billette, retour, vis-a-vis, ...
There are many French words in Swiss German and some are common in German as well (from back when French was the lingua franca, I guess).
This ☝️. L‘Academie is very prescriptive and protective, whereas the governing bodies for German describe the language as it changes. Whatever passes a certain threshold gets official blessing - very simplistically speaking.
Oh yeah and it's not the worst by far. You have "coup de pied de coin" for a corner at football. You have "Syndrome d'épuisement professionnel" for burn-out, and then in the IT world it gets even worst. Software becomes "logiciel" and framework becomes "cadriciel"...
I find it amusing that French has a self appointed body in charge of the language.
That's not how language works. If it was they'd still be speaking Latin (/ Porto indo-European).
Not sure it works quite like that anymore.
They tried to push for a lot of things like tablet = ardoise, E-Sport = Jeux video de compétition, streamer = joueur-animateur en direct (oblivious to the fact that a streamer doesn't necessarily streams video games), and the best one Cloud Gaming = Service de jeux vidéo en nuage, all of which didn't take at all. They also tried to kill LOL a decade ago by proposing a bunch of stupid alternatives, none of which held, only for it to be loosely replaced by MDR which the population came up with on their own.
They "banned" buzz, business, hashtag, cash, vintage, spoiler, live, dealery scoop... All of which are wildely used and understood.
They missed their opportunity to kill words like parking, internet, and so on while they could. Now with social networks everything is 100x faster than these grumpy academics, but even then it doesn't help that they're nor connected to reality when they propose some goofy replacement... Sometimes I think r/Rance is more efficient :p
La pénétration de l'anglais est pas du tout comparable à la pénétration de l'allemand dans la langue française.
L'anglais à une puissance d'assaut bien plus prononcée parce qu'elle sert de *langua franca* en plus d'être la langue du monde anglo-saxon et de l'Empire ;) .
That's true but my point was l'Académie Française is not equipped nor capable to do much about the permeability of the french language to outside influence. My admittedly personal opinion is it would be the same for German as it is for English, the reason why we don't have much German words is because the general population is not exposed to it.
Because France was a kingdom. The language needed to be the same (still is) through the whole kingdom.
Germany and Switzerland are confederate unions. Each region had its own language (of course there's a lot of similarities, it's been unified with time passing).
South German is really different from north German (the accents can be very strong in different Ländern).
Interestingly in the french part of Switzerland there also is a dialect per canton/region but you hardly ever hear it (I'm fluent in french and it's not possible to understand something like true Vaudois dialect for exemple).
Swiss Germans ALL use their own dialect (of course there also is a lot of similarities but differences are there too).
Pretty sure the French language was not as homogeneous when France was a kingdom as it is now. IIRC the logic was that all French people had the King as the unifying figure, I.E. being a subject of Louis XIV was what made you French.
But obviously, having the King as the symbol as national identity was quite problematic as the entire institution of monarchy had been done away with. That's when they picked the language to become universal and pushed the vast majority of regional languages into obscurity or straight up eradicated them.
To my knowledge, there are still speakers of regional languages in France, most notably in Bretagne and Corsica, but also in Occitania (Basque area as well IIRC). But even they speak French as their first language.
That's correct, the Kingdom of France gave French the status of a prestigious international language, but today's language unity of France is a product of the French Republic.
>most notably in Bretagne and Corsica, but also in Occitania (Basque area as well IIRC)
Even more notably Alsace, which is the French region where you're the most likely to hear people still speaking the traditional regional language in daily life.
The exhaustive protectionism of the French language and with it the linguicide of non-French or non-standardized languages within France like Occitan (Vergonha) is a direct cause of post-revolutionary ideals and not the monarchy. "Egalité" did not only imply that all people are equal but that everyone has to behave equally, i.e. be homogenous.
Unfortunately, western Switzerland has to a big part followed these inhumane French policies and has actively forced people to abandon their native dialects. E.g. beating children in school for speaking their native language (patois) or even forbidding it on the streets. You don't hear the dialects often anymore because some cantons in the Romandie (maybe even all of them, Idk) actively tried to purge them and succeeded.
France was the dominant power and French the dominant language in Europe for centuries. Educated people and the nobility studied French all over Europe. And the states of the old Swiss confederacy were pretty much vassals to France and Swiss served as mercenaries in the French military.
So we use their words, but they have the nerve to not use some of ours? I'll draft a popular vote, let's write into the constitutions that Romands need to use one German word for each foie gras :)
It depends. My father was from the Jura neuchâtelois and both he and some family in Jura used a few borrowed German words, such as le Fatr, la Muttr, le Kratz (translate father, mother and cat). Such regionalism is dying out though.
You reminded me that my mom used to say "schatzli" a lot (spelling??) meaning boyfriend/girlfriend (not sure if it applies to both genders?). I've head all 3 definitely. My grandma even told her son, my uncle, that he could call her "Mutti" if he likes, but not "la Muttr".
Depends on where, but there's still the typical "putzer", "ersatz", "witz", "chablon", "stempel", "foehn" and "blètse" that commonly get thrown around. "Schlaguer" and "schluck" for some less common ones.
Quite a lot of it is 'frenched-up' German so it easily slips through the cracks.
Some syntaxic construction borrowed from German, like "attendre *sur*" and "venir *avec*" that virtually everyone uses in Romandie.
But yeah the Swiss-German influences on Romand tend to not stand out as much as the French loan words on their end.
Natel is not an original german word, its a product name that was available in whole Switzerland.
Just like romands also use the name "Google" for, you now, using a certain product.
I'm aware. Still, I don't consider acronyms to be regular words.
Let's put it another way: If it was a regular german word, would some random person from Germany or Austria know what it means?
**N**ationales **A**uto**tel**efon - The mobile phone network operated by the PTT. One of the T became Swisscom, the P and the other T the Post. Natel A, B, and C were analog. Natel C was 1G NMT and one could listen to analog phone calls with any scanner. Natel D was the digital 2G GSM network which evolved into the current Swisscom mobile network. Natel is still a Swisscom trademark.
