The speech of German youngsters

Liz   Mon Sep 18, 2006 7:39 pm GMT
What are the current changes/tendencies in the speech/language use of German youngsters (which are worth investigating)?
Fredrik from Norway   Mon Sep 18, 2006 7:57 pm GMT
I believe they stopped saying "Heil Hitler" at the end of nearly every sentence.
Liz, writing messages to   Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:12 pm GMT
As far as "veeeery" is concerned, it is NOT a long /i:/ sound but a prolonged, exaggerated /e/ sound. Just to avoid misunderstanding.... :-))
Fredrik aus Norwegen   Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:18 pm GMT
The person above was not me, but a troll.

Liz:
Your question is not easy to answer, but when I spent one year in Germany I noticed that almost nobody (and I mostly hung out with students) pronounced the accusative of the masculine indefinite article, "einen". Most people sounded as if they were saying:
Ich habe ein' Bruder.
I don't know if that is a recent phenomena.
Fredrik aus Norwegen   Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:20 pm GMT
The person above was not me, but a troll.

Liz:
Your question is not easy to answer, but when I spent one year in Germany I noticed that almost nobody (and I mostly hung out with students) pronounced the accusative of the masculine indefinite article, "einen". Most people sounded as if they were saying:
Ich habe ein' Bruder.
I don't know if that is a recent phenomena.
Liz   Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:48 pm GMT
<<The person above was not me, but a troll.>>

No probs :-) Is he a troll playing with your name and identity? Or he might be a genuine "Frederik from Norway" or rather "Frederik from NoWay" who is definitely not you.

<<Most people sounded as if they were saying:
Ich habe ein' Bruder.
I don't know if that is a recent phenomena.>>

I'm not German and I'm not living in Germany currently, but:
I don't really think it's a new phenomenon. I think "einen" has always sounded like "ein" in faster colloquial speech (of course, it is ultimately "einen" in extremely well planned, meticulously pronounced, formal, slow, careful speech), since the second "e" in "einen" is usually realised as a schwa, or it is totally reduced or dropped. Hence the pronunciation "ein".

Just one question... I was wondering why we have to type "I hate spam" into the box below. It's an entire waste of time, and I really have doubts about its efficiency. It is meant to filter out spammers, I reckon. BUT:

1. Let's assume that I'm a spammer, for the sake of argument. I can easily type the aforementioned thing in, and I'm free to overwhelm the forum with spams.
2. If I'm not a spammer, I certainly won't send spams, even without typing the stuff in. Or if it drives me nuts, I will...
Fredrik aus Norwegen   Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:58 pm GMT
Liz:
Your explanation sounds logical.
It seems as if you know German, why don't you post something in German on the "Wer spricht Deutsch" thread?
Liz   Mon Sep 18, 2006 9:09 pm GMT
<<It seems as if you know German, why don't you post something in German on the "Wer spricht Deutsch" thread?>>

Well, my German is really bad, or I would say it's not good enough for posting. I'm quite fluent in German, when I'm in a good mood. But sometimes I don't feel like speaking, let alone writing it. Or I simply can't, and my speech becomes halting. On the other hand, I make quite a few grammatical mistakes/errors, especially in adjective declinations.
mike   Tue Sep 19, 2006 7:30 am GMT
Liz: I just started studding German. The major mistakes I do now are when to pronounce long vowel, and when to pronounce short vowel. Do you still do such mistakes till this day?

“I hate spam”…I thought of this as well, but only for once. The only thing that came in my mind is that it is just to reduce the possibility of sending unfinished posts which might happen by accidentally pressing on the “send message” button…when you type “I hate spam” means you have finished writing your post...Why they have chosen that expression in particular?. Well, “I hate spam” is just as witty as the name “antimoon” itself, nothing more!
Liz   Tue Sep 19, 2006 12:43 pm GMT
<<Liz: I just started studding German. The major mistakes I do now are when to pronounce long vowel, and when to pronounce short vowel. Do you still do such mistakes till this day?>>

Not really, but...I can't think of _a_ particular example at the moment. However, I used to have problems with that as well. It usually has got something to do with stress, too. Stress is extremely important in German, I daresay, a little more important than in English (of course it's crucial in English, too). And sometimes it's very hard to get right. Let me tell you an example:

