the time people will understand you, even if you use the wrong articles. Just give it a try when learning. Germans are mostly very polite in that regard
Actually, there is Swiss Standard German, German Standard German and Austrian Standard German. But these varieties of Standard German ("Dachsprache") are very similar to each other. Just a few different details in vocabulary and grammar, hardly noticeable. Austrians and Germans understand news programs of Switzerland (in Swiss Standard German) without big effort, though the speech melody is different. Or newspapers: Mostly, you won't recognize the difference between Swiss, German or Austrian newspapers from short articles. The big difference between spoken and written language doesn't exist only in Switzerland. Also in Germany, people from the north can have problems to understand people from the south (e.g. Bavaria). People from Vienna (Austria) will understand people from the region Bregenzerwald (Vorarlberg, Austria) only with an effort. In all German speaking countries, there are different regional dialects, which can differ strongly from the Standard German of the country and would hamper proper transregional communication. My home country is Vorarlberg (west of Austria). The dialects of Vorarlberg belong to the Alemannic dialects, like the dialects of Swiss German. The major part of Austria speaks Bavarian dialects, like the major part of Bavaria does.
Use of dialects in Germany is not that wide spread though, you won't find cities or towns like in Switzerland where all locals speak in their dialect, the dialect in Germany is mostly still in use in smaller villages but experts are certain that they will die out in the near future. Btw, no hard feelings that we didn't let you join after WW1 even though you guys voted for it, we can still be friends though.
I think the most noticable difference in the written language are monday, tuesday etc. These are different from German to Austria and I guess also Switzerland. Edit: I meant the months, not the days🤦🏼♀️
As an Italian living in Milan nor far from Switzerland, I don't see any difference beteween Swiss Italian and standard Italian. The only one is that in Switzerland they use "Azione" when talking about discounts or season sales. Azione means something totally different in Italian.
Swiss high german is the common and official fallback. Should be noted that unlike the video is suggesting swiss high german (the German learned in schools he is refering to) is not the same as high german from Germany ... neither spoken nor written. But the similarities are so great that people from both nations can understand each other with a little bit of effort.
I agree, with a Swiss German dialect as my mother tongue, I learned it pretty naturally in school but also while reading books and watching TV, where 90% was in Standard German. I even remember playing Superhero as a kid and everyone switching to Standard German as a way to differentiate our “secret identities”. But of course while reading and writing Standard German is second nature to me, I don’t have the same fluidity in Standard German, because I use Swiss German in my daily live. It’s also very hard to speak it without any Swiss accent. Therefore I sometimes even prefer speaking English or French to Standard German.
They don't accept the euro in Switzerland by the way. I was kind of surprised when I went down to the local convenience store and tried to pay with Euro currency. Other than that, it's a beautiful country. The homes look just like the homes you'd see in the United States.
I don't think the articles were just made up some day. I think it has smth to do with the ending of words. I didn't learn this as I'm a native German speaker, but I think ppl who learn German learn how to determine the gender by the ending of words.
No we don't. I referred to a word by the wrong gender my whole life until only a few weeks ago I learned it was wrong. I'm German. Lived here my whole life. Have a great education. I still got it wrong. I'm 27 and the word was "Diabetes".
@@bearo8 Haha I feel called out because i just realized I'm not sure what the correct article is for diabetes? (I am German too) I'm guessing das Diabetes
I cry when learn Germany then i try to learn Korean. It's same, so difficult. Then i try to learn English and Japanese but i really want to live in Swiss 😂
I learned German in the uni, but I'm a native Spanish speaker, in Spanish we have only two genders, so when I was first introduce for the third German gender it was (and is) difficult to me to remember the articles. For worse, the gender in Spanish sometimes match in German but sometimes no, and it is not easy to rethink the genders of the thinks that you learn as a child (fortunately in Spanish the gender is more or less regular).
The not understanding part is a bit of an exaggeration. Ever since the radio most Swissgerman people understand each other. We only have problem with the most extreme dialects and if they are mumbled. Just recently I asked a guy from North Germany. Even he could mostly understand Swissgerman if it is spoken clearly _(no he had no contact with Swissgerman beforehand, but I don't know if he is the norm or the exception)._ Officially German and Swissgerman are the same language. There are differences, but it is only a matter of getting used to it, as far as I can tell. Also some dialects use words which others don't use. That also makes some difficulties.
As stated, a lot of languages have gendered nouns. From my knowledge of at least 4 (2 romance, 1 slavic & german) languages, there seems to be a pretty good overlap as far as what nouns one language considers feminine vs. masculine, slightly less perfect overlap for neuters. Is there an academic study on the subject?
I think even harder than the articles are the Plural forms. No rules and about 9 ways to put a word in plural: -e, -n, -en, -er, -s, Umlaut and Umlaut combined with -e or -er... or the word just doesn't change....
I am not a germanist linguist, but i think the articles follow some kind of logic. From what i observed it has to do with how the word feels to the speaker. And this feeling, i think, depends on the ending of a noun. Nouns with the same endings have the same gender. But there are also foreign and loan words which are not of german origin, then it even comes to discussions among germans on "how the word feels". i believe once you watch out for the endings you will get the right feeling of a word :)
3:50 "Why don't they just scrap the swiss german and just speak German?" There is a beautiful English phrase - respect, and a saying, "Don't interfere!"
