The German language

(I have no idea if I've spelled that right. But it means ballpoint pen.)

talking of which, one of the things I like about German is that all nouns start with a capital letter. I think it looks both exotic and dignified.

Plough rough through

It's not exactly SO, for example the "e" is "Kaiser" is pronounced differently than in "Freund". It's easier than English though. I don't think there's a language in the world where every letter is pronounced the same way every time, though Finnish comes pretty close (with only major exception, the "ng" sound).

(speed limit)

Spanish is pretty much like that. You change the sound of c and g depending on what vowel they're followed by, but that's about it.

brustwarze
handschuhe
krankenhaus

lieblingsfach
kunst

mandarin? (but i guess the characters are more like words than letters)

oh and schadenfreude is indeed a good one, and xpost doppelganger

What about ll? Or j or h in the beginning of the word? Though Spanish vowels are always pronounced the same, I think.

I think you'll find that werkelijk = Dutch and wirklich = German, so

JA WEG

(See, video games help you learn!)

I agree with Ken that the word Handschuh is a total classic.

Can we hear it for German syntax, please? e.g. Today have I heard that a man who for Germany football played has has in England to come decided.

yeah, a double l means a different sound to single l, and same with double r. and j and h are the same sound at the beginning of a word as they are within it - h is never pronounced, anyway.

KIPPIS - cheers!
Hei - hallo!
Moi moi - bye bye!
KRAPULA - HANGOVER!

Hooray!

these are all great thanks. so far some others I have learned as I start the journey from A0 - just say “wie geht’s” not “wie geht es einen/dir”; just say “wiedersehn” or even tschüss

“Ciao“ works as well, these days.

And it’s “Wie geht es Ihnen,” not “einen.”

ganz peinlich, schatzi

thanks - trials of learning primarily via YouTube + pimsleur...

xp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5m6Czgl1acU

makes it a whole lot easier learning a language when you live with a fluent speaker you can bounce questions off and speak with

This is not a great idea unless you are benchmarking a specific region and maybe even subculture within the region. The dangers of sounding like late 90s Björk talking are great.

the guy in pimsleur is a shagger

can you to me that please on the map to show?

yoga ass language

nico (from nico's weg) has a preternatural ability for picking up the german language

here's my approach so far:

0. have set some language priorities for first three months, and have a 12 month goal
1. listen to 1 episode of pimsleur in the morning first thing, while walking to work (these are pretty slow with limited vocabulary but find them good for tuning your ear to stuff)
2. jot down any new vocabulary in notes while walking (transfer into anki later)
3. if it's raining, listen to coffee break german on the bus instead
4. do some self talk while in e.g. shower, on bike etc
5. ask partner questions (using german only, to extent possible... not always possible obv)
6. do occassional anki session (max 35 cards per day) when have some downtime at night
7. look up things when (if) I think of them
8. maintain a diary of words, sentences I've made up, and things I've done during the day etc (this is really basic but just about getting me thinking/narrating in the language)

basically a mix of structured learning and organic (as-and-when things come to me) learning. only scribbling this down for my posterity and in case it helps anyone else

that all sounds like... a lot, but most important thing for me is trying to at least touch the language every day. some days I will do a couple of hours of learning (exhausting), others it will only be the pimsleur. and I don't do the pimsleur on the weekends, so the learning activity is a little lighter then (mostly just annoying partner w/questions)

Was ist dein deutsches Llieblingswort ?

geil

schornsteinfeger

sowieso

jeweilig

find the schlechteste those with hard to pronounce Rs (lehrern). also why is squirrel so hard in all languages

genau is the best word

doch

Aztekenexpresszuggesellschaft

― SIGSALY Can't Dance (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 12 March 2016 15:06 (three years ago)

quatsch

Ehrgeiz

„Schmetterling“ is underrated imo, the word means “little thing” (-ling) that “bats forcefully” (Schmetter-)

genau def a hall of famer

new one today which is nice: außergewöhnlich

just has a nice rhythm and balance to it, with a satisfying definitive ending

rein theoretisch

still enjoying this ish. favourite thing recently are conjunctions that throw the conjugated verb to the end so sentences become this odd parade of unmoored subjects objects times locations with a wee verb popping up at the end to stitch them all together

like.... Du solltest ‚Gruß Gott‘ sagen wenn du in Österreich bist....... bist my man wyd all the way out there on your own

|||||||| ist ein Threadnichtaufdemlaufendengehaltenhabender.

