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Standard High German | |
---|---|
Standard German, High German, also often simply German | |
Standardhochdeutsch, Standarddeutsch, Hochdeutsch | |
Region | German-speaking Europe |
Speakers | L1: 76 million (2019) [1] L2: 59 million Total: 130 million |
Indo-European
| |
Early forms | |
Standard forms | |
Signed German | |
Official status | |
Regulated by | Council for German Orthography [2] |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-1 | de |
ISO 639-2 | ger (B) deu (T) |
ISO 639-3 | deu |
Glottolog | stan1295 |
Linguasphere | 52-ACB–dl |
Standard High German (SHG), [3] less precisely Standard German or High German [a] (German : Standardhochdeutsch, Standarddeutsch, Hochdeutsch or, in Switzerland, Schriftdeutsch), is the umbrella term for the standardized varieties of the German language, which are used in formal contexts and for communication between different dialect areas. German is a pluricentric Dachsprache with currently three codified (or standardised) specific national varieties: German Standard German, Austrian Standard German and Swiss Standard German. [4]
Regarding the spelling and punctuation, a recommended standard is published by the Council for German Orthography which represents the governments of all majority and minority German-speaking countries and dependencies. [5] Adherence is obligatory for government institutions, including schools. Regarding the pronunciation, although there is no official standards body, there is a long-standing de facto standard pronunciation (Bühnendeutsch), most commonly used in formal speech and teaching materials. It is similar to the formal German spoken in and around Hanover. Adherence to those standards by private individuals and companies, including the print and audio-visual media, is voluntary. Austrian German has had standard pronunciation exceptions since 1904 (Luick's österreichische Bühnenaussprache). [6] In Switzerland, no such official pronunciation codex exists, yet most Standard Swiss German speakers are markedly different sounding from Hanover-type phonetic targets.
Standard German originated not as a traditional dialect of a specific region but as a written language developed over a process of several hundred years in which writers tried to write in a way that was understood in the largest area.
Martin Luther's translation of the Bible in 1522 (New Testament, Old Testament 1534) was an important development towards an early standardization of written German. Luther based his translation largely on the already developed language of the Saxon chancery, which was more widely understood than other dialects and as a Central German dialect, was felt to be "halfway" between the dialects of the north and south. Luther drew principally on Eastern Upper and East Central German dialects and preserved much of the grammatical system of Middle High German.[ citation needed ]
Later in 1748, a grammar manual by Johann Christoph Gottsched, Grundlegung einer deutschen Sprachkunst, was key in the development of German writing and standardization of the language. Similarly to Luther, Gottsched based his manual on the Central German variant of the Upper Saxon area. [7] Over the course of the mid-18th century and onward, a written standard then began to emerge and be widely accepted in German-speaking areas, thus ending the period of Early New High German.
Until about 1800, Standard German was almost entirely a written language. People in Northern Germany who spoke mainly Low Saxon dialects, which were very different from Standard German, learned it more or less as a foreign language. However, the Northern pronunciation (of Standard German) later became considered standard [8] [9] and spread southward. In some regions such as around Hanover, the local dialect has completely died out as spoken language but is preserved in dialect literature and scholarly descriptions.
It can thus be argued that it is the spread of Standard German as a language taught at school that defines the German Sprachraum , which was thus a political decision, rather than a direct consequence of dialect geography. That allowed areas with dialects with very little mutual intelligibility to participate in the same cultural sphere. Some linguists claim today that a One Standard German Axiom is a defining feature of Germanistik. [10] Outside of Switzerland, Austria and South Tyrol, local dialects tend to be used mainly in informal situations or at home and in dialect literature, [11] but more recently, a resurgence of German dialects has appeared in mass media.[ citation needed ]
In German, Standard German is generally called Hochdeutsch, reflecting the fact that its phonetics are largely those of the High German spoken in the southern uplands and the Alps (including Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and parts of northern Italy as well as southern Germany). The corresponding term Low German reflects the fact that these dialects belong to the lowlands stretching towards the North Sea. The widespread but mistaken impression that Hochdeutsch is so-called because it is perceived to be "good German" has led to use of the supposedly less judgmental Standarddeutsch ("Standard German"), deutsche Standardsprache ("German standard language"). On the other hand, the "standard" written languages of Switzerland and Austria have each been codified as standards distinct from that used in Germany. For this reason, "Hochdeutsch" or "High German", originally a mere geographic designation, applies unproblematically to Swiss Standard German and Austrian German as well as to German Standard German and may be preferred for that reason.