Funny video, but it shows also why most Americans struggle to learn a different language. My advice: listen to your Swiss wife and accept the German language as it is: accept that there are different articles, try to learn them instead of putting your energy into arguing why it is that way. For Europeans and specially for Swiss people, it’s quite normal to learn another language, although it’s also hard for us. But it’s just something, that we are use to do, since we went to school. First we have to learn the proper German and then also French and English. In fact, you can learn a language like you learn how to read, write or count. Americans often didn’t have the opportunity to learn another language at school, or if so, it was not really meant for practical use. So Americans living in Europe, often give up after a short while to learn the local language, because most natives speak English anyway. But after a while, you will realize that there will always be a gap that separates you from the local people and that you are excluded from social life in many ways. Don’t give up and good luck!
A tip for Americans or any person who isn't from Europe: don't even bother to say "omg you guys🤪🤪 why don't yall just speak one language so you can understand each other" this is not like the Americas where primarily there is only 3 languages spoken (Spanish, English and Portuguese) Switzerland/Europe has years of culture, traditions, LANGUAGES so why would a person or the whole country stop using the language they grew up with
If the Kartoffel is an Erdöpfel or Herdäpfel, it's no longer feminine. The whole secret is: There is (nearly) no connection between biological and grammatical gender. A very, very rough rule of thumb is to look at the ending of a word - it it ends with -chen it's mostly neutral, if it ends with an e its more often female than not, for example. But that does not help with -el endings. In the end, however, it's all about etymology and about what article they thought to be appropriate (or sounding about right) _before_ they invented the rules for German language back in the 19th century. Before that it was much like in Switzerland today: every region maintained its own rules. Other german words for the Kartoffel (orig. Tartuffel from ital. tartuficolo, which refers to il tartufo - dem Trüffel / truffle) are Erdapfel (like the Züri word, but without the umlauts: The apple which grows in the earth) or Grumbirre / Krumbir (the pear which grows in the soil). The word potato itself meant originally only the sweet potato (batata, ital. patate douce, dt. Batate), and the third tuber imported from the Americas to Europe is "die Topinambur" (girasole, sometimes also referred to as Rosskartoffel = horse potato). It's all not very logical - but neither are many English quirks.
I really wish people would stop teaching this stuff as if the grammatical genders have anything to do with biological genders. I'm all for renaming the whole concept, because then nobody would even get the idea of thinking about biological gender when trying to figure out what grammatical gender to use.
'Artikels' are somehow by the ending of the word determined, it's kinda hard to explain but after a lot of time you get a feeling what grammatical gender a word has. (And of course there are special cases to make it more complicated) e.g. most words that end with e are feminine :]
As a Swiss i have to say he is very accurate😂 the only thing i dont agree is the Part where he says that we cant understand each other.
o.K. Have you ever tried to listen when ein Walliser und ein Zuercher versuchen einander zu verstehen?
I'm from Bern so I speak Bärndütsch. Once I had a job where I had to go and have Workshops/classes in every Canton. In St. Gallen, Thurgau, Appenzell about 50% of the people couldn't understand and I had to switch to Hochdeutsch. In Zürich there were a lot of Germans living and working there who told me they have no problems understanding Schweizerdeutsch but they understand Züridütsch, not Bärndütsch😅.
Many understand every dialect but many don't.
@@DramaQueenMalena weil sie zu faul sind, ganz einfach...
@@rogerschmid6860 Es sind nicht alle gleich sprachbegabt, denke ich.
I am from the Berner Oberland and was working in Bern. Our Main office was in Zuerich. Well, I was talking to the Main office and the guy didn’t
say anything for a long time. So, finally he asked me: vous parlez francais? Offensichtlich war mein Oberlaender dialect nicht grad einfach zu verstehen….. Schriftdeutsch hilft.
The odd thing is that the Swiss French and Swiss Germans communicate together in English.
Well i never managed to speak German, even with 8 years of German in school soooo 😅😅
Well, Anthony, that is a new one for me. We learned French in School and I have always communicated in french with all my french customers, friends and acquaintances. . …
@@alyssia7239 so, you need to practice to really learn it. I was in the french part of Switzerland to practice my School french and I am in the US where I am practicing my School english, (which is somewhat different from the English we learned in School)
Depends where you are from... People from bilingual region do not necessarily speak english... What I have seen happen most often here is one person speaking german and the other one answering in french, because we kinda all understand french and german, we just can't necessarily speak the other language. That makes for bilingual conversations
I live in lucerne and go to geneva every weekend, and i absolutely cannot be bothered to learn french, and the people in geneva dont want to learn german, so i can confirm.
Hey, at least it keeps the two cultures from mixing too much
Don't worry about messing up the "Artikels". Everyone here is going to admire you for taking the challenge speaking German. Enjoy.e
Yes! I have found that to be true. People don't seem to care if the article is correct when I try to speak.
@@AmericameetsSwitzerland In Solothurn its "härdöpfel" so basiccaly a ground apple.
Exactly, what I was thinking about the "Artikels". People can understand you anyway - maybe they can recognize you as a foreigner - but who cares? As a native, I know the "Artikels" make no sense at all and even I stumble form time to time - especially when I was younger - over some stupid differences between german and swiss german (die Giraffe - dr Giraff). Keep going learning German!
@@m.m.4718 yeah, as a foreigner in switzerland i've learned that it's much easier to just be proud of being different instead of trying to fit in
Agreed. I have been here for 20 years and still have a problem with the Artiklen... screws up the entire conversation.
People definitely do write in Swiss German, especially on social media, etc.
yeah but everything formal is in german, swiss german isnt an official language
@@pedrobento03 True, but it would behoove you to learn Schweizerdeutsch because that is what will be spoken at government offices, the library, at school and even in court (believe me, I was there).
@@swissladydriver8980 yea i know i live in switzerland lol
@@pedrobento03 Then you should know that what's official is not necessarily what's important in day to day life.