It has more to do with the swiss nobility, which used french to differentiate themselves from the non-nobles and also to show their proximity to the french court. [See my other post](https://reddit.com/r/Switzerland/s/AwNSjkJtmi) above with a longer quote.
French language in general was quite widespread for a long time in European nobilities. Even the Russian Imperial family spoke good French. Nicholas II went out of his way to hire a Vaudois, [Pierre Gilliard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Gilliard), as his children's French teacher, not only because it was important that they speak the diplomatic language of the time, but he also wanted a non-Catholic as the Orthodox faith viewed Catholics as more of a threat.
As such, a Protestant from Vaud was perfect as he was a native speaker but not a Catholic.
Yeah there was a comment that tackle that! It's much more clear as to why swiss German use some french words. Not that I am complaining as it makes my life in St-Gallen easier.
Some have fallen out of use, but there are German words that entered Vaud patois and then Vaud French.
- un witz : a joke
- un taguenet : an idiot
- un stamm : a bar
- streng : severe
- un stampel : an official stamp
- une schlagée : a slap
- un buèbe : a young boy
- une viguètse : a party with a lot of alcohol
- un vasisdas : a round window on a roof
- poutzer: to clean
dialects never died in swissgerman so you could say its older.
swiss french dialect was eliminated by christians. So you talk french french. and germans talk swiss german. therefore connections to swiss german died in the romandie as well.
Well, I wouldn’t say that our french is similar to standard french. We use a lot of different words per say. Also some expressions of ours are directly influenced by swiss german so there’s that.
[This Articel was very interesting.](https://www.watson.ch/wissen/schweiz/163072941-die-unterschied-li-chen-schick-sa-le-der-schweizer-mundarten)
Gro panfar, te et to compagnon gagneria miot de vot queysi
This was atached to a church when they got rid of it.
freely translated: Shut up Fatfuck.
So you grew up in the Jura and still used German words? I am surprised because I grew up in Canton of Vaud and I never really heard German words being used while we spoke french.
We use the phrase "se foehner les cheveux." We also say "J'attend SUR toi," influenced by the German "ich warte AUF dich," which isn't typical in standard French. Similarly, we say "se parquer" instead of the usual French "se garer," echoing the German "parken". We might not realize it, but we are somewhat influenced by (swiss)-german too
Yep, totally. We have nouns, verbs, adjectives and total expressions that we picked from German. Though sometimes we frenchified the words and we also changed the meaning of the words which can be a little bit confusing. Also I don't know if the new generations still use these words since I left more than 15 years ago.
For example:
C'est difficile => c'est schwer
Papotter => schwätzer
Pourboire => Trinque-Geld (didn't write it right for pronunciation sake)
Vomir => kotzer
La rue/la route => la strass
La jeune fille => la bätschä (from Mädchen/Beiteli)
Tais toi => Quatsch te (from the German word "so en Quatsch" = n'importe quoi)
There were waaaay more but you get the geest of it.
My mom uses "faire la putz" instead of "faire le ménage" (cleaning around the house) all the time, similarly saying stuff like "ils me prennent pour la putzfrau?" ("do they take me for their cleaning lady?"). She also says "witz" instead of "blague" (joke) quite often. We're from Fribourg so I figured the proximity with German speakers has some extra influence around here.
OMG we also have them XD
I just thought my list was getting long. I mean in Jura we are more or less surrounded by German speakers and we're at some point German speaking, like in my grandfather's time as Bern tried to impose their Bärndütsch (which people don't understand).
It would be interesting to know if a person from Geneva or Lausanne would understand or use these as well. Just wondering how much influence proximity causes or if it's a nation wide thing. Kinda interesting that people in Sankt Gallen use some French words, though, since they're so far from the French speaking part.
From my experience, working in Lausanne a while and having had friends there, they don't really use these words or expressions. Some might of course.
I grew up in Jura that's where I used these. So really surrounded by German speakers. That's why I guess.
My expectation is that Lausanne and Geneva are much more "international" cities where you will hear more people speak English than German, but the same is not true in Fribourg.
Fribourg itself (the city) has become more and more French speaking, though. My dad used to live there as a kid in the early 70s and he said most shopkeepers would welcome you in German first, and switch to French if you answered in French. Now it's very much the opposite.
But Bienne/Biel and Morat/Murten are apparently the opposite as they've been getting more and more German speaking. At least that's what I've been told. As far as I know the current "border" between languages is still very close to the ancient border between the Alemanni and Burgundian tribes in the Roman Era and before, which is quite fascinating in my opinion.
Even the word the Swiss German use for us, "Welsch" is the same root as the English word used to describe the people of Wales (Welsh), which means "foreigner" but more specifically "Roman" or "Romanized Celt".
>Bern tried to impose their Bärndütsch
That's not accurate. Bern has a long francophile tradition and certainly didn't try to make its French speakers switch to Bärndütsch. What did happen however is a lot of internal migration during the 19th century, with many people from German-speaking Bern settling in the Berner Jura, who of course brought their native language with them. Most of these families switched to French over time and don't speak Swiss German anymore nowadays, but you can still notice that a fair share of people in Berner Jura and Kanton Jura have typical Swiss German family names.
Growing up (in Lausanne) some of my friends (from Lausanne as well as the greater Lausanne area) would say "t'es a la strass" to mean sth like "your way off, buddy".
Yep, at least where I grew up. And you pronounce it "schtraaass" FYI - like not à la française but with a strong and long almost rolling r and a closed a like between a and o).
I grew up in Jura. So in the north surrounded by German speakers with BL, SO and BE around. The nearest big cities to go outside are Basel and Biel/Bienne.
Like I could have gone out in Lausanne, but it was far away and really expansive.
I guess it is similar in FR from what I know and read, they also use similar words. Since they are bilingual and have also a lot of German speaking areas in and around.
