Vienna, the capital city of Austria is one of the most international cities and an attractive business location within Europe. In the world's largest and strongest economic area, the European Union, German is by far the most spoken native language. Although there are some words in which we have not fully agreed yet, such as Paradeiser (DE: tomato) or Schlagobers (DE: whipped cream) we always understand each other. Even if many Austrians insist on speaking their own language, the differences between the 'Austrian' and the 'German' German are almost nonexistent. High German or Standard German is a mixture of Middle German and Upper German and most of the Austrian dialects are based on it. The answer is quite simple, because in fact, Standard German is just another word for High German and that is what we teach at the ActiLingua Academy. Often, students ask us what the term 'standard German' really means. So be careful, because so-called 'false friends' can quickly lead you to the wrong track and your conversation partner and you could speak of very different things.ĥ. German meaning with a capital letter at the beginning: childĮnglish meaning: a time of the year / season Those words are called false friends: words that are similar in the German and English language, but mean something different. But there are some words that are a bit tricky. Words like “Kindergarten” or “Strudel” for example, mean the same in English and German. German and English have more in common than you might think. For example: Wehrdienstverweigerer' (EN: conscientious objector) or 'Weltmeisterschaftseröffnungsspiel' (EN: world championship opening game). Because of the possibility of creating words by joining single words together to make one word, the German language is considered as a particularly rich language. The “Duden”, a popular reference book for grammar and orthography of the German language, lists 135.000 words. This means, the German language contains eight times as many words as the English language.In the everyday conversation, we use much less words: only 12.000 – 16.000 words including about 3.500 foreign words. About one third of those words was added in the last 100 years. The German language consists of about 5.3 million words – with a rising trend. Supposedly, only one single vote prevented the application of the motion and this vote came from the ethnic German parliamentary speaker “Mühlenberg.” 3. According to rumors, in 1828 there was a vote in Pennsylvania on whether German should be introduced as the second official language beside English. Even in the next generation, the so-called “Mühlenberg-legend” gained more and more popularity. This caused frustration among the immigrants, which formed the basis for the legend. The motion was rejected by 42 votes against 41. In 1794, a group of German immigrants presented a petition in Virginia to the US House of Representatives, demanding a German translation of the legal texts. But is that true? Like with every legend, there is some truth in it. By a hair’s breadth German has become the main language of the USAįor more than 200 years, there has been a legend, which says that German almost became the official language of the USA. In addition, German belongs to the ten most popular languages ?in the world and that is why we also got an entry in the Guiness Book of World Records of 2006. According to ZAF (Center for Education and Training), in 2015 about 15.4 million people attended German courses at schools, universities or language institutes half a million more students than 5 years ago. Even abroad, the German language seems to be in great demand. It is a key language in the European Union and the new economies of Central and Eastern Europe.

German is spoken by more than 120 million people in Austria, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Switzerland and in parts of Belgium, Northern Italy and Eastern France. How many people speak German? What is the meaning of 'Standard German'? How many words do we use in the German language? And what do 'false friends' have to do with learning German? We will provide you with the answers to these and more questions. You can find more information about our Live Online Courses.ĥ things you didn't know about the German language.

These courses are held online by a native speaker teacher. Learn German with your ActiLingua teacher wherever you are and enjoy having a part of Vienna with you. 5 interesting facts about the German language Learn here what you didn't know about the german language

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