@@swissladydriver8980 i dont remember saying that tho?
I’m an extremely weird case. I grew up in Canada with Swiss parents (I’m actually Swiss). I can speak decent Swiss-German and understand it perfectly. I rebelled against German School as a kid, so I never learned German. It freaks people out that I can speak passable Swiss-German but I can’t speak German.
When I’m in Switzerland and I stumble with words people automatically switch to German which is worse for me. Even my relatives forget themselves and do it and then they switch back.
I’m really good at a language that is only useful in central Switzerland.
Then you can't read German?
@@MarsOhr not really. I can fumble through it, but it is not easy.
@@thomasw4709 You miss a lot. Live is more interesting if you speak a foreign language and people treat you differently.
@@christofabt8958 he speaks another language though lmao
You're a funny weird case 😅😂
Really funny as a swiss person 😂👍🏻👍🏻 very well explained
Thank you. I appreciate that.
Jede schwiizer wo da uf youtube vorgschlage becho hett hett sich denkt haha yeah lueged mer mol ob er s im griff hett 😂
@@aliam7546 ganz genau haha
its funny because in school during class we always speak german, sometimes if there is a special program (like workshops or smth like that) you know its gonna be chill if the person that leads the workshop asks if everyone understands swissgerman 😂
I studied German for years in University, even did a semester in Berlin - I just moved to Zurich and am having a TOUGH time understanding Swiss German lol!
I'm a german native speaker and I dont understand a word they're saying, so much for that. I thinks it's like if americans went to rural scotland
when i notice that someone doesn't understand the dialect, i switch straight to high german. Actually everyone does it that way
@@Mage_co Yes I am also Swiss and do the Same but, there are Stil a lot of People in Switzerland who just Continue to speak in the Dialekt
@@jolutien0435 That could be because not all of them speak High German well and are shy. since i sometimes have to speak high german myself with swiss people ;-) so that they understand me i am used to high german
@@Mage_co No everyone learns high german in school
Most germans do have trouble understanding the Swiss but if you're from the south it's easier (especially when you're from the border region like me) bc the dialects are similar.
Andreas, you say "gsi" instead of the German word "gewesen".
@@christofabt8958 gewesen ist verwesen
@@christofabt8958 gsi isch au deutsch. wie die badenser, als schwob weiss mer des.
@@christofabt8958 Des sagt man im Schwäbischen au😊
Es kommt drauf an manches Schwitzerdütsch( schreibt man das so?) kann man recht gut verstehen aber manchmal rafft man auch gar nichts , aber ich verstehe auch kein Schwäbisch...
dude what u mean we need to learn 1 language?!?!?😂 we need to learn english and french too☠
😂 I know. I feel terrible for you. Haha
My sister had to learn German, English AND Italian
You only need to learn English and French too?? I had to learn not only German, English and French in school but also Italian and even fxcking Latin...
@@swissskillsp8933 haha same It truly is pain
@@gianluscher1159 I feel too😫😆 at school I learn English , Japanese, sometimes Chinese, and still learning Balinese language
Just one thing about the langage barrier. There are also biliingual ans trilingual regions in Switzerland. A french speaking person who comes from Fribourg/Freiburg will probably has a better level in german than someone who comes from Geneva, because Fribourg is a bilingual town. It's not like the four bilingual regions are nicely cut off each other.
As someone coming from Geneva, I agree
@See you soon boi fribourg is also bilingual / 80%french 20%german
Well the roestigraben cuts in the middle of the city of Fribourg, so the town is technically and practically bilingual
@See you soon boi offical its only french but in reality you can have everithing in german(schools, official papers, road signs) so for me it is bilingual.
@@Lolo-tz8sz Been there you do all in french tbh and i'm from Québec, they understand pretty well my accent lol
I find the Swiss people really amazing. They are a perfect example of a multilingual. I have a friend, who is Swiss, she can of course speak Swiss German, the high German, Perfect English, French, Italian (Perfectly), and could understand everything about Dutch. I mean, most of Swiss people can at least understand and speak 3 languages depending where they come from. It’s truly remarkable 🤩
I'm from switzerland as well. And because my Mom is from the philippines and my parents speak English, I grew up hearing and learning Swissgerman, German, English + a bit of Filipino (Tagalog). And then in elementary school I was being taught English (which was of course pretty easy for me) and French as well. Later on, in High School (or Gymnasium how it is called here) I chose Italian as my main subject (idk if one can call it like that) and Spanish as an additional language subject. So yeah it's really nice and I love to have had the opportunity to learn so many languages and being able to talk to so many people from so many places and countries.
No, I can assure you, most Swiss people can barely speak a secong langugae, except for english.
Swissgerman speakers hate to learn french, and swissfrench speakers hate to learn german. We have to learn it in school, but I'd guess about 80% can't speak the language after that. Not even remotely. Which is why they talk in english with each other.
Not to speak of italian, because that part almost always just gets forgotten by the others. 😅😂
@@killerpussy84 yeah that's actually pretty sad, I never understood all my classmates who hated french or italian. I've always loved all my language subjects..
I mean we have the opportunity to learn other languages but most people are just not interested in really learning and speaking another language, you know, well
@@killerpussy84 Really? This is something new I am hearing. I thought everyone knew the official languages. (at least the three) Thank you for letting me know about this. 😄
There are no official rules for Swiss German (because it‘s only a spoken language), but there are a lot of *patterns* . F. e. tenses:
- only 1 past tense: present perfect simple
- no future tense: present simple + when/time
Etc. 😊 Greetings from Switzerland 🇨🇭
Agree. I don't know what he said there were no rules if he doesn't even know how to speak the language.