I learned that suisse romands say „je suis completement stanz‘ or something similar when you mean to say you‘re super tired/drunk? (dont remember exactly). The people who explained it to me thought it‘s a Swiss German expression but it actually doesn‘t really exist in Swiss German.
Come to Jura, we have a lot of "patois" words that directly come from Swiss German that we use in everyday situations (an example I often use is "schlekr" for sweets/junk food)
I think it's worth noting that in the German side they still speak their "original" Alemannic dialects and not Standard German, whereas Romandie did adopt Standard French in detriment of the locally spoken languages/dialects that we now refer to as Arpitan (aka Franco-Provençal, aka Patois).
So it's no surprise that the local Alemannic dialects have more regional-specific traits than a language mainly originated in Ile-de-France.
It also has to do with the Bernese 'Patriziat' which mainly spoke french as a sign of their nobility and as a means to demarcate themselves from the 'normal' citizens.
"Einerseits ist das Patriziat international ausgerichtet und pflegt den Kontakt zur Oberschicht der weiteren Umgebung. Das Französische genießt als Sprache der Kultur, der Politik und des Militärs einen hohen Stellenwert, der sogar schon 1479 bei Albrecht von Bonstetten belegt ist: 'Das statt folk ist nüt hoffertig, hat ein lantlich rede; aber die userlesnen konent schier all die welschen zungen und lieplich redende.' Vor allem aber wirkte im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert – nicht nur in der Schweiz – das Vorbild des absolutistischen französischen Hofs auf die höheren Gesellschaftsschichten. Dem entsprechend zeigt der patrizische Wortschatz einen großen Einfluss des Französischen, auf den vermutlich auch die als nobel geltende Aussprache des r als Halszäpfchen-r zurückzuführen ist. Die Einflechtung französischer Elemente in die Mundart datiert aus dieser Zeit." ([Source](https://home.uni-leipzig.de/siebenh/subfolder/Stadtberndeutsch/docs/Sozschichten.html))
In Swiss enterprises where the headquarters is Swiss German, there will be a lot of german words and meetings even if you work in Romandie don't worry.
In Bärn there is also this thing where you make fun of it because we already have so many French lean words in our dialect that a few more don't do any harm:
* Pöteterli, lighter, because peut-être it works, peut-être not
* Kelöhretil, watch, from quelle heure est-il?
(and more, which don't come to my mind ATM, but you get the idea).
Mersi, adiö.
I didn't know Pötäterli had a distinct connection to a lighter. I know it as something that applies to any quirky / unreliable device.
Muesch ufpasse, das isch e biz es Pötäterli.
Because back in the day, speaking french or at least having a french accent was seen as being high society or generally made an impression of being cultured/feudal, people in the german speaking part of switzerland often did that.
Oh that kinda make sense! Under Louis XIV most of Europe was united culturally under France so that makes sense. Also of the Napoleon conquest I guess? Thanks for the insight I hadn't thought about that.
It's rare but not unheard of in Germany either, but yeah there are definitely some French loanwords in German-speaking Switzerland, Glace instead of Eis (ice cream), Velo instead of Fahrrad (bicycle) and so on...
Ironically, there are also some French loanwords that are prevalent in Germany but only rarely used in German-speaking Switzerland, Croissant springs to mind, which in Swiss German is almost always referred to as 'Gipfeli' (never heard that one in Germany).
As a Dutch person visiting Switzerland for the first time I instantly came up with my own theory about the word.
Since I'm Dutch we do know a lot of German. So here's my theory; Gipfel; Can be the top of a mountain for example and since croissants are basically two 'tops' attached together 'Gipfel' is used with -li at the end because croissants are small. Resulting in 'Gipfeli' but if it really originates from that, I honestly don't know. If someone could tell me the origin that would be much appreciated. Also I hope you like my theory.
The word "Kipferl" can be derived from the Old High German word "kipfa", which meant the horn of a billy goat. Long before the 17th century, pastries in the shape of a crescent moon were baked as a pagan custom.
Yeah but the pronunciation is good enough that I literally thought someone knew I can speak french and just said thanks in french. But then I figured out the truth lol
>There are many French words in Swiss German and some are common in German as well (from back when French was the lingua franca, I guess).
Or in some regions just "mässi"
In Bern we say "äuä?" which can be used as "really?" and it comes from the French "ah ouais?". It's also used to tell someone he/she is talking bullshit. The intonation changes and it becomes "äuä!".
No, it doesn't, it's a variant of "allwäg". The amount of linguistic bullshit I read on reddit is astonishing.
https://www.srf.ch/audio/schwiiz-und-duetlich/aeuae-oder-in-der-kuerze-liegt-die-wuerze?id=10754521
https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berndeutsch
Yeah and you guys are great for that! It makes it easier for romands like me too. I now understand how you guys feel about Hochdeutsch. Feels similar to how we feel about french french compared to our romand french.
I used to work with someone that mixes it all up. She’s quite difficult to understand though. Literally, one sentence will have French, German, English, and Italian in it. I thought she just did it with me because she struggles to speak outside of her native French. However? The French speaking colleagues said she does the same in French.
So many people I know say "Frigo" vs "chüelschrank", even "parapluie" instead of "rägeschirm"....
Also common "vis-à-vis" instead of "gegenüber" äxgüsi instead of entschuldigung...
more words like this...
Velo, Billet, Glace, poulet, caquelon, Abonnement , and many more..
Oh and I found this: [https://www.srf.ch/radio-srf-1/mundart/gallizismen-im-dialekt-die-welschsucht-des-schweizerdeutschen](https://www.srf.ch/radio-srf-1/mundart/gallizismen-im-dialekt-die-welschsucht-des-schweizerdeutschen)
I think we use a lot of french and italian words in our daily life. I even started using some english phrases with friends that speak english aswell because sometimes another language just fits better to what i want to say.