Since the 1980s, German has widely been considered a pluricentric language with the national standard varieties of German Standard German, Austrian Standard German and Swiss Standard German. These varieties of standard German differ above all in vocabulary, pragmatics and pronunciation, but in some instances also in grammar and, in only a handful of cases, in orthography. In formal writing, the differences are small; in regards to the spoken language, the different varieties of Standard German are easily recognized by most speakers. [11]
These three national standards (German, Austrian and Swiss) have each been adopted by other German-speaking countries and communities as their standard form of German. The German standard is applied in Luxembourg, Belgium, and Namibia while the Swiss standard has been adopted in Liechtenstein. [13]
The variation of the Standard German varieties must not be confused with the variation of the local German dialects. Even though the Standard German varieties are to a certain degree influenced by the local dialects, they are very distinct. All varieties of Standard German are based on the common tradition of the written German language, whereas the local dialects have their own historical roots that go further back than the unification of the written language, and in the case of Low German, belong to a different language entirely.
This section needs additional citations for verification .(January 2022) |
In most regions, the speakers use a continuum of mixtures from more dialectal varieties to more standard varieties according to situation. However, there are two (or three) exceptions:
While the three principal national varieties are recognized as three distinct standards, the differences are few, perhaps comparable to the difference between British and American English. The pronouncing dictionary of the Duden dictionary group [16] codifies the standard pronunciation for German Standard German and allows for a small number of divergences; for example, the string "äh" has two authorized pronunciations, /ɛː/ and /eː/. Some regions see only the first as correct, and others use only the second; Duden now recognizes both as correct. Standardized High German pronunciation is generally used in radio and television as well as in German learning materials for non-natives and at least aspirationally by language teachers. The accent is documented in reference works such as Deutsches Aussprachewörterbuch (German Pronunciation Dictionary) by Eva-Maria Krech et al., [c] Duden 6 Das Aussprachewörterbuch (Duden volume 6, The Pronunciation Dictionary) by Max Mangold and the training materials at the Westdeutscher Rundfunk (West German Broadcasting) and Deutschlandfunk (Radio Germany). It is an invented accent, rather than one radiating from any particular German-speaking city. It is often said that the people of Hannover speak German with an accent that comes closest to the standard of the Duden dictionaries, but the claim is debatable, particularly since it may apply equally well to the rest of Northern Germany. [ citation needed ]
Standard High German is written in the Latin alphabet. In addition to the 26 standard letters, German has three vowels with an umlaut mark, namely ä, ö and ü, as well as the Eszett or scharfes s (sharp s): ß . In Switzerland and Liechtenstein, ss is used instead of ß.
A first step to standardisation, although non-prescriptive, of Early New High German was introduced by the Luther Bible of 1534. In consequence, the written language of the chancery of Saxony-Wittenberg rose in importance in the course of the 17th century so much so that it was used in texts such as the 1665 revision of the Zürich Bible.
The First Orthographical Conference convened in 1876 by order of the government of Prussia, but failed. Konrad Duden published the first edition of his dictionary, later simply known as the Duden , in 1880. The first spelling codification by the Second Orthographic Conference of 1901, based on Duden's work, came into effect in 1902.
In 1944 there was a failed attempt at another reform; this was delayed on the order of Hitler and not taken up again after the end of World War II.