@@swissladydriver8980 Many swiss people believe that we have no rules because spellingbis basically anarchy but we have fix grammar rules
@@ninoslanguagejourney6002 yes.
This is the good thing about the German language, you may butcher it, nobody cares. Insider trick: use the diminutive -li and a word turns neutral.
that's true, and it must also be why "mädchen" (little girl) is neuter instead of female, it uses a diminutive.
one of the big differences between german in switzerland and german in germany is that in switzerland we use so many french words instead of german ones: for example a bicycle is typically called a velo (french) here in switzerland. In germany it's Fahrrad. They're called Helvetismen if u are more interested in it. Swiss german on the other hand is the wild west.
It's like a secret language only there to mess with people from germany
😂 You are probably right.
people I Switzerland also mess with themselves because many cities have different Swiss German accents. and even for me, who lived his whole live in Switzerland, there are still accents that. are hard to understand for me
@@nonexistentcomedychannel5136 It's a tradeoff.
@@nonexistentcomedychannel5136 also ich cha zwar alles versta aber nd nahmache
@@jurilamprecht3643 Es gelingt den wenigsten Ausländern die Schweizer-Dütsche Sprache wirklich korrekt sprechen zu können. Jeder echte Schweizer merkt es rasch einmal, dass es offensichtlich seine Muttersprache sein kann. - Selbst Deutsche aus Deutschland haben damit Mühe und so selbige es dennoch versuchen, so klingt das für uns Schweizer eher fürchterlich dämlich und schon fast lächerlich. - Aber keine Sorge, wir verstehen das sehr gut.
In Switzerland it‘s a boy potato because Härdöpfel = Erdapfel (potato of soil) -> *der* Apfel (apple). 🤓
Erdapfel = pomme de terre... It comes from French.
And further east it's called a Grumpra/Grundbira = Grundbirne = ground pear. Everyone seems to have looked at potatoes and had the same thought: "It's looks kinda like this fruit we have a lot of and it grows underground"
As a child I always thought of it as a "Herdöpfel" stove apple because unlike apples you cook potatos
@@eliaelirko9849 Mee too! 😄😅
Dutch: aardappel 😎
I live in the french speaking part of Switzerland (more precisely in Neuenburg), and all of the residents of the french speaking part has to learn german.
I have studied it since 10 years, and I still hate it.
Thank you for the words of encouragement.
America meets Switzerland 😂😂😂
Well, I can assure you swiss germans feel the same about french. A terrible language to speak and to pronounce the words. The writing is made by Lucifer himself with all the silent letters and the total misspronouncing of the vowels. I mean my wife is from a french speaking african country and I chose to learn and speak their native language over french...
@@waynebrady1819 I'm from Vaud, my native language is French and it's really a pain in the ass. I struggle a lot with German but it's quite an easy language to speak
@Bengal PG3D sad taht teh parst from belgium whos peak neherlandish and german has to lean french
I can only imagine how frustrating the article thing must be, because there's no rhyme or reason to it, you just have to brute force learn them, so to speak.
in old German they did make sense: just like today in modern Italian these words had suffices from which it was easy to determine the article used in them. such features survive to this day in some spoken dialects and in a small selection of words.
Not really. It kinda clicks in you're head after some years spent with the language. Similar to slavik languages you just need to remember that words have genders, most of which make some sense.
...unlike English language where you need to remember not only the meaning of the world, but also it's spelling, which can be completely unnecessary complicated - that's frustrating
Your video is very funny and well written! Go on! Good luck!
Cool Video. I really enjoyed watching it, even more because we live in the same town. Don't worry about the articles too much. We will understand you, even if you don't use them correcly... or just add a "li" as others have already mentioned and it turns neutral.
I'm so happy to have Swiss German as my first language, it's much easier learning other languages 😂
I can understand your frustration - German can be a very difficult language to learn. I went to Germany at age 17 from the States. However, I was always very curious about sound and meanings, written words (adverts, newspapers, magazines etc.) and just tried to figure them out from the context. At one point I shared an apartment with 2 German friends and one day at breakfast they said..."It is too difficult to speak in English - you have to learn German"... I cried!!! But it was the best favor they could have done for me - they spoke only German to me and within a month or two I could speak general conversational German. I also watched a lot of tv and read comic books (simple language constructions) and soap operas on tv are also very useful. It can be a difficult language but it's not "awful" - it has quite a lot of beauty in it when you get to know it better. Good luck!!
I would recommend to learn swiss german first and not make a very common mistake to learn "high german" first. It seems logic to learn "high german" instead of swiss german with the explanation in the video. However, i can tell you from experience with many people all over the world working in Switzerland that those who first started learning swiss german, were much quicker and more succesful in their approach to learn german. I guess there are a few reasons for that: for one, swiss german is less complicated and has less rules eg. times and therefore makes it easier to learn. Second, to learn german after swiss german is easier. The best examples are the swiss themselfes, where we have no problem understand german, but the germans have trouble understaning swiss german (not only single words, but the way the language is spoken). And third, it is much easier to find somebody to talk to if you speak the language that the actual people surrounding you are talking.
Herd öpfel is actually the french style directly translatet... herd = earth öpfel = apple thats why. its DER herdöpfel (der apfel)
french : pomme de terre (apple of/from earth)
the articles are actually more of a "feeling" thing you have to get, but mostly determined by the ending of the word..
female endings : -in / -heit / -schaft / -ei / -keit / -ung / -ion
male -ig / -ling / -ich
time/date and weather related things are mostly male(except die Wolke =the cloud)
Lastly the MOST IMPORTANT in German : No rule withouts exception !
just too complicated :))
even as Belgian, i think life is too short to learn German! :)
this is the best rendition of our language I have listened to ..... You really hit it just perfect. Schwyzer duetsch isch ae schwaery Sprach.... And my dialect is one of the hard one to understand...