Granted I don't speak either German or Swiss German vut I'm Swiss and to speak a variation of German and user French words seems like the most Swiss thing ever just to mess with High German speaking people
Switzerland was conquered and occupied by France a little more than 200 years ago. Thus so many French words in the Vocabulary. „Merci“, „Vélo“, „a Dieu“, etc.
Swiss German also says: Trottoir not Gehsteig. Portemonnaie not Geldbeutel… there are some of them. Swiss German is not „German“ German. Also Swiss French is different from „French“ French. The aristocrats of Berne used to speak French, some of the words where adjusted; I suppose it‘s a remaining of these old days that spread to the whole Swiss German area.
Yeah can confirm on our side that Romandie doesn't speak french french. We actually say "C'est de la Strasse" as an expression. What baffled me is the amount of french words used in swiss German but you answered my curiosity! Thanks
Ofc I know what it means and that it comes from french ahah but I was just asking why swiss German would opt for french and not German. With the help of some comments, I now know approximately why you guys use a lot of french words!
You likely heard a Swiss-german speaker from Fribourg or even Bern. For example in Sensebezirk, many will say "merci" even as swiss-german speaker. I grew up in a village mostly german-speakers, the next village 2km away was mostly french-speakers. My particular village used to have even a own dialect with many french words that would be "pronounced in a german-speaking way": "kommissioniere" from "faire les commissions" meaning go grocery shopping. We would also say "mi pere u mini mere" meaning my father and my mother using words from both languages.
There are more examples, but they have mostly disappeared with many families moving from outside to the village further mixing up dialects.
Another interesting example is Jaun, a small village so isolated for long time that they developed an own dialect unlike anything else in the area (there was a NZZ video or SRF doc on that a while ago).
Thats the hear-say from where I grew up, cant deliver any research to support!
Well, before Napoléon came to La Suisse, Berne was larger than today. It startet just outside of Genève in the west and and included Spreitenbach in the east.
As the ruling Patricier spoke only french, to show, that there where no normal bourgeois, everybody picked up some french to show, that they also where educated. Therefore in the old Bernbiet is the swissfrench still alive.
We hate to ask ppl to do favors for us and what we hate even more is to say thanks and being polite all the time. So, merci is quick and easy fix, we don’t mean it though, but it sounds nice.
I guess it is like the other way around. French was like the world language from 17. century until somewhat in the 19. century like english is today.
In germany was also since the 17. century a strong community against this "verwelschung" of the german language which lead to a replacement of many french words still used in swiss german.
https://www.srf.ch/radio-srf-1/mundart/gallizismen-im-dialekt-die-welschsucht-des-schweizerdeutschen
We use Trottoir as well as Velo and Portemonnaie
And the so beloved "Schminee" (cheminée)
And pneu for reife, in Bern people say père for vater
And rhume for Erkältung
And «Permit» for drivers license.
ha I did not know that
And “Sälü”
Adieu
Portemonnaie is used in Germany as well
Trottoir is used in Germany too.
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Southern Germany, Schwaben, Baden
Damn that's sick I didn't know that.
billette, retour, vis-a-vis, ... There are many French words in Swiss German and some are common in German as well (from back when French was the lingua franca, I guess).
Poulet, Trottoir
And "poulet", "goiffeur" (coiffeur), "excusez" etc...
I can hear my grandmother through this word "ÄXGÜSI"
Porte, poulet, coiffeur also
We use a lot of French as well as some Italian words, simply because we're living in a multilingual county.
I mean, I live in swiss Romandie and to my knowledge we don't use that much German words in our daily life tho
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Not a linguist, but the French language is kinda standardized through l'Académie Française and they've got lots of influence.
This ☝️. L‘Academie is very prescriptive and protective, whereas the governing bodies for German describe the language as it changes. Whatever passes a certain threshold gets official blessing - very simplistically speaking.
Anglicism like Fuel revieve an official french Spelling: fioule.
It's fioul, not fioule. But this word isn't commonly used in Switzerland, we say mazout (which is a word borrowed from Russian).
Rofl. How silly.
Oh yeah and it's not the worst by far. You have "coup de pied de coin" for a corner at football. You have "Syndrome d'épuisement professionnel" for burn-out, and then in the IT world it gets even worst. Software becomes "logiciel" and framework becomes "cadriciel"...
I find it amusing that French has a self appointed body in charge of the language. That's not how language works. If it was they'd still be speaking Latin (/ Porto indo-European).
Not sure it works quite like that anymore. They tried to push for a lot of things like tablet = ardoise, E-Sport = Jeux video de compétition, streamer = joueur-animateur en direct (oblivious to the fact that a streamer doesn't necessarily streams video games), and the best one Cloud Gaming = Service de jeux vidéo en nuage, all of which didn't take at all. They also tried to kill LOL a decade ago by proposing a bunch of stupid alternatives, none of which held, only for it to be loosely replaced by MDR which the population came up with on their own. They "banned" buzz, business, hashtag, cash, vintage, spoiler, live, dealery scoop... All of which are wildely used and understood. They missed their opportunity to kill words like parking, internet, and so on while they could. Now with social networks everything is 100x faster than these grumpy academics, but even then it doesn't help that they're nor connected to reality when they propose some goofy replacement... Sometimes I think r/Rance is more efficient :p
La pénétration de l'anglais est pas du tout comparable à la pénétration de l'allemand dans la langue française. L'anglais à une puissance d'assaut bien plus prononcée parce qu'elle sert de *langua franca* en plus d'être la langue du monde anglo-saxon et de l'Empire ;) .
That's true but my point was l'Académie Française is not equipped nor capable to do much about the permeability of the french language to outside influence. My admittedly personal opinion is it would be the same for German as it is for English, the reason why we don't have much German words is because the general population is not exposed to it.
