SWISS GERMAN or GERMAN? Which one do I need when moving to Switzerland?

So you are moving to Switzerland and you are wondering: Do I need High German? Should I learn Swiss German? How do I learn Swiss German? Can knowing German help me with learning and understanding Swiss German? I asked one Swiss person and a bunch of my German speaking friends to answer all of these (and more!) questions.

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Time stamps:
Intro: (00:00)
Official languages in Switzerland: (00:45)
Differences between Swiss German & High German: (01:54)
How different is Swiss German across Switzerland?: (03:30)
Can you get by with only knowing High German?: (04:50)
Can German speaker understand Swiss German?: (06:03)
Is knowing German helpful when learning German?: (06:54)
Is knowing High German useful when living in Switzerland?: (07:15)
Should I learn High German when moving to Switzerland?: (07:55)
Tips for learning Swiss German: (08:20)

Images used:
- Carrot: Nevit Dilmen, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
- Swiss map of languages: Marco Zanoli (sidonius 13:20, 18 June 2006 (UTC)), CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

#Switzerland #SwissGerman #HighGerman

[OurSwissAdventure]

Would you like to see more videos with invited Swiss guests?

[mgoksoy]

If you think Swiss German is not a beautiful language, you are mistaken. I am Turkish, came to Zurich in 1980. I realized very quickly that although many Swiss people understood English, they were not very happy to have to speak it. It was a foreign language. So I searched possibilities to learn Züritüüch. Many Swiss people told me that I first had to learn High German. So I applied to the Volkshochschule, and graduated in one and a half years. I then applied to the Schwitzertüüchbund and I was accepted. I graduated one year later and was able to understand Züritüüch and speak it well enough. I then realized that I had many more Swiss friends than before. In fact, I was invited to join a Maennerchor in the region in Zürich where I was living. Wollishofen. After that, I lived in paradise until the time when I had to leave Switzerland in 1988. I still wish I would be living in Zurich .

[djohnson-kucl]

BTW: I like the sound of Swiss German. I think it sounds very friendly. They use a lot of "oooh", "uuuuh", and "aaah" sounds that sound cute and approachable.

[MovingAbroad]

Great editing! Thank you for having the opportunity to participate in this video. Have a great weekend :)

[arielgioino]

Socialize with the Swiss😂 you may learn some small talk about the weather, or what mountain did you ski last weekend😅

[KikoAnimates]

Danke!! I've had a dream to move to Switzerland since my childhood. This video helped out. This channel is really helpful and great

[SlovenianGirlAbroad]

Thanks for the shoutout Erika! I'm glad I could help. ;)

[raymondmartin]

Great introductory video, and of what is
important in this matter.
While I have been in the US most of my life,
born in London UK during WWII, we came
to the US before I started school here, but
I grew up with German as my Father was
from Germany, and my Mother was from
Zurich, so the little Swiss German I know
came from my Mother's Zurich dialect.

[djohnson-kucl]

Great video! I like your videos. I have learned some basic German first, but I find the Swiss don't seem to enjoy speaking German. It always feels awkward. I'm still new to both, have traveled to Switzerland a lot, and intend to live in Switzerland permanently. I would say if you're traveling, you can get by in English. If you plan on spending a lot of time here, my experience tells me you need High German and Swiss German. Basically it's hard to connect with local people if you speak high german, but you can't communicate on official or job related materials if you speak Swiss German.

[fedrajani]

Thank you very much for the video, it was lovely and very helpful for me that I want to learn Swiss German. I am looking forward to your next video.

[jonathanschmid]

Die Frage, ob Schweizerdeutsch eine eigene Sprache ist, ist rein politisch. Wie gross der Unterschied zum Standarddeutsch ist, ist irrelevant. Um eine eigene Sprache zu sein, bedürfte es zuallererst einer schriftlichen Form. Diese gibt es nicht, weil das Schweizerdeutsch - wie im Video gesagt - eine Gruppe alemannischer Dialekte ist. Man müsste eine esperantoähnliche Mischung konstruieren, oder einen Dialekt favorisieren, um eine Schriftlichkeit zu definieren. Das Zweite ist dabei noch unwahrscheinlicher als ersteres. Das weiss man, wenn man die Geschichte der Schweiz kennt. :) Das Länderkürzel ist übrigens lateinisch gehalten (CH - Confoederatio Helvetica), um keine der Sprachregionen zu favorisieren.

