German language

German
Deutsch
Pronunciation	[dɔʏtʃ]
Native to	Primarily German-speaking Europe, also in the worldwide German-speaking diaspora
Native speakers	90 million (2010) to 95 million  (2014) L2 speakers: 10–15 million (2014)
Language family	Indo-European Germanic West Germanic High German German
Early forms:	Old High German Middle High German German
Standard forms	German Standard German Swiss Standard German Austrian Standard German
Writing system	Latin (German alphabet) German Braille
Official status
Official language in	6 countries Austria Belgium Germany Liechtenstein Luxembourg Switzerland 3 dependencies South Tyrol (Italy) 31 communes in Poland 9 municipalities in Brazil Several international institutions
Recognised minority language in	13 countries (minority/cultural/national language) Brazil (Espírito Santo, Rio Grande do Sul & Santa Catarina) Bosnia and Herzegovina Czech Republic Denmark (Syddanmark) Hungary Italy (Trentino) Kazakhstan Namibia Poland Romania Russia (Azovo German National District) Slovakia Ukraine
Regulated by	No official regulation (German orthography regulated by the Council for German Orthography).
Language codes
ISO 639-1	de
ISO 639-2	ger (B) deu (T)
ISO 639-3	Variously: deu – German gmh – Middle High German goh – Old High German gct – Colonia Tovar German bar – Bavarian cim – Cimbrian geh – Hutterite German ksh – Kölsch nds – Low German sli – Lower Silesian ltz – Luxembourgish vmf – Mainfränkisch mhn – Mócheno pfl – Palatinate German pdc – Pennsylvania German pdt – Plautdietsch swg – Swabian German gsw – Swiss German uln – Unserdeutsch sxu – Upper Saxon wae – Walser German wep – Westphalian hrx – Riograndenser Hunsrückisch yec – Yenish
Linguasphere	further information 52-AC (Continental West Germanic) > 52-ACB (Deutsch & Dutch) > 52-ACB-d (Central German incl. 52-ACB–dl & -dm Standard/Generalised High German) + 52-ACB-e & -f (Upper German & Swiss German) + 52-ACB-h (émigré German varieties incl. 52-ACB-hc Hutterite German & 52-ACB-he Pennsylvania German etc.) + 52-ACB-i (Yenish); Totalling 285 varieties: 52-ACB-daa to 52-ACB-i
300px      (Co-)Official and majority language      Co-official, but not majority language      Statutory minority/cultural language      Non-statutory minority language

German (German: Deutsch) is a West Germanic language. It is spoken in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Luxembourg; natively by around 100 million people. It is the most widely spoken mother tongue in the first language. There are some people who speak German in Belgium and in the Netherlands and in France and Northern Italy. There are people who speak German in many countries, including the United States and Canada, where many people emigrated from Germany. It also spoken in Eastern Europe, Bulgaria, Romania, and Russia.

German is a part of the West Germanic language family and is much like English and Dutch. Much of the vocabulary in German is related to English, but the grammar is more complicated.

German has a system of cases, and when helping verbs are used, the main part of the verb must be moved to the end of the sentence. For example, "Someone has stolen my car" is Jemand hat mein Auto gestohlen ("Someone has my car stolen"), and "Someone called me last night" is Jemand hat mich letzte Nacht angerufen ("Someone has me last night called").

In writing, every noun must start with a capital letter. German is the only language that still has that rule, but Danish and English did so a long time ago.

Standard German is an official language in Switzerland, but the Swiss dialect of German is difficult to understand for native speakers from Germany and even for Swiss who are not native to speaking German. One reason that the dialects are still so different today is that even if Switzerland adopted Standard German, mostly as a written standard, German Swiss in World War II wanted to separate themselves from the Nazis by choosing to speak dialect over the Standard German.

Swiss German also has some differences in spelling, for example, the letter ß, which is used only in German, is replaced by ss.

Dialects

• Alsatian
• Bavarian dialect
• Franconian Dialect
• Kölsch
• Low Saxon
• Swiss dialect
• Mannheimerisch dialect
• Palatinate German

References

Notes

Other websites

• Online German Language Course An online German language course that includes lessons covering pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar.
• German phrasebook at Wikivoyage
• Learn to Speak German Archived 2013-06-08 at the Wayback Machine Student Resource
• Free German Language Course Archived 2013-02-17 at the Wayback Machine
• German Thesaurus