In the following decades German spelling was essentially decided de facto by the editors of the Duden dictionaries. After the war, this tradition was followed with two different centers: Mannheim in West Germany and Leipzig in East Germany. By the early 1950s, a few other publishing houses had begun to attack the Duden monopoly in the West by publishing their own dictionaries, which did not always conform to the "official" spellings prescribed by Duden. In response, the Ministers of Culture of the federal states in West Germany officially declared the Duden spellings to be binding as of November 1955 ("Duden-Monopol" or "Dudenmonopol", "Duden-Privileg" or "Dudenprivileg"). [ citation needed ] [17]
The orthography reform of 1996 was based on an international agreement signed by the governments of the German-speaking countries Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein and Switzerland; but acceptance of the reform was limited and led to public controversy and considerable dispute. The states (Bundesländer) of North Rhine-Westphalia and Bavaria refused to accept it. At one point, the dispute reached the highest court, which quickly dismissed it, claiming that the states had to decide for themselves and that only in schools could the reform be made the official rule – everybody else could continue writing as they had learned it.
While, as of 2004 [update] , most German print media followed the reform, some newspapers, such as Die Zeit , Neue Zürcher Zeitung and Süddeutsche Zeitung , created their own in-house orthographies.
After 10 years, without any intervention by the federal parliament, a major revision of the spelling reform was installed in 2006 because there were disagreements regarding capitalization and splitting of German words. Also revised were the rules governing punctuation marks.[ citation needed ]
The most noticeable change was probably in the use of the letter ß, called scharfes s (Sharp S) or Eszett (pronounced ess-tsett, coming from ſz). Traditionally, this letter was used in three situations:
Examples are Füße, paßt, and daß. Currently, only the first rule is in effect, making the reformed spellings Füße, passt, and dass. The word Fuß 'foot' has the letter ß because it contains a long vowel, even though that letter occurs at the end of a syllable. The logic of this change is that an 'ß' is a single letter whereas 'ss' are two letters, so the same distinction applies as (for example) between the words den and denn.
This is a selection of cognates in both English and Standard German. Instead of the usual infinitive ending -en, Standard German verbs are indicated by a hyphen after their stems. Words that are written with capital letters in Standard German are nouns.
English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
and | und | arm | Arm | bear | Bär | beaver | Biber | bee | Biene | beer | Bier | best | best | better | besser |
blink | blink- | bloom | blüh- | blue | blau | boat | Boot | book | Buch | brew | brau- | brewery | Brauerei | bridge | Brücke |
brow | Braue | brown | braun | church | Kirche | cold | kalt | cool | kühl | dale | Tal | dam | Damm | dance | tanz- |
dough | Teig | dream | Traum | dream | träum- | drink | Getränk | drink | trink- | ear | Ohr | earth | Erde | eat | ess- |
far | fern | feather | Feder | fern | Farn | field | Feld | finger | Finger | fish | Fisch | fisher | Fischer | flee | flieh- |
flight | Flug | flood | Flut | flow | fließ- | flow | Fluss (Fluß) | fly | Fliege | fly | flieg- | for | für | ford | Furt |
four | vier | fox | Fuchs | glass | Glas | go | geh- | gold | Gold | good | gut | grass | Gras | grasshopper | Grashüpfer |
green | grün | grey | grau | hag | Hexe | hail | Hagel | hand | Hand | hard | hart | hate | Hass | haven | Hafen |
hay | Heu | hear | hör- | heart | Herz | heat | Hitze | heath | Heide | high | hoch | honey | Honig | hornet | Hornisse |
hundred | hundert | hunger | Hunger | hut | Hütte | ice | Eis | king | König | kiss | Kuss (Kuß) | kiss | küss- | knee | Knie |