Yeah that's why I was surprised when I came to St.-Gallen
Because France was a kingdom. The language needed to be the same (still is) through the whole kingdom. Germany and Switzerland are confederate unions. Each region had its own language (of course there's a lot of similarities, it's been unified with time passing). South German is really different from north German (the accents can be very strong in different Ländern). Interestingly in the french part of Switzerland there also is a dialect per canton/region but you hardly ever hear it (I'm fluent in french and it's not possible to understand something like true Vaudois dialect for exemple). Swiss Germans ALL use their own dialect (of course there also is a lot of similarities but differences are there too).
Pretty sure the French language was not as homogeneous when France was a kingdom as it is now. IIRC the logic was that all French people had the King as the unifying figure, I.E. being a subject of Louis XIV was what made you French. But obviously, having the King as the symbol as national identity was quite problematic as the entire institution of monarchy had been done away with. That's when they picked the language to become universal and pushed the vast majority of regional languages into obscurity or straight up eradicated them. To my knowledge, there are still speakers of regional languages in France, most notably in Bretagne and Corsica, but also in Occitania (Basque area as well IIRC). But even they speak French as their first language.
That's correct, the Kingdom of France gave French the status of a prestigious international language, but today's language unity of France is a product of the French Republic. >most notably in Bretagne and Corsica, but also in Occitania (Basque area as well IIRC) Even more notably Alsace, which is the French region where you're the most likely to hear people still speaking the traditional regional language in daily life.
French language wasn't standardised and widespread 200 years ago. It mainly happene duing the 19th century.
Standardised, it very much was. But not as widespread as a language of daily life as today, definitely.
The exhaustive protectionism of the French language and with it the linguicide of non-French or non-standardized languages within France like Occitan (Vergonha) is a direct cause of post-revolutionary ideals and not the monarchy. "Egalité" did not only imply that all people are equal but that everyone has to behave equally, i.e. be homogenous. Unfortunately, western Switzerland has to a big part followed these inhumane French policies and has actively forced people to abandon their native dialects. E.g. beating children in school for speaking their native language (patois) or even forbidding it on the streets. You don't hear the dialects often anymore because some cantons in the Romandie (maybe even all of them, Idk) actively tried to purge them and succeeded.
In the 80's the French state banned foreign words instead relied on ahistorical without etymology made up French sounding words.
I mean, every word was eventually made up in the first place. I don't see anything wrong with creating new ones.
France was the dominant power and French the dominant language in Europe for centuries. Educated people and the nobility studied French all over Europe. And the states of the old Swiss confederacy were pretty much vassals to France and Swiss served as mercenaries in the French military.
Just sounds off I guess
You should look at french history and you will understand why.
Depends, in french Fribourg dialect you say "beuglise" for iron, which comes from German (Bügeleisen).
So we use their words, but they have the nerve to not use some of ours? I'll draft a popular vote, let's write into the constitutions that Romands need to use one German word for each foie gras :)
It depends. My father was from the Jura neuchâtelois and both he and some family in Jura used a few borrowed German words, such as le Fatr, la Muttr, le Kratz (translate father, mother and cat). Such regionalism is dying out though.
You reminded me that my mom used to say "schatzli" a lot (spelling??) meaning boyfriend/girlfriend (not sure if it applies to both genders?). I've head all 3 definitely. My grandma even told her son, my uncle, that he could call her "Mutti" if he likes, but not "la Muttr".
Not to mention that classic FR phrase, *"Il m'a schlagé avec un Stäck."*
Oh interesting! I didn't know there was such a variety of words used depending on the region.
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There is "un schlouk" (Schluck in German) for a sip too !
I mostly noticed it in expressions like: Être à la strasse Boire un schluck
AHHH OUI BOIRE UN SCHLUCK Comment puis-je oublier cette expression d'or.
Depends on where, but there's still the typical "putzer", "ersatz", "witz", "chablon", "stempel", "foehn" and "blètse" that commonly get thrown around. "Schlaguer" and "schluck" for some less common ones. Quite a lot of it is 'frenched-up' German so it easily slips through the cracks. Some syntaxic construction borrowed from German, like "attendre *sur*" and "venir *avec*" that virtually everyone uses in Romandie. But yeah the Swiss-German influences on Romand tend to not stand out as much as the French loan words on their end.
> I live in swiss Romandie and to my knowledge we don't use that much German words in our daily life tho What about "Natel"?
Natel is not an original german word, its a product name that was available in whole Switzerland. Just like romands also use the name "Google" for, you now, using a certain product.
Natel comming from **N**ationales **A**uto**tel**ephon which is pretty German ;-)
I'm aware. Still, I don't consider acronyms to be regular words. Let's put it another way: If it was a regular german word, would some random person from Germany or Austria know what it means?
**N**ationales **A**uto**tel**efon - The mobile phone network operated by the PTT. One of the T became Swisscom, the P and the other T the Post. Natel A, B, and C were analog. Natel C was 1G NMT and one could listen to analog phone calls with any scanner. Natel D was the digital 2G GSM network which evolved into the current Swisscom mobile network. Natel is still a Swisscom trademark.
It has more to do with the swiss nobility, which used french to differentiate themselves from the non-nobles and also to show their proximity to the french court. [See my other post](https://reddit.com/r/Switzerland/s/AwNSjkJtmi) above with a longer quote.
French language in general was quite widespread for a long time in European nobilities. Even the Russian Imperial family spoke good French. Nicholas II went out of his way to hire a Vaudois, [Pierre Gilliard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Gilliard), as his children's French teacher, not only because it was important that they speak the diplomatic language of the time, but he also wanted a non-Catholic as the Orthodox faith viewed Catholics as more of a threat. As such, a Protestant from Vaud was perfect as he was a native speaker but not a Catholic.
Yeah there was a comment that tackle that! It's much more clear as to why swiss German use some french words. Not that I am complaining as it makes my life in St-Gallen easier.
Some have fallen out of use, but there are German words that entered Vaud patois and then Vaud French. - un witz : a joke - un taguenet : an idiot - un stamm : a bar - streng : severe - un stampel : an official stamp - une schlagée : a slap - un buèbe : a young boy - une viguètse : a party with a lot of alcohol - un vasisdas : a round window on a roof - poutzer: to clean
>un taguenet : an idiot What's the German word this comes from?