[LisaCulton]

For me, it was requirement that I had at least the B2 certificate in any one of the official Swiss languages in order to get a medical license here. I already had C1 in German, so the requirement was not a problem. However, it would be in your best interest to learn Swiss German (here in the East) in order to live life with ease.

[ensodance]

Thanks a lot for resorces and interesting information !

[handofclay]

The mist interesting fact for me is that we don't have any rules on how to write in swiss german. That's why a lot of people struggle with writing in swiss german, because you can't "cheat" by talking with an accent. My mother is from Germany. although her speaking swiss german is flawless, she sometimes still struggles to write certain words.

plus, because there's no rule, some people (me included) write the same word differently, sometimes even in the same sentence, for some reason.
like, sometimes I write "lüüt" (people) sometimes "lüt". its the exact same word, it's just a feelings thing, really.

[anonymous]

It’s like Doric. Same language but very hard, if not impossible to understand.

[Georges]

You get along in German or English well in the Italian Part.

[ilment]

**German language history**: When all the small states joined to form Germany, there was no High German. There were so many dialects. For example, you have Plattdeutsch(Rostock), Bayrisch(Munich), Saechsisch(Dresden), Swiss German, Schwaebisch(Stuttgart), Koelsch(Cologne), Dutch (but take it with a pinch of salt).

The German Army had a problem - German soldiers/officers/commanders could not understand each other! So the Kaiser declared the German in Hannover as High German. So no matter whether you from Koenigsberg in Prussia or Konstanz at the Bodensee, you learned Hochdeutsch.

Now the Swiss were not part of the German Empire and so this requirement wasn't there. High German became more important with time as universities and institutions needed to communicate with their northern neighbors.

I really struggle to understand Wallis German. But what I found so funny was that it shares its roots with even Low German.
EXAMPLE for Farmer: Deutsch/Plattdeutsch/Walliser Deutsch/Dutch/Afrikaans - Der Bauer/De Buer/De Bure/De Boer/Die boer

Do German first and then do Swiss German - it's the grammar that always gets you in German. But what's nice in German is what you say is what you write - most of the time ;) and I think the same applies to Swiss German

Thanks for the videos - big fan

[xxx_phantom_xxxw_t_a]

nformative clip. But, cake can also be "Chueche", for me a "Chüechli" is more like a little strawberry or cheese cake (incidental).

There is a funny anecdote about the Swiss dialect; when Swiss speak High German, Germans think they understand Swiss German.
At one employer (earlier) we had a German CEO who understood Swiss German, but spoke High German, I found that pleasant, it didn't bother me at all, I just think the contrived attempted Swiss German, which is often ridiculed, is bad (which we don't find funny at all). By the way; Everyone in German-speaking Switzerland learns High German at school, so you can definitely get along with High German in the German-speaking part of Switzerland.
Understanding Swiss German if one has not learned it or can only speak Standard German; rather unlikely, depending on the dialect, individual chunks or nothing at all. I was streaming once and got a call from my daughter (forgot to mute the headset), the audience / listeners laughed afterwards because it sounded funny, they understood next to nothing (Bernese dialect).

So, I only partially agree with the sound of Swiss German, wondering which dialect and who speaks it, listen to someone from Graubünden, for example ... to melt away, also a "broad" Bernese dialect, partly also from Aargau.

[studiomiroa]

As a newbie resident in Switzerland, I am learning High German since I have to take a language exam for my visa. And it's helpful to understand all official documents and signs. And I am trying to learn Swiss German words.
I don't have any problem using English, since Swiss people speak good English, but Swiss people appreciate it when I try to speak German and some Swiss-German words.
Interestingly, people mix with German, Italian, French, and English! Once I ordered food at an Italian restaurant in Italian, and the waiter answered me in German, so I asked him in German, and he answered in Italian. And then, we settled in English. That was funny! And people often say 'Merci', 'Au revoir'. I truly feel I am in Switzerland!

[djjnson]

Hmm regarding learning swiss German as a German im not sure. Somewhere I read, that as a native German, swiss people dont like it when Germans try to imitate or adapt swiss dialect. It sounds awkward and then its better to just speak high German instead of a bad swiss German copy. Change my mind :)