I used to have problems with the stress in polysyllabic words, e.g.: "belegtes (Brötchen)" and "lebendig". Especially "lebendig" was a tough stuff for me. It is derived from the noun "Leben", which is stressed on the first syllable, i.e. "Lében", and is pronounced with a long /e:/ sound. The second "e" is therefore reduced to a schwa, or totally eliminated. As opposed to that, "lebendig" has the main stress on the second syllable, i.e.: "lebéndig", but the stressed vowel is realised by a short /e/ sound. Note that the acute accent above the stressed syllable does not indicate a long vowel (of course it might be a long vowel, but not neccesarily and not always).

<<The only thing that came in my mind is that it is just to reduce the possibility of sending unfinished posts which might happen by accidentally pressing on the “send message” button…when you type “I hate spam” means you have finished writing your post...Why they have chosen that expression in particular?. Well, “I hate spam” is just as witty as the name “antimoon” itself, nothing more!>>

Well, you might be right in thinking so.
Pauline   Tue Sep 19, 2006 1:07 pm GMT
Liz,
I've quickly read some of the messages ; I've noticed you've interest for german, but you're hesitant for write on the german forum because of inexactness.
I can't speak very well german or english, but on the german forum they're very nice, so don't worry about you can't perfectly write it. I can't at all, but we can have some nice conversations :-)
Liz   Tue Sep 19, 2006 2:24 pm GMT
<<Liz,
I've quickly read some of the messages ; I've noticed you've interest for german, but you're hesitant for write on the german forum because of inexactness.
I can't speak very well german or english, but on the german forum they're very nice, so don't worry about you can't perfectly write it. I can't at all, but we can have some nice conversations :-)>>

Thanks for encouraging me, Pauline, that's very nice of you. I might join you one day. :-))

BTW, I have read some of your conversations there ("reading conversations" - how paradox it sounds!). These were very interesting, though. (I just don't know why I put "though" at the end of the sentence. It might be a bad habit, though. :-))) It seems that today I'm in the mood of analysing my own sentences.
Arthur   Tue Sep 19, 2006 3:09 pm GMT
>>I used to have problems with the stress in polysyllabic words, e.g.: "belegtes (Brötchen)" and "lebendig". Especially "lebendig" was a tough stuff for me. It is derived from the noun "Leben", which is stressed on the first syllable, i.e. "Lében", and is pronounced with a long /e:/ sound. The second "e" is therefore reduced to a schwa, or totally eliminated. As opposed to that, "lebendig" has the main stress on the second syllable, i.e.: "lebéndig", but the stressed vowel is realised by a short /e/ sound. Note that the acute accent above the stressed syllable does not indicate a long vowel (of course it might be a long vowel, but not neccesarily and not always).

One useful help is to take into account, that in most German words, the penultimate syllable is stressed, no matter how many syllables the word has. A couple of exceptions:

1) when the word is a verb but it appears as ge- + a monosyllable in participle. Ex.: tun-getan
2) when the word is a verb with a stressed particle in the beginning. Ex.: zuwenden (zu is stressed, but wen- too), but in zugewandt you have the stress again in zu, but in wandt, because the infinitive ending dissapears.
Fredrik from Norway   Tue Sep 19, 2006 6:25 pm GMT
Yes, we have, Adam, but the rest of Europe don't think it's as funny as anymore as you Britons do. A very nice German friend of mine told me that she felt that her exchange year in Britain had been quite stressfull because she was confronted with the Briton's WW2 obsession and accompanying sadomachosistic sexual phantasies every time she told she was German. She didn't mind discussing the war, but just wanted a break sometimes!

BTW I saw a really funny adaption of the sketch on a BBC show recently. A redfaced Englishman walks into an Indian hotel and the Indian receptionist starts:
- Don't mention the Empire, don't mention the Empire!

:-))
Guest   Tue Sep 19, 2006 6:52 pm GMT
Brennus,

The deletion of the posts of Viriatum caused that he went away. He was making valuable contributions here and didn't get even an explanation from you, for part of his thread having been deleted.

On the other side, the comments of Adam seem to be allowed to stay.

I expressed my discomfort to you two weeks ago. Sorry if I insist again, but I simply don't understand this situation quite well.

Guest