Thanks for talking me out of trying to learn Swiss.
Its the best german learn it pls
😂😂. My husband (American) and I (Swiss) had quite the same discussion about the articles.
And side note, we do understand eachothers dialects 😉 unless it's very specific words that are only locally used but this you have in every country and their dialects
People from Zermatt will understand all other Swiss Germans ... but not always the other way around
After living in La France depuis 20 years...Accepte that...C’est Comme Ça...I started buying 2 baguettes because there was no problem avec deux baguettes
Das gut. Fiel gluck mit dem project! Im sure the spelling is wrong but good luck!
Der Apfel [ fiel] vom Baum und [ viele ] Äpfel liegen am Boden.
The apple [ fell ] from the tree and [ many ] apples lay on the ground
Sehr gut! Du kannst besser deutsch als ich.
Very well explained. And funny! Thank you!
Linguistically the swiss german dialects are part of the alamannic dialects which used to be spoken until quite recently everwhere in the Southwest of Germany, in Alsace and in Western Austria and of course in nowadays Switzerland. In fact it is a mixture between middle high german and early new high german. These dialects are therefore older than standard German (new high German) which started to develop in the late 14-hundreds.
this is the funniest thing 😂 im so glad i found this
Thank you for the explanation, very interesting!
Swiss German is a dialect. In Ticino, like in Italy, we have many differents dialects. We speak Italian, but dialect too. A man from Milano, who speaks dialect, can't understand a man from Genova or Napoli.
You can‘t compare Italian to Swissgerman and say it’s a dialect tho- Swissgerman as a whole has again a lot of dialects which literally is why Swissgerman is a language.
@@AnaS-of8ri I think he's talking about the Lombard language (often referred to as dialect) which has several dialects and is quite different than standard Italian
In Romandie we also have our own local language (Arpitan) closely related to French, but not mutually intelligible with it, and unfortunately it's been massacred. It's only spoken by a few thousand in the Valais. Still quite alive in Aosta, Italy tho and struggling in the parts of France where it's been spoken historically
@@darkkestrel1 thanks for clarifying!
Your explanation is very exact. Greetings from Basel
Since you mentioned "Heidi": That's pretty special: In the Swiss German dialects, the name "Heidi" is neuter, despite it's a girl's name. It's " 's Heidi" (das Heidi) in Swiss German dialect, not "d' Heidi" (die Heidi).
In the famous "Heidi"-novels of Johanna Spyri, it was "das Heidi", at least in the original version.
I know a similar case in my parent's dialect (Bregenzerwald, Vorarlberg, Austria): The girl's name "Mikle" (short for "Maria Katharina") is also neuter. I know of girl of this name. She moved to Vienna. She got tired of explaining "das Mikle" to each new acquaintance, so she is called "die Mikle" in Vienna now and still "das Mikle" in her home country and by relatives.
hends ned früener oft de Meitli "s" gseit?
@@Someone-wh8hi s'Meitli = Einzahl , d'Meitli = Mehrzahl
I think in this particular case it is das heidi because she is ein mädchen which has das as an article. If we only knew Heidi in her grown up form we would call her die Heidi.
I've been learning german for over 10 years and still get the articles mixed up. This video really represents how I feel about German. Eager to learn but pretty much hopeless
It is very difficult for a non-Swiss to learn and understand Schwyzerdütsch. Strictly speaking, even the Germans can't really do that and are completely overtaxed. Besides, it even sounds rather embarrassing for us Swiss sometimes, such a foreigner tries to speak Schwyzerdütsch. Very few people manage to speak a Schwyzerdütsch dialect without an accent. As a Swiss I can even find out where one or the other of them comes from, i.e. where they originally grew up.
As a german I can say: I love my language! I don't think it's awful. And I love swiss german and english too! 😁
its soo funny to see your sights of my language 😂😂😂 and you are right with „there are no rules“
its all about the melody 👌
Great Channel and videos! Hope your success will increase ! You just understood what is painfull for Swiss french speaking part of the country to learn this awfull and difficult german ! We start ton learn it when we are 10 years old but it’s so frustrating to always majong mistakes ! Include the gender part which is also existing in french. For exemple the sun in french is male (le soleil) but female in german. Invert for the moon. But the worst are those cut-verbs with particules that you never know with witch verb it belongs... a nightmare ! So swiss-german citizen dislike the « clean-german » from germany so its hard when a Swiss french-speaker try to speak the german and that your swiss-german fellow answer in how dialect or better in french ( because They prefer french instead of german). So bit by bit the english become the 5th non-official language beetween swiss citizen. If you want a place to sleep to discover the Suisse Romande please contact me you’ll be welcome ! I will be your guide !
I really like the research and effort you put together in this video.
I also like to be heard as a Swiss, we're kinda special.
A comment on the “der” “Herdöpfel/potato”, the article changes because “Herdöpfel” is a form of “Erdapfel” which is a combination of the words “Erde” and “Apfel” so it means literally ‘apple from the ground’, however in the Swiss German and regular German the article for words consisting of two or more words will always address the last word in the combination. So it is “die Kartoffel” but “der Herdapfel/Erdapfel”, because it is “der Apfel” even tho it would be “die Erde”... side note: the word “Erdapfel” is an old German word, however it is these days only used in Switzerland as “Hardöpfel” or “Herdöpfel” or “(Erd)bolle”...