land | Land | landing | Landung | laugh | lach- | lie, lay | lieg-, lag | lie, lied | lüg-, log | light(A) | leicht | light | Licht | live | leb- |
liver | Leber | love | Liebe | man | Mann | middle | Mitte | midnight | Mitternacht | moon | Mond | moss | Moos | mouth | Mund |
mouth (river) | Mündung | night | Nacht | nose | Nase | nut | Nuss (Nuß) | over | über | plant | Pflanze | quack | quak- | rain | Regen |
rainbow | Regenbogen | red | rot | ring | Ring | sand | Sand | say | sag- | sea | See (f.) | seam | Saum | seat | Sitz |
see | seh- | sheep | Schaf | shimmer | schimmer- | shine | schein- | ship | Schiff | silver | Silber | sing | sing- | sit | sitz- |
snow | Schnee | soul | Seele | speak | sprech- | spring | spring- | star | Stern | stitch | Stich | stork | Storch | storm | Sturm |
stormy | stürmisch | strand | strand- | straw | Stroh | straw bale | Strohballen | stream | Strom | stream | ström- | stutter | stotter- | summer | Sommer |
sun | Sonne | sunny | sonnig | swan | Schwan | tell | erzähl- | that(C) | dass (daß) | the | der, die, das, des, dem, den | then | dann | thirst | Durst |
thistle | Distel | thorn | Dorn | thousand | tausend | thunder | Donner | zwitscher- | upper | ober | warm | warm | wasp | Wespe | |
water | Wasser | weather | Wetter | weave | web- | well | Quelle | well | wohl | which | welch | white | weiß | wild | wild |
wind | Wind | winter | Winter | wolf | Wolf | word | Wort | world | Welt | yarn | Garn | year | Jahr | yellow | gelb |
English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German | English | German |
English has taken many loanwords from German, often without any change of spelling (aside from frequently eliminating umlauts and not capitalizing nouns):
German word | English loanword | Definition of German word |
---|---|---|
abseilen (v.) | abseil | to descend by rope / to fastrope |
Angst | angst | fear |
Ansatz | ansatz | onset / entry / math / approach |
Anschluß/Anschluss | Anschluss | connection / access / annexation |
Automat | automat | automation / machine |
Bildungsroman | bildungsroman | novel concerned with the personal development or education of the protagonist |
Blitzkrieg | blitzkrieg, shortend blitz | lit. 'lightning war': military strategy |
Bratwurst | bratwurst | fried sausage |
Delikatessen | delicatessen | delicious food items |
Dirndl | dirndl | lit. "young woman": type of feminine dress |
Doppelgänger | doppelgänger | lit. "double going / living person alive", look-alike of somebody |
Dramaturg | dramaturge | professional position within a theatre or opera company that deals mainly with research and development of plays or operas |
Edelweiß or Edelweiss (Swiss spelling) | edelweiss | edelweiss flower |
Ersatz | ersatz | lit. "replacement", typically used to refer to an inferior substitute for a desired substance or item |
Fest | fest | feast / celebration |
Flugabwehrkanone | flak | lit. "flight defence gun": anti-aircraft gun, abbreviated as FlaK |
Frankfurter | frankfurt(er) | demonym of Frankfurt am Main |
Gedankenexperiment | gedankenexperiment | thought experiment |
Geländesprung | geländesprung | ski jumping for distance on alpine equipment |
Gemütlichkeit | gemütlichkeit | snug feeling, cosiness, good nature, geniality |
Gestalt | gestalt | form or shape / creature / scheme; a concept of 'wholeness' (etymologically die Gestalt comes from the past participle of Old High German stellen used as a noun) [18] |
Gesundheit! | Gesundheit! (Amer.) | health / bless you! (when someone sneezes) |
Glockenspiel | glockenspiel | percussion instrument |
Hamburger | hamburger & other burgers | demonym of Hamburg |
Heiligenschein | heiligenschein | lit. "saints' light": halo (as a religious term) |
Hinterland | hinterland | lit. "(military) area behind the front-line": interior / backwoods |
kaputt | kaput | out of order, not working |
Katzenjammer | katzenjammer | lit. "cats' lament": hangover, crapulence |
Kindergarten | kindergarten | lit. "children's garden" – nursery or preschool |
Kitsch | kitsch | fake art, something produced exclusively for sale |
Kobold | kobold, cobalt | small supernatural being |
