What do Swiss people think of Swiss German and Standard German?

There has always been a contradiction between Swiss German and Standard German in the German-speaking area of ??Switzerland. A study examines attitudes towards dialects and Standard German through the eyes of Swiss expatriates.

She is from Schwyz, 28 years old, and is a college student in the Department of German Literature. She has been interested in language and the topic of "immigration and contact with unfamiliar cultures" since she was a child. As early as when she was in college, she had been in contact with children returning to Switzerland from various countries as a summer camp instructor organized by the Swiss Youth Foundation Abroad.

Later she became a representative of this foundation and had the opportunity to contact the Swiss Abroad Organization (ASO), which provided a favorable opportunity for her who was looking for thesis materials. So she chose the topic "Expats' Views on Dialects and Standard German - A Conceptual Study" as her graduation thesis.

“Because of these results, the opinions of Swiss people living abroad are important here,” this is what Rita Marty wrote in the introduction to her paper. In order to get enough material, she needed to find the right test candidates.

Finally, with the help of Swiss foreign organizations and Swiss schools abroad, she finally found enough test targets and strict conditions. Most of the candidates came from Latin America, followed by Europe, and some from Africa and the United States. and Oceania.

The conditions for becoming a test candidate are very strict: Participants must first live in a country other than Switzerland; but not a German-speaking country. The sojourn family must be attended by one parent and one child, both of whom must understand German and Swiss German. The child cannot have attended school in a German-speaking country; it is best that the other parent is not from a German-speaking country.

Different views across generations Views of language vary among the Swiss living abroad surveyed.

“If both parents are from the German-speaking area of ??Switzerland, then the dialect is generally spoken at home. If the father is Chilean and the mother is from the German-speaking area of ??Switzerland, then Spanish is spoken at home, and only the mother and The child communicates in Swiss German, and the father generally speaks standard German when expressing his emotions naturally," Marty said.

In Swiss families living abroad, children are more unfamiliar with both Standard German and Swiss German than their parents.

Respect "Swiss values"

However, Swiss children living abroad attach great importance to their parents' hometown. A survey of these young testers concluded that Swiss culture, Switzerland and the Swiss language are of great significance to them.

Swiss dignity seems to be more important to these children abroad than to teenagers living in Switzerland. In some language surveys, it has been revealed that second-generation Swiss immigrants now abroad are beginning to show a stronger interest in the dialect of their hometown than their parents.

However, during Marty’s visit, this phenomenon was not obvious. She just feels that children growing up abroad have a more idealistic impression of Switzerland than teenagers in Switzerland.

During the investigation of differences with the home country, Marty also noticed that Swiss living abroad are more confident in using standard German than Swiss natives. "In Switzerland, people have mixed emotions when it comes to Standard German."

Swiss abroad, regardless of whether they are young or old, confidently believe that their knowledge of German has improved, is good, or is very good. Although sometimes this is not the case.

In this regard, Marty said: "Although the German level of Swiss children living abroad is not as good as that of children in Switzerland, they are not afraid to speak German. I think the reason is because they do not have the opportunity to interact with people who really speak German. For example, they are far away from Germany, so no one around them speaks better than them."

Swiss abroad do not dislike Germans. The test subjects were also asked about their attitudes towards Germans. It was found that Swiss living abroad had a much more favorable view of Germans than Swiss residents at home.

Finally: "This is an important result of my thesis work, although it does not fully reflect the attitude towards language I want to know. But language and the people who speak it are generally regarded as As one. There is little desire to differentiate from the Germans among foreigners. They appear to be more tolerant and open-minded.”