Austrians also use Erdäpfel, but in some part of the country it turns into 'Grumbirn' which is a combination of Grund=ground and Birne,which is pear.Since a pear is female in german, the 'Grumbirn' turns female. :-)
Most people ,though, use Kartoffel which is male in Austria.
@@mick-berry5331 'Grumbrin' sounds so harsh, I like it! thanks for your answer, I like those small details within similar speaking countries! Greets from Switzerland :)
@@benotyourboss Grumbirn sollte es sein, von Birne... Es ist immer wieder erstaunlich,wieviele Dialekte sich auch in kleinen Ländern herausbilden. Ich habe das auch z.B.in Haiti gesehen.
@@mick-berry5331 Ah ja macht Sinn, hab da wohl etwas schnell gelesen :-)
Definitiv, das glaube ich Ihnen gerne. Ich finde es einfach herrlich und edel sich damit auseinander zusetzen, weil sich gerade eben viele, vor allem jüngere Leute, nicht so damit beschäftigen. Als Beispiel zählen da bsp.weise Flurnamen und so.
In Fribourg a potato is a "Häppere" xD
😳 I've spent a year trying to learn German. Pretty much just learned how to say potato many different ways.
German,French,Italian, English,Roman (depends on where you are in the country.
hahaha that was hilarious! It is "die Schaltfläche", but it is "der Button" if you use the English word. Yes that's right. The German articles have also taken over the English language.
Hi, Germanspeaker here relocated to Switzerland. About your question why the article for "Kartoffel" in german is "die Kartoffel" is because of an old tradition. The farmers have the tradition to name their potato variety (eg. sweet potato, soft potato ..) by the name of their daughter. You can google all the German "Kartoffelsorte" and you will find potato variity such as Linda, Sieglinde and so on. Thats the reasion why in German it is DIE Kartoffel. I hope this answers your question.
Him: this is a kartoffel🥔
**Meanwhile in Denmark** That is a kartoffel😂🥔
I come from the Italian speaking part of Switzerland (Canton Ticino). During the middle school and high school years we learned French and German (Hochdeutsch). Romansh is not a language taught, at least in my region. Now I work in Italian and I have little to no contact with the other regions. I speak fluent French but with my Swiss German friends I only speak English 😂
zum Glück ist englisch und Deutsch verwandt. Bald kannst du es schaffen!
Hello, thank you for your video. It is worth noting, that Swiss German (i.e Bernese Deutsch, Zürich Deutsch have their own grammar. A typical example of this matter is that the dialects only have one past, that is, for example present perfekt. Also, Berndeutsch for example has also a few aspects in common with the English language, for example "Tue nid so dumm! " which means almost literally do not behave so stupid if freely translated. It is to say that many folks find actually Swiss German easier to learn instead of High German. Berndeutsch shares also many french words for ex. merci, adieu etc. Also, Walliserdeutsch is one of the oldest Swiss German dialects. It is true that, depending of the location where you are coming from, you will or will not understand Walliserdeutsch. We Bernese and the people from Wallis understand each other without problems, if one is willing to so. In Berndeutsch and Züri-Deutsch there are even dictionaries and grammar books available. Greetings from Bern, Beato
I can unterstand your troubel with the articels in german. I am swiss and i love your video. Specally the part with the potato. 👍
I have also a problem in english. Do you have any rules for the pronaunciation of your vocals? I don‘t get it all theese years. 😅
short answer: YES
cool video and you seem like a great guy. greetings from a fellow swiss ;)
yo i feel you dude 😂i moved to switzerland when i was 10 years old, first i focused on learning german, then when i mastered it i began to speak in like a mix of swiss german and german until after like 6 years i finally began speaking swiss german fluently
Ahahah! Your videos are amazing. I was born and grew up in Ticino, so I speak italian, swiss-italian (dialekt!), german and understand swiss-german, french and english. To be a polyglot it's good! :-D
Wow, that’s amazing!
Thank you for watching!
This video is spot on! Our German teacher gave us the Awful German language book when we first started lessons. 🤣
Very funny, happy you came to Switzerland 😁 Greetings from Basel
Pro-Tip: Make everything cute and small and you'll end up everytime with "das" (i.e. das Härdöpfeli, Das Druckerli, Das Fläschli)
It's so funny to see this as a swiss person😂but when we get in school it's not like german is a completly foreign language, because we hear german all the time in the TV for example.
I disagree. We learn it from such a young age and we have it so much around that we are thought to not count it as a foreogn language but really I think they all just fuck with us cause I can definitely remember having to study standard German. Heck even when I went to business school my classmates struggled with German class to learn the grammar rules. It's a pitty that swiss German isn't recognized aas its own language so we don't get credit for having to learn standard German but just take it a s a given while the difference is very compareable with how different Portuguese is from Spanish.
6:23 haha well yeah, it's because "Apfel" (Apple) is written with "der". And "Erdapfel" just means "Earth Apple" if you will. So an apple that grows beneath the ground/earth. It's similar to french "pommes de terre" which means the same. So maybe there's a french influence here, idk. But well....I don't know either who came up with the articles. Sometimes they're important because the meaning of the words can change depending on which article you use. I can't think about examples right now where the words are written exactly the same, except for one, but I can give some examples of phonetically similar words:
• Der Wal (The Whale) - Die Wahl (The Vote/Choice/Election/...)
• Das Rad (The Wheel) - Der Rat (The Advice/Council)
• Die Leiter (The Ladder) - Der Leiter (The Conductor)
But at least the article for plural is always the same (Die Leitern, Die Räder, Die Wale, Die Wahlen,....)
