Various nonsense...NIK: etc.

[Stephan Forstner]

>> Oh, by the way, more than a few English words are slipping back into
>> German (or Swiss dialect) the opposite way, you know.  'Ausflippen'
>> is my favorite of these, being that it's half-translated (from 'flip
>> out' obviously). Einäwäg (Anyway) is used in Swiss German commonly,
>> whereas most 'foreign' words come from French (Märssi vilmal being a
>> wonderful half-French (Merci), half-German (vielmals) expression).

But keep in mind that French is not actually a 'foreign' language in
Switzerland (which is prolly why you put it in quotes anyway). German,
French, Italian, and Romansch are all offical languages, and at least in
the German-speaking parts of the country all students are (or rather were)
expected to learn one or more of the 'other' languages. Nowadays that may
no longer be true, I suspect that English may actually be the first choice
for a second language among many. And when speaking with computer
professionals, I find that most technical terms seem to be in English
because the German equivalents are so long-winded.

>        `Einäwäg' is *horrible*. If German had some kind of regulating
>body like the Academie Française (though I'm not saying it should because
>that's a fairly hopeless attempt) that'd have to be on their hitlist. But
>the same probably goes for most Schwyzerdeutsch anyway.

Indeed. I prefer the 'softer' Schwyzerdeutsch, and since the written
language is actually Hochdeutsch a Swiss should eventually be able to
understand a German, though the opposite may not necessarily be the case.
Some years back I was exercising my Swiss-speaking skills with a German
tourist here in NYC and he eventually said something along the lines
of "Ach, that awful hillbilly German the Swiss use!" In all fairness my
Swiss might have been a bit rusty.

Stephan

P.S. Don't forget Austria, where the dialect is somewhere in the middle
between Swiss and German, though a bit closer to German (Bavarian) I
believe.