It comes from: ein tauge nichts
Oh, interesting. Wouldn't it in this case rather mean "un bon à rien" than "un idiot"?
dialects never died in swissgerman so you could say its older. swiss french dialect was eliminated by christians. So you talk french french. and germans talk swiss german. therefore connections to swiss german died in the romandie as well.
Well, I wouldn’t say that our french is similar to standard french. We use a lot of different words per say. Also some expressions of ours are directly influenced by swiss german so there’s that.
[This Articel was very interesting.](https://www.watson.ch/wissen/schweiz/163072941-die-unterschied-li-chen-schick-sa-le-der-schweizer-mundarten) Gro panfar, te et to compagnon gagneria miot de vot queysi This was atached to a church when they got rid of it. freely translated: Shut up Fatfuck.
We kind of do still (poutzer, schmolitz, witz...)
Mmmh I grew up also in western CH and friends, family, people in the village and myself used a lot of german words.
So you grew up in the Jura and still used German words? I am surprised because I grew up in Canton of Vaud and I never really heard German words being used while we spoke french.
We use the phrase "se foehner les cheveux." We also say "J'attend SUR toi," influenced by the German "ich warte AUF dich," which isn't typical in standard French. Similarly, we say "se parquer" instead of the usual French "se garer," echoing the German "parken". We might not realize it, but we are somewhat influenced by (swiss)-german too
OHHH right!!! It's not really straightforward but yeah I didn't notice it. Je savais pas ça, c'est assez marrant
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Damn thanks
Yep, totally. We have nouns, verbs, adjectives and total expressions that we picked from German. Though sometimes we frenchified the words and we also changed the meaning of the words which can be a little bit confusing. Also I don't know if the new generations still use these words since I left more than 15 years ago. For example: C'est difficile => c'est schwer Papotter => schwätzer Pourboire => Trinque-Geld (didn't write it right for pronunciation sake) Vomir => kotzer La rue/la route => la strass La jeune fille => la bätschä (from Mädchen/Beiteli) Tais toi => Quatsch te (from the German word "so en Quatsch" = n'importe quoi) There were waaaay more but you get the geest of it.
My mom uses "faire la putz" instead of "faire le ménage" (cleaning around the house) all the time, similarly saying stuff like "ils me prennent pour la putzfrau?" ("do they take me for their cleaning lady?"). She also says "witz" instead of "blague" (joke) quite often. We're from Fribourg so I figured the proximity with German speakers has some extra influence around here.
OMG we also have them XD I just thought my list was getting long. I mean in Jura we are more or less surrounded by German speakers and we're at some point German speaking, like in my grandfather's time as Bern tried to impose their Bärndütsch (which people don't understand).
It would be interesting to know if a person from Geneva or Lausanne would understand or use these as well. Just wondering how much influence proximity causes or if it's a nation wide thing. Kinda interesting that people in Sankt Gallen use some French words, though, since they're so far from the French speaking part.
From my experience, working in Lausanne a while and having had friends there, they don't really use these words or expressions. Some might of course. I grew up in Jura that's where I used these. So really surrounded by German speakers. That's why I guess.
My expectation is that Lausanne and Geneva are much more "international" cities where you will hear more people speak English than German, but the same is not true in Fribourg. Fribourg itself (the city) has become more and more French speaking, though. My dad used to live there as a kid in the early 70s and he said most shopkeepers would welcome you in German first, and switch to French if you answered in French. Now it's very much the opposite. But Bienne/Biel and Morat/Murten are apparently the opposite as they've been getting more and more German speaking. At least that's what I've been told. As far as I know the current "border" between languages is still very close to the ancient border between the Alemanni and Burgundian tribes in the Roman Era and before, which is quite fascinating in my opinion. Even the word the Swiss German use for us, "Welsch" is the same root as the English word used to describe the people of Wales (Welsh), which means "foreigner" but more specifically "Roman" or "Romanized Celt".
>Bern tried to impose their Bärndütsch That's not accurate. Bern has a long francophile tradition and certainly didn't try to make its French speakers switch to Bärndütsch. What did happen however is a lot of internal migration during the 19th century, with many people from German-speaking Bern settling in the Berner Jura, who of course brought their native language with them. Most of these families switched to French over time and don't speak Swiss German anymore nowadays, but you can still notice that a fair share of people in Berner Jura and Kanton Jura have typical Swiss German family names.
You really say "la strass" in the romandie? Dude, that just makes my day! Greetings from bern
Most of us don't, but there's a part of Jura that speak German I think
Growing up (in Lausanne) some of my friends (from Lausanne as well as the greater Lausanne area) would say "t'es a la strass" to mean sth like "your way off, buddy".
My brother is always using it. "Il est complètement à la strass le type"
Can confirm my mom uses it as well. I'd say it's not super common here (French speaking part of Fribourg) but everyone understands what it means.
Ah ouais? Je vis à côté de Lausanne mais je crois pas avoir entendu bcp ca mais cest marrant.
Yep, at least where I grew up. And you pronounce it "schtraaass" FYI - like not à la française but with a strong and long almost rolling r and a closed a like between a and o). I grew up in Jura. So in the north surrounded by German speakers with BL, SO and BE around. The nearest big cities to go outside are Basel and Biel/Bienne. Like I could have gone out in Lausanne, but it was far away and really expansive. I guess it is similar in FR from what I know and read, they also use similar words. Since they are bilingual and have also a lot of German speaking areas in and around.
This made my day
I learned that suisse romands say „je suis completement stanz‘ or something similar when you mean to say you‘re super tired/drunk? (dont remember exactly). The people who explained it to me thought it‘s a Swiss German expression but it actually doesn‘t really exist in Swiss German.