But sadly it gets problematic again when you are confronted with the cases:
• Der Mann, aber...
Das Haus *des* Mann*es*
• Der Mann, aber...
Das Auto gehört *dem* Mann
• Der Mann, aber...
Ich rede über *den* Mann
It's tough 🥲 but most of the time people will understand you, even if you use the wrong articles. Just give it a try when learning. Germans are mostly very polite in that regard
Swiss German is also spoken in Liechtenstein
Actually, there is Swiss Standard German, German Standard German and Austrian Standard German.
But these varieties of Standard German ("Dachsprache") are very similar to each other.
Just a few different details in vocabulary and grammar, hardly noticeable.
Austrians and Germans understand news programs of Switzerland (in Swiss Standard German) without big effort, though the speech melody is different. Or newspapers: Mostly, you won't recognize the difference between Swiss, German or Austrian newspapers from short articles.
The big difference between spoken and written language doesn't exist only in Switzerland. Also in Germany, people from the north can have problems to understand people from the south (e.g. Bavaria). People from Vienna (Austria) will understand people from the region Bregenzerwald (Vorarlberg, Austria) only with an effort. In all German speaking countries, there are different regional dialects, which can differ strongly from the Standard German of the country and would hamper proper transregional communication.
My home country is Vorarlberg (west of Austria). The dialects of Vorarlberg belong to the Alemannic dialects, like the dialects of Swiss German. The major part of Austria speaks Bavarian dialects, like the major part of Bavaria does.
Use of dialects in Germany is not that wide spread though, you won't find cities or towns like in Switzerland where all locals speak in their dialect, the dialect in Germany is mostly still in use in smaller villages but experts are certain that they will die out in the near future.
Btw, no hard feelings that we didn't let you join after WW1 even though you guys voted for it, we can still be friends though.
I think the most noticable difference in the written language are monday, tuesday etc. These are different from German to Austria and I guess also Switzerland.
Edit: I meant the months, not the days🤦🏼♀️
@@juleseefire ?? I don't know a difference here. But the month January is "Januar" in Germany (at least in the north) and "Jänner" in Austria.
@@701983 oh yeah. My fault. I mixed those up. 🤦🏼♀️ Thanks!
are there so called Swiss French and Swiss Italian just like Swiss German?
As an Italian living in Milan nor far from Switzerland, I don't see any difference beteween Swiss Italian and standard Italian. The only one is that in Switzerland they use "Azione" when talking about discounts or season sales. Azione means something totally different in Italian.
Just out of curiosity, do Swiss people from different regions speak English with each other to understand each other?
Swiss high german is the common and official fallback.
Should be noted that unlike the video is suggesting swiss high german (the German learned in schools he is refering to) is not the same as high german from Germany ... neither spoken nor written. But the similarities are so great that people from both nations can understand each other with a little bit of effort.
One of the funniest videos I have seen. Thanks mate
Thank you.
Omg i am swiss and this makes me realise how big the US actually is!!! That’s crazy
I'm Swiss and YES I also want to meet that guy who invented the articles, he was such an ass hahaha
I have laughed so hard because it's so accurate! 🤣
2:25
I recommend Baseldyytsch.
We have a dictionary (German-Baseldyytsch), and a grammar book, both newly released about 5 years ago!
Actually I Feel like it was very natural to learn german and swiss german at the same time, growing up.
I agree, with a Swiss German dialect as my mother tongue, I learned it pretty naturally in school but also while reading books and watching TV, where 90% was in Standard German. I even remember playing Superhero as a kid and everyone switching to Standard German as a way to differentiate our “secret identities”. But of course while reading and writing Standard German is second nature to me, I don’t have the same fluidity in Standard German, because I use Swiss German in my daily live. It’s also very hard to speak it without any Swiss accent. Therefore I sometimes even prefer speaking English or French to Standard German.
@@marmotarchivist Yeah, very accurate description :) I remember playing in standard german too, to feel more dramatic or adult I guess😅
In french (and Suisse Romande as well), your potatoes are girls as well! ^^
They don't accept the euro in Switzerland by the way. I was kind of surprised when I went down to the local convenience store and tried to pay with Euro currency.
Other than that, it's a beautiful country. The homes look just like the homes you'd see in the United States.
Yeah they have their own currency lol
They are not in Euro Zone bruh !
@@kiranp5611 yes, but why not ? I dunno.
@@matthewjackson9615 because they are not retarded.
I don't think the articles were just made up some day. I think it has smth to do with the ending of words. I didn't learn this as I'm a native German speaker, but I think ppl who learn German learn how to determine the gender by the ending of words.
No we don't.
I referred to a word by the wrong gender my whole life until only a few weeks ago I learned it was wrong.
I'm German. Lived here my whole life. Have a great education. I still got it wrong.
I'm 27 and the word was "Diabetes".
@@bearo8 Haha I feel called out because i just realized I'm not sure what the correct article is for diabetes? (I am German too) I'm guessing das Diabetes
@@lg6497 ja ich dachte immer die Diabetes.
Laut Duden (und dem Betroffenen, der mich verbessert hat) ist es der Diabetes
I cry when learn Germany then i try to learn Korean. It's same, so difficult. Then i try to learn English and Japanese but i really want to live in Swiss 😂
So funny, you made my day...! I never saw our language through your eyes, but you're absolutely right!
sympathischä Duude! :) i wünsche dir viu Erfoug
I learned German in the uni, but I'm a native Spanish speaker, in Spanish we have only two genders, so when I was first introduce for the third German gender it was (and is) difficult to me to remember the articles. For worse, the gender in Spanish sometimes match in German but sometimes no, and it is not easy to rethink the genders of the thinks that you learn as a child (fortunately in Spanish the gender is more or less regular).