I don’t like the guy who coined the phrase, but “Lockerungsdrängler” is a classic German compound imo.

still plugging away doing a little everyday - less structured since we entered lockdown, mostly because my days are less structured and if I exercise I tend to do it w/my partner so doing podcast course would be considering kinda..... antisocial

been slacking on the speaking lately tho - need to up that def

been a little difficult to keep the motivation too when there's no potential for a visit to germany on the horizon at least in the short- to medium-term. always found w french that visting france gave my language skills a little turbo boost over any plateaus and so was looking forward to the same from visits to germany this year but........ the rona

yeah I've had that problem too. I keep meaning to work on my German because I might possibly want to move to Germany when this is over, but that seems very far off and hard to imagine.

I just saw this anglicised map of Germany and now I can't stop thinking about it pic.twitter.com/nbpAwPXy13

— Marcel Dirsus (@marceldirsus) July 27, 2020

Slot Newswanston!

Pretty sure most of those places exist in England.

Son ellos https://t.co/CPTu3mdG06 pic.twitter.com/k3UmzhQBOh

— common white girl (@PlanetaTamara) June 27, 2022

Don't think there's a proper Germany thread bar this one. Making my way through this rn.

https://jewishcurrents.org/bad-memory-2

Phantombildzeichner

Person who sketches identikit portraits (Phantombilder)

Learning German online from the Goethe Institut and the login page URL ends with the word "moodle" which makes me think Moodles is somehow involved.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vergangenheitsbew%C3%A4ltigung

My days of German fluency are long gone, but I still favour Zahlungsmittel and verkehrsgünstig over their English equivalents.

This was fun:
https://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/dialekt-test-wir-wissen-woher-sie-stammen-jetzt-noch-genauer-205060715129

Apparently, I am from Hannover. (I am not from Hannover. I am from Pittsburgh.) My husband was a bit north from where he is from, though (Hamburg).

German compound word of the day (a mere 24 letters): Kundenzufriedenheitsumfrage
It means "customer satisfaction survey", so it's a regular, everyday word.

Not bad, but German children's books can do better than that:

"An good way to learn German is to try reading children's books to familiarise yourself with basic grammar and vocabulary"

German children's book: pic.twitter.com/GENRnrL0vw

— Nic Houghton (@40PercentGerman) December 10, 2024

Lol that's like a mega-compound word: Hilfeleistung (assistance, from Hilfe help and Leistung performance), löschen (extinguish), Gruppen (well, groups), Fahrzeug (vehicle). Apparently you can say HLF: three letters :P

Nice one encountered in the wild re:South Korea: Amtsenthebungsverfahren (impeachment, literally office removal procedure). The h is accentuated.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Eierschalensollbruchstellenverursacher

The longest German word that currently appears in the Duden dictionary is the full version of the acronym ADHD. It has a mere 44 letters.

https://images.thalia.media/00/-/c0cf3d0a61324e83bb981fa61a08e303/aufmerksamkeitsdefizit-hyperaktivitaetsstoerung-adhs-taschenbuch-manfred-doepfner.jpeg

we threw our kids into the local school system when we lived in Austria - i was really impressed after about 4-5 months they would be screaming at each other in the playground in fluent German.

I was impressed that Kevin Keegan (RIP, Mighty Mouse!) could still hold a conversation in German over 30 years after he had left Hamburg.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EmxGqmvywo

Chris Nolan has ruined one of my favorite verbs, "becircen".

Wurzelknorken is a playful, colloquial German portmanteau and whimsical slang term combining Wurzel (root) and Knorken (an old-fashioned northern German expression meaning swell, cool, or fine). It roughly translates to "root-knob," "little root fellow," or a quirky rustic character, and is most famously used as the name for independent, alternative, and electronic music micro-festivals in Germany.