KrautorSauerkraut | kraut, Kraut | herb, cabbage or pickled cabbage |
Kulturkampf | kulturkampf | cultural war |
Leitmotiv | leitmotif | guiding theme (the verb leiten means "to guide, to lead") |
NationalsozialismusorNationalsozialist | nazi | national socialism or national socialist |
Nixe | nixie | water spirit |
Panzer | panzer | lit. "armour": tank |
plündern (v.) | to plunder | lit. "taking goods by force" (original meaning "to take away furniture" shifted in German and both borrowed by English during the Thirty Years' War) |
Poltergeist | poltergeist | lit. "rumbling ghost" |
Realpolitik | realpolitik | diplomacy based on practical objectives rather than ideals |
Reich | Reich | empire or realm |
Rucksack | rucksack | backpack (Ruck → Rücken which means "back") |
Sauerkraut | sauerkraut | shredded and salted cabbage fermented in its own juice |
Schadenfreude | schadenfreude | taking pleasure in someone else's misfortune, gloating |
Spiel | spiel | lit. "game / play": sales pitch / lengthy speech with the intent to persuade |
Sprachbund | sprachbund | linguistic term, lit. "language alliance": area of linguistic convergence |
Sprachraum | sprachraum | linguistic term, lit. "place/area/room of a language": area where a certain language is spoken |
Strudel | strudel | lit. "whirlpool": kind of pastry |
Unterseeboot | U-boat | lit. "under sea boat": submarine, abbreviated as U-Boot |
über (prep.) | uber | over, above |
Übermensch | übermensch | superhuman, "overhuman" |
Vampir | vampire | dead person that feeds on the living |
verklemmt (adj.) | verklemmt (Amer.) | lit. "jammed": inhibited, uptight |
Waldsterben | waldsterben | lit. "forest dieback", dying floral environment |
Wanderlust | wanderlust | desire, pleasure, or inclination to travel or walk |
Wasserscheide | watershed | lit. "water division": drainage divide |
Weltanschauung | weltanschauung | lit. "perception of the world": worldview |
Wunderkind | wunderkind | lit. "wonder child": child prodigy, whiz kid |
Zeitgeist | zeitgeist | lit. "spirit of the times": the spirit of the age; the trend at that time |
Zeitnot | zeitnot | chess term, lit. 'time trouble' |
Zugzwang | zugzwang | chess term, lit. "compulsion to move" |
Zwischenzug | zwischenzug | chess term, lit. "intermediate move" |
The Duden is the de facto official dictionary of the Standard High German language, first published by Konrad Duden in 1880. The Duden is updated regularly, with new editions appearing every four or five years. As of August 2017 [update] , it was in its 27th edition and in 12 volumes, each covering different aspects such as loanwords, etymology, pronunciation, synonyms, and so forth.
The first of these volumes, Die deutsche Rechtschreibung (German Orthography), has long been the prescriptive source for the spelling of Standard High German. The Duden had become the bible of the Standard High German language, being the definitive set of rules regarding grammar, spelling, and usage of Standard High German. [19]
The Österreichisches Wörterbuch ("Austrian Dictionary"), abbreviated ÖWB , is the official dictionary of the Standard High German language in the Republic of Austria. It is edited by a group of linguists under the authority of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture (German: Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur). It is the Austrian counterpart to the German Duden and contains a number of terms unique to Austrian German or more frequently used or differently pronounced there. [20] A considerable amount of this "Austrian" vocabulary is also common in Southern Germany, especially Bavaria, and some of it is used in Switzerland as well. Since the 39th edition in 2001 the orthography of the ÖWB has been adjusted to the German spelling reform of 1996. The dictionary is also officially used in the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is currently available in 44th edition, from 2022, and includes an online version with limited access. [21]
Several organisations promote the use and learning of the Standard German language.