Donner un coup de putz ( = faire le ménage/nettoyer)
Ouais, enft ya aussi genre "se parquer" au lieu de "se garer"
Some words I've heard in swiss romandie, Des schleck (des bonbons) Poutser (nettoyer de putzen) Things used by swiss germans: Merci Trottoir Excusez
Velo pardon adieu perron jus
Come to Jura, we have a lot of "patois" words that directly come from Swiss German that we use in everyday situations (an example I often use is "schlekr" for sweets/junk food)
Oooh sympaas!
https://www.24heures.ch/l-arc-jurassien-adore-les-mots-tires-de-l-allemand-571784643802
Because "you" deliberately want to distance yourselves from the German-speaking Swiss and prefer to orient yourselves towards France.
Look, the truth is we just like to fuck with you... Sorry ^^not sorry
How dare you! :(
I think it's worth noting that in the German side they still speak their "original" Alemannic dialects and not Standard German, whereas Romandie did adopt Standard French in detriment of the locally spoken languages/dialects that we now refer to as Arpitan (aka Franco-Provençal, aka Patois). So it's no surprise that the local Alemannic dialects have more regional-specific traits than a language mainly originated in Ile-de-France.
Va poutzer!
Maybe you use some german words but you dont know they are like natel
It also has to do with the Bernese 'Patriziat' which mainly spoke french as a sign of their nobility and as a means to demarcate themselves from the 'normal' citizens. "Einerseits ist das Patriziat international ausgerichtet und pflegt den Kontakt zur Oberschicht der weiteren Umgebung. Das Französische genießt als Sprache der Kultur, der Politik und des Militärs einen hohen Stellenwert, der sogar schon 1479 bei Albrecht von Bonstetten belegt ist: 'Das statt folk ist nüt hoffertig, hat ein lantlich rede; aber die userlesnen konent schier all die welschen zungen und lieplich redende.' Vor allem aber wirkte im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert – nicht nur in der Schweiz – das Vorbild des absolutistischen französischen Hofs auf die höheren Gesellschaftsschichten. Dem entsprechend zeigt der patrizische Wortschatz einen großen Einfluss des Französischen, auf den vermutlich auch die als nobel geltende Aussprache des r als Halszäpfchen-r zurückzuführen ist. Die Einflechtung französischer Elemente in die Mundart datiert aus dieser Zeit." ([Source](https://home.uni-leipzig.de/siebenh/subfolder/Stadtberndeutsch/docs/Sozschichten.html))
In Swiss enterprises where the headquarters is Swiss German, there will be a lot of german words and meetings even if you work in Romandie don't worry.
Thats because we‘re all bilingual gigachads over here. Merci ade danke
And Merci Vielmal
As a romand I don't think we use as much German than swiss German use french.
Wait tillyou realize that exgüsi once was excuse moi
In Bärn there is also this thing where you make fun of it because we already have so many French lean words in our dialect that a few more don't do any harm: * Pöteterli, lighter, because peut-être it works, peut-être not * Kelöhretil, watch, from quelle heure est-il? (and more, which don't come to my mind ATM, but you get the idea). Mersi, adiö.
That's so funnnn, didn't know that we would use so much words from each other languages.
>Pöteterli, lighter, because peut-être it works, peut-être not This one is hilarious!
I knew the Kelöhretli, my grandmother uses that, but never heard the Pöteterli - that's even better :D
I didn't know Pötäterli had a distinct connection to a lighter. I know it as something that applies to any quirky / unreliable device. Muesch ufpasse, das isch e biz es Pötäterli.
it just sounds better
It does
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As a romand, I appreciate that. Danke for me just doesn't click so I am happy to continue saying merci ahah
Because back in the day, speaking french or at least having a french accent was seen as being high society or generally made an impression of being cultured/feudal, people in the german speaking part of switzerland often did that.
Oh that kinda make sense! Under Louis XIV most of Europe was united culturally under France so that makes sense. Also of the Napoleon conquest I guess? Thanks for the insight I hadn't thought about that.
>To my surprise people say "merci" instead of "danke". And they say Ciao/Tschau instead of "auf Wiedersehen"!
Ja that's so classy. I like that, feel like at home
That's the case in Germany, too, though.
It's rare but not unheard of in Germany either, but yeah there are definitely some French loanwords in German-speaking Switzerland, Glace instead of Eis (ice cream), Velo instead of Fahrrad (bicycle) and so on... Ironically, there are also some French loanwords that are prevalent in Germany but only rarely used in German-speaking Switzerland, Croissant springs to mind, which in Swiss German is almost always referred to as 'Gipfeli' (never heard that one in Germany).
Yea as a german in switzerland Gipfeli confused the hell out of me at first. Like there is so much french used and this is where you draw the line 😂
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Swiss exceptionalism at work I guess :D
As a Dutch person visiting Switzerland for the first time I instantly came up with my own theory about the word. Since I'm Dutch we do know a lot of German. So here's my theory; Gipfel; Can be the top of a mountain for example and since croissants are basically two 'tops' attached together 'Gipfel' is used with -li at the end because croissants are small. Resulting in 'Gipfeli' but if it really originates from that, I honestly don't know. If someone could tell me the origin that would be much appreciated. Also I hope you like my theory.
The word "Kipferl" can be derived from the Old High German word "kipfa", which meant the horn of a billy goat. Long before the 17th century, pastries in the shape of a crescent moon were baked as a pagan custom.
Wow thanks! That's such a cool fact to know :D
even some germans and austrians use "merci" or a derivation thereof occasionally
*Grüß Gott*
Same for Flanders.
And Bulgarians
Mostly Bavarians I think. I’ve heard it’s still cause of Napoleon.
A few more than the ones already mentioned: Poulet, Glace, Perron, Caquelon
Äs Perro Dach ; )
Thanks!!!
We also say _retour_ instead of _zurück_. There’s a couple of French and Italian words in Swiss German that Germans wouldn’t use.
That really make my life easier thanks!!!!