The not understanding part is a bit of an exaggeration. Ever since the radio most Swissgerman people understand each other. We only have problem with the most extreme dialects and if they are mumbled. Just recently I asked a guy from North Germany. Even he could mostly understand Swissgerman if it is spoken clearly _(no he had no contact with Swissgerman beforehand, but I don't know if he is the norm or the exception)._
Officially German and Swissgerman are the same language. There are differences, but it is only a matter of getting used to it, as far as I can tell. Also some dialects use words which others don't use. That also makes some difficulties.
As stated, a lot of languages have gendered nouns. From my knowledge of at least 4 (2 romance, 1 slavic & german) languages, there seems to be a pretty good overlap as far as what nouns one language considers feminine vs. masculine, slightly less perfect overlap for neuters. Is there an academic study on the subject?
Very well explaind and true. I love it
Funny as Fuck! You're the best!
I like your video! 🤗🇨🇭 Good job! 😎
just to confuse you a little bit more: button is not only die schaltfläche button is also der Knopf
Dude the fact that you have 673(now 674 subs) is beyond reason. Keep the vids coming
I think even harder than the articles are the Plural forms. No rules and about 9 ways to put a word in plural: -e, -n, -en, -er, -s, Umlaut and Umlaut combined with -e or -er... or the word just doesn't change....
I am not a germanist linguist, but i think the articles follow some kind of logic. From what i observed it has to do with how the word feels to the speaker. And this feeling, i think, depends on the ending of a noun. Nouns with the same endings have the same gender.
But there are also foreign and loan words which are not of german origin, then it even comes to discussions among germans on "how the word feels".
i believe once you watch out for the endings you will get the right feeling of a word :)
3:50 "Why don't they just scrap the swiss german and just speak German?" There is a beautiful English phrase - respect, and a saying, "Don't interfere!"
Funny video, but it shows also why most Americans struggle to learn a different language. My advice: listen to your Swiss wife and accept the German language as it is: accept that there are different articles, try to learn them instead of putting your energy into arguing why it is that way. For Europeans and specially for Swiss people, it’s quite normal to learn another language, although it’s also hard for us. But it’s just something, that we are use to do, since we went to school. First we have to learn the proper German and then also French and English. In fact, you can learn a language like you learn how to read, write or count. Americans often didn’t have the opportunity to learn another language at school, or if so, it was not really meant for practical use. So Americans living in Europe, often give up after a short while to learn the local language, because most natives speak English anyway. But after a while, you will realize that there will always be a gap that separates you from the local people and that you are excluded from social life in many ways. Don’t give up and good luck!
(H)erdöpfel is the meaning of ground-apple and the apple is a boy - simple like that ;-)
A tip for Americans or any person who isn't from Europe: don't even bother to say "omg you guys🤪🤪 why don't yall just speak one language so you can understand each other" this is not like the Americas where primarily there is only 3 languages spoken (Spanish, English and Portuguese) Switzerland/Europe has years of culture, traditions, LANGUAGES so why would a person or the whole country stop using the language they grew up with
If the Kartoffel is an Erdöpfel or Herdäpfel, it's no longer feminine. The whole secret is: There is (nearly) no connection between biological and grammatical gender. A very, very rough rule of thumb is to look at the ending of a word - it it ends with -chen it's mostly neutral, if it ends with an e its more often female than not, for example. But that does not help with -el endings.
In the end, however, it's all about etymology and about what article they thought to be appropriate (or sounding about right) _before_ they invented the rules for German language back in the 19th century. Before that it was much like in Switzerland today: every region maintained its own rules.
Other german words for the Kartoffel (orig. Tartuffel from ital. tartuficolo, which refers to il tartufo - dem Trüffel / truffle) are Erdapfel (like the Züri word, but without the umlauts: The apple which grows in the earth) or Grumbirre / Krumbir (the pear which grows in the soil). The word potato itself meant originally only the sweet potato (batata, ital. patate douce, dt. Batate), and the third tuber imported from the Americas to Europe is "die Topinambur" (girasole, sometimes also referred to as Rosskartoffel = horse potato). It's all not very logical - but neither are many English quirks.
I really wish people would stop teaching this stuff as if the grammatical genders have anything to do with biological genders. I'm all for renaming the whole concept, because then nobody would even get the idea of thinking about biological gender when trying to figure out what grammatical gender to use.
@@DasAntiNaziBroetchen Full accord to that.
Hilarious 😂 well done mate
What language do they speak in Grenchen, Switzerland?
'Artikels' are somehow by the ending of the word determined, it's kinda hard to explain but after a lot of time you get a feeling what grammatical gender a word has. (And of course there are special cases to make it more complicated) e.g. most words that end with e are feminine :]
Say they in Canada very mercy or in Italy mille dank?? At least both have more then one language or only Swiss do mix so sh.t?
Ooh you live in Einsiedeln? I did my apprenticeship at the Marstall behind the monastry which is the oldest horse studs in Europe.
Oh Wow. I had no idea.
Happy to answer any questions if you have them, I speak romanish natively as well as a bit of french and fluent Swiss German
Is your language actually similar to Romanian?
@@ParietalCell1492 it’s a bit similar but i for example could not understand it fully, perhaps a little
@@cseblivestreaming I heard Rumantsch is closer to Romanian than other romance languages.
@@ParietalCell1492 that’s true, however there are smaller dialects of italian spoken in the dolomites which are more similar still