The government-backed Goethe-Institut, [22] (named after Johann Wolfgang von Goethe) aims to enhance the knowledge of German culture and language within Europe and the rest of the world. This is done by holding exhibitions and conferences with German-related themes, and providing training and guidance in the learning and use of the German language. For example, the Goethe-Institut teaches the Goethe-Zertifikat German language qualification.
The German state broadcaster Deutsche Welle provides radio and television broadcasts in Standard German and 30 other languages across the globe. [23] Its Standard German language services are spoken slowly and thus tailored for learners. Deutsche Welle also provides an e-learning website for learning Standard German. [24]
Austrian German, Austrian Standard German (ASG), Standard Austrian German, Austrian High German, or simply just Austrian, is the variety of Standard German written and spoken in Austria and South Tyrol. It has the highest sociolinguistic prestige locally, as it is the variation used in the media and for other formal situations. In less formal situations, Austrians use Bavarian and Alemannic dialects, which are traditionally spoken but rarely written in Austria. It has been standardized with the publishing of the Österreichisches Wörterbuch in 1951.
German is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family, mainly spoken in Western and Central Europe. It is the most spoken native language within the European Union. It is the most widely spoken and official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian autonomous province of South Tyrol. It is also an official language of Luxembourg, Belgium and the Italian autonomous region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia, as well as a recognized national language in Namibia. There are also notable German-speaking communities in France (Alsace), the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Denmark, Romania and Hungary (Sopron). Overseas, sizeable communities of German-speakers are found in Brazil, South Africa (Kroondal), Namibia, among others, some communities have decidedly Austrian German or Swiss German characters.
The High German languages, or simply High German – not to be confused with Standard High German which is commonly also called "High German" – comprise the varieties of German spoken south of the Benrath and Uerdingen isoglosses in central and southern Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and eastern Belgium, as well as in neighbouring portions of France, Italy, the Czech Republic (Bohemia), and Poland. They are also spoken in diasporas in Romania, Russia, Canada, the United States, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Chile, and Namibia.
Swiss German is any of the Alemannic dialects spoken in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, and in some Alpine communities in Northern Italy bordering Switzerland. Occasionally, the Alemannic dialects spoken in other countries are grouped together with Swiss German as well, especially the dialects of Liechtenstein and Austrian Vorarlberg, which are closely associated to Switzerland's.
Bavarian, alternately Austro-Bavarian, is a major group of Upper German varieties spoken in the south-east of the German language area, including the German state of Bavaria, most of Austria and the Italian region of South Tyrol. Prior to 1945, Bavarian was also prevalent in parts of the southern Sudetenland and western Hungary. Bavarian is spoken by approximately 12 million people in an area of around 125,000 square kilometres (48,000 sq mi), making it the largest of all German dialects. In 2008, 45 percent of Bavarians claimed to use only dialect in everyday communication.
In German orthography, the letter ß, called Eszett or scharfes S, represents the phoneme in Standard German when following long vowels and diphthongs. The letter-name Eszett combines the names of the letters of ⟨s⟩ and ⟨z⟩ in German. The character's Unicode names in English are double s, sharp s and eszett. The Eszett letter is currently used only in German, and can be typographically replaced with the double-s digraph ⟨ss⟩, if the ß-character is unavailable. In the 20th century, the ß-character was replaced with ss in the spelling of Swiss Standard German, while remaining Standard German spelling in other varieties of the German language.
The German orthography reform of 1996 was a change to German spelling and punctuation that was intended to simplify German orthography and thus to make it easier to learn, without substantially changing the rules familiar to users of the language.
