Deutsch Fragen

[Robodl95]

Hallo Meliltonia, kannst du mir helfen? Ich habe mehrere fragen.

1. Was ist das wahre deutsch Menschen sprechen? Sie lehren nicht uns "denglish" aber "korrekte" deutsch meist. Was ist mehr gemeinsame: Hallo oder hi? Eis oder Eiscreme? Kuehl oder cool? Ich heisse... oder Meine Name ist....? etc.
2. Wie spricht man "y" auf deutsch? Es ist nicht üblich Ich finde.
3. Wie viele Menschen sprecht (sprechen?) englisch in Deutschland.
4. Tun deutsch je falsch Geschlecht? (das ist schlecht Ich weiss.... lol)
5. Spricht man lol, omg, ttyl, etc.?
6. Spricht man etc.?
7. Moechts du Revolverheld? ;D
8. Du kannst nicht nur Sauerkraut, Bier und Schnitzel essen... was essen sie typische?
9. Die Leute sagen, Deutsche sind nicht lustig, was ist ein lustiges Deutsch Witz?
10. Verstehst du?

<sub>Translation
Hello Melitonia can you help me? I have several questions.
1. What is the true German that people speak? They don't teach us "denglish" but "correct" German mostly. What is more common: Hello or hi? Ice or icecream? Cool or cool? I am called.... or My name is....? etc.
2. How do you pronounce "y" in German? I find it is not very common.
3. How many people speak English in Germany?
4. Do Germans ever use the wrong gender?
5. Do people use lol, omg, ttyl, etc?
6. Do people use etc.?
7. Do you like Revolverheld?
8. You cannot only eat Sauerkraut, Beer and Schnitzel, what do you typically eat?
9. People say that Germans are not very funny, what is a funny Germany joke?
10. Do you understand?</sub>

[Melilotona]

Hey Rob! I'll try to answer your questions as well as I can. If you have more just let me know.

1. It depends. Younger people who learnt English in school and are surrounded by modern media tend to use more English words. However, it has also to do with the social class a person is from and from their education. I think it's best when I "use" myself as an example if that's okay. I try to avoid English words as much as I can. Not because I don't like English! It's because I love both English and German and in most cases there is no need to mix them. I'm from a middle-class family and I'm well-educated (I have the highest school leaving certificate and I'm going to study soon). (Sorry if that sounded arrogant! It wasn't meant to!) Referring to your examples I'd say "hallo" (because both young and old people use it, teenagers also say "hi" or "hey"), "Eis" ("Eiscreme" or "Eiskrem" is more likely to be found on the packaging of ice cream, but I don't know anyone who actually says it), "kühl" when you're talking about the temperature, "cool" when something is good, and "Ich heiße..." (I talked with ChanahEmiliania about the last one yesterday ;D)

2. There aren't many words that contain "y" and thinking about I get the impression that the words that do are foreign words. Sometimes you pronounce it like a German "j" ("Yak"), sometimes like a German "i" ("Baby", yeah, we say that, too) and sometimes like a German "ü" ("Ypsilon").

3. Difficult to say. In my grandparents' generation it was not common to learn any foreign languages in school because most people couldn't afford good education for their children in the first place. When my parents went to school things had changed already - most schools offered at least two foreign languages (always English and sometimes French, Latin or Italian, apparently). Except in the GDR (German Democratic Republic) where you were supposed to learn Russian. Long story short: A lot of people, if not the most, have learnt English at some stage, the question is how well they speak it.

4. Yup, they do. It's one of the more common mistakes especially children make, but after a while you just know the genders of pretty much every word.

5. Younger people use them in the Internet.

6. Yes, but the "more German way" would be "usw."

7. Ahm, I'm not a fan of theirs but they're ok.

8. A typical German dinner would consist of some meat, vegetables and potatoes, pasta or rice. Common beverages are juice, water and also wine and beer (depends on the dish). Funnily the things you listed are rather associated with Southern Germany. In the traditional Northern German cuisine there's a lot of fish.

9. Thanks for the prejudice. I am very humorous myself and I just love sarcasm which is only one of my many talents. Typical (and usually boring) jokes are about blondes, East Frisians and Austrians. Hardly anyone laughs about them, though. Oh, and there are "anti jokes" and the funny thing about them is that they're not funny at all. "Two pieces of meat loaf meet. One of them turns over, the other one is called Herbert." See what I mean?

10. I hope I did understand, otherwise I wasted quite a lot of time! ;D

[Robodl95]

Thanks so much! What exactly is an Austrian joke? lol

[Melilotona]

A joke about someone from Austria.

[Robodl95]

Oh I know that but like what about them?

I thought about another question, when you make a compound word (ie Regenboden, Käsebrot, etc) does the word take the gender of the 1st or 2nd word?

[kikyo4815]

I would guess that an Austrian joke might be the same as an American making a joke about a Canadian for no real reason other than the fact that they're Canadian.

I have several American friends who like to tease me, haha. xD

[Robodl95]

Ahh but we love the Canadians! Syrup, bacon, lumberjacking, the awesome accent I always wanted to go to Canada....

[kikyo4815]

"If I threw a piece of ham over the border, would it be called Canadian bacon?" <- My personal favourite. xD

But we know you guys love us. ;D

Come to Canada! You'll love it here! If only you didn't need a passport to cross the border, like the good old days. I just got my passport a few months ago, as we're planning to pass through Maine on our way to the maritime provines this summer.

[Melilotona]

The jokes about Austrians, East Frisians and blonde women aim at their supposed stupidity. I have blond hair and blue eyes myself and hope I'm that stupid.

The word has the gender of the second part. You could see the first one as a description for the other one, do you know what I mean? For example "Schlittenhund" (sled dog) - it's not just any dog, but a dog that pulls a sled.

[Robodl95]

Yeah I get it, thanks!

[ChanahEmiliania]

I have a question related to one of Rob's:

3. Wie viele Menschen sprecht (sprechen?) englisch in Deutschland.
3. How many people speak English in Germany?

Should it be sprecht or sprechen? In English, "people" is plural, but in Spanish, "la gente" is treated as singular, so I'm curious as to which it is in German.

[Melilotona]

"Leute" (=people in the sense of a bunch of human beings) is plural, so it has to be "sprechen". The third person singular of "sprechen" (to speak) is "spricht". It's an irregular verbs (are there any regular verbs in German?).

ich spreche
du sprichst
er/sie/es spricht
wir sprechen
ihr sprecht
sie sprechen

[ChanahEmiliania]

Follow-up question: You used "Leute," but Rob used "Menschen"...what's the difference between these words?

[Melilotona]

"Leute" means people, "Menschen" humans. "Menschen" can be used as a synonym of "Leute", but it doesn't always work the other way round. "Die ersten Menschen" (the first human beings) makes sense, "die ersten Leute" sounds, uhm, not so good.