Standard Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian are different national variants and official registers of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language.
Swabian is one of the dialect groups of Upper German, sometimes one of the dialect groups of Alemannic German, that belong to the High German dialect continuum. It is mainly spoken in Swabia, which is located in central and southeastern Baden-Württemberg and the southwest of Bavaria. Furthermore, Swabian German dialects are spoken by Caucasus Germans in Transcaucasia. The dialects of the Danube Swabian population of Hungary, the former Yugoslavia and Romania are only nominally Swabian and can be traced back not only to Swabian but also to Franconian, Bavarian and Hessian dialects, with locally varying degrees of influence of the initial dialects.
The phonology of Standard German is the standard pronunciation or accent of the German language. It deals with current phonology and phonetics as well as with historical developments thereof as well as the geographical variants and the influence of German dialects.
German orthography is the orthography used in writing the German language, which is largely phonemic. However, it shows many instances of spellings that are historic or analogous to other spellings rather than phonemic. The pronunciation of almost every word can be derived from its spelling once the spelling rules are known, but the opposite is not generally the case.
The Duden is a dictionary of the Standard High German language, first published by Konrad Duden in 1880, and later by Bibliographisches Institut GmbH, which was merged into Cornelsen Verlag in 2022.
A pluricentric language or polycentric language is a language with several codified standard forms, often corresponding to different countries. Many examples of such languages can be found worldwide among the most-spoken languages, including but not limited to Chinese in the People's Republic of China, Taiwan and Singapore; English in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa, India, and elsewhere; and French in France, Canada, and elsewhere. The converse case is a monocentric language, which has only one formally standardized version. Examples include Japanese and Russian. In some cases, the different standards of a pluricentric language may be elaborated to appear as separate languages, e.g. Malaysian and Indonesian, Hindi and Urdu, while Serbo-Croatian is in an earlier stage of that process.
The appearance of the German language begins in the Early Middle Ages with the High German consonant shift. Old High German, Middle High German, and Early New High German span the duration of the Holy Roman Empire. The 19th and 20th centuries saw the rise of Standard German and a decrease of dialectal variety.
Helvetisms are features distinctive of Swiss Standard German, that distinguish it from Standard German. The most frequent Helvetisms are in vocabulary and pronunciation, but there are also some distinctive features in syntax and orthography.
Swiss Standard German, or Swiss High German, referred to by the Swiss as Schriftdeutsch, or German: Hochdeutsch, is the written form of one (German) of four national languages in Switzerland, besides French, Italian, and Romansh. It is a variety of Standard German, used in the German-speaking part of Switzerland and in Liechtenstein. It is mainly written and rather less often spoken.
The Rat für deutsche Rechtschreibung, or RdR, is the main international body regulating Standard High German orthography.
The Österreichisches Wörterbuch, abbreviated ÖWB, is the official spelling dictionary of Standard German in Austria, i.e. of Austrian Standard German. It has been edited since 1948 by a group of linguists under the authority of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture and contains a number of terms unique to, distinct or characteristic for Austrian German. Such Austrianisms may be more frequently or differently used or pronounced compared to other German-speaking areas. A considerable amount of this Austrian vocabulary is also common in Southern Germany, especially Bavaria, and some of it is used in Switzerland as well. The most recent edition is the 44th from 2022. Since the 39th edition from 2001 the orthography of the ÖWB was adjusted to the German spelling reform of 1996.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to German language:
Zu Hause oder mit den Angehörigen sprechen 60,1% der betrachteten Bevölkerung hauptsächlich Schweizerdeutsch, 23,4% Französisch, 8,4% Italienisch, 10,1% Hochdeutsch und 4,6% Englisch
mittelhochdeutsch gestalt = Aussehen, Beschaffenheit; Person, Substantivierung von: gestalt, althochdeutsch gistalt, 2. Partizip von stellen.