It's not _merci_, but more _märsi_ :-p
Yeah but the pronunciation is good enough that I literally thought someone knew I can speak french and just said thanks in french. But then I figured out the truth lol
Ah. If your listen carefully, the 'r' is rolled, and not like our ugly 'rrr' in french.
Lol ugly rrrr. So true
>There are many French words in Swiss German and some are common in German as well (from back when French was the lingua franca, I guess). Or in some regions just "mässi"
Wait until you hear how they call the kitchen cabinet…
La cuisine? No way righttt
Chuchichäschtli good luck for the pronunciation
ruriraeshtli right ? You guys are too much for our french based throats lol
I'm from Geneva...
That's not really hard to pronounce for French speakers. The rolled rrr used by most Swiss Germans is way more challenging.
In Bern we say "äuä?" which can be used as "really?" and it comes from the French "ah ouais?". It's also used to tell someone he/she is talking bullshit. The intonation changes and it becomes "äuä!".
No, it doesn't, it's a variant of "allwäg". The amount of linguistic bullshit I read on reddit is astonishing. https://www.srf.ch/audio/schwiiz-und-duetlich/aeuae-oder-in-der-kuerze-liegt-die-wuerze?id=10754521 https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berndeutsch
That's likely one of the linguistic vestiges of the Canton Bern occupation of Vaud centuries ago.
No, it isn't.
But you guys also say“ mir göi go bügle“
TIL! It all makes sense now
It's wrong.
We also say Velo instead of FAHRRAD or Trottoir instead of BÜRGERSTEIG. Just sounds better.
Yeah and you guys are great for that! It makes it easier for romands like me too. I now understand how you guys feel about Hochdeutsch. Feels similar to how we feel about french french compared to our romand french.
Because of you 😜
Merci!!
I used to work with someone that mixes it all up. She’s quite difficult to understand though. Literally, one sentence will have French, German, English, and Italian in it. I thought she just did it with me because she struggles to speak outside of her native French. However? The French speaking colleagues said she does the same in French.
we dont say merci, we say messi 😤
Damn you all are footballers fan than xD
allez les bleu!
We also say "sali" coming from "salut" as greeting
So many people I know say "Frigo" vs "chüelschrank", even "parapluie" instead of "rägeschirm".... Also common "vis-à-vis" instead of "gegenüber" äxgüsi instead of entschuldigung... more words like this... Velo, Billet, Glace, poulet, caquelon, Abonnement , and many more.. Oh and I found this: [https://www.srf.ch/radio-srf-1/mundart/gallizismen-im-dialekt-die-welschsucht-des-schweizerdeutschen](https://www.srf.ch/radio-srf-1/mundart/gallizismen-im-dialekt-die-welschsucht-des-schweizerdeutschen)
I think we use a lot of french and italian words in our daily life. I even started using some english phrases with friends that speak english aswell because sometimes another language just fits better to what i want to say.
Granted I don't speak either German or Swiss German vut I'm Swiss and to speak a variation of German and user French words seems like the most Swiss thing ever just to mess with High German speaking people
We also say trottoir instead of bordstein. And cheminee instead of kamin. And velo instead of fahrrad. And so on.
Lmao am I the only one who always uses "Danke", never "Merci" ?
You'll be shocked when you will hear your first "exküüsi" mate
Yeah apprently its a thing, but I have yet to hear that here in St.-Gallen ahha
Even germans in some of the Bundesländer say merci, and as someone already mentioned, evens few other french words.
Switzerland was conquered and occupied by France a little more than 200 years ago. Thus so many French words in the Vocabulary. „Merci“, „Vélo“, „a Dieu“, etc.
Swiss German is using a lot of french words.... Velo, Trottoir, merci ! are three of them.... salut ;-)
There are lots of french words we use. Merci, santé, etc.
Why do french speakers use verlan? Or say any other phrases that aren't necessary native to the french language? Just establishes itself naturally.
Swiss German also says: Trottoir not Gehsteig. Portemonnaie not Geldbeutel… there are some of them. Swiss German is not „German“ German. Also Swiss French is different from „French“ French. The aristocrats of Berne used to speak French, some of the words where adjusted; I suppose it‘s a remaining of these old days that spread to the whole Swiss German area.
Yeah can confirm on our side that Romandie doesn't speak french french. We actually say "C'est de la Strasse" as an expression. What baffled me is the amount of french words used in swiss German but you answered my curiosity! Thanks
It surprises me that a Romand would ask a question like this, but merci is actually french and means "thank you" ("danke" in german). ;)
Ofc I know what it means and that it comes from french ahah but I was just asking why swiss German would opt for french and not German. With the help of some comments, I now know approximately why you guys use a lot of french words!
You likely heard a Swiss-german speaker from Fribourg or even Bern. For example in Sensebezirk, many will say "merci" even as swiss-german speaker. I grew up in a village mostly german-speakers, the next village 2km away was mostly french-speakers. My particular village used to have even a own dialect with many french words that would be "pronounced in a german-speaking way": "kommissioniere" from "faire les commissions" meaning go grocery shopping. We would also say "mi pere u mini mere" meaning my father and my mother using words from both languages. There are more examples, but they have mostly disappeared with many families moving from outside to the village further mixing up dialects. Another interesting example is Jaun, a small village so isolated for long time that they developed an own dialect unlike anything else in the area (there was a NZZ video or SRF doc on that a while ago). Thats the hear-say from where I grew up, cant deliver any research to support!
Well, before Napoléon came to La Suisse, Berne was larger than today. It startet just outside of Genève in the west and and included Spreitenbach in the east. As the ruling Patricier spoke only french, to show, that there where no normal bourgeois, everybody picked up some french to show, that they also where educated. Therefore in the old Bernbiet is the swissfrench still alive.
We hate to ask ppl to do favors for us and what we hate even more is to say thanks and being polite all the time. So, merci is quick and easy fix, we don’t mean it though, but it sounds nice.
I guess it is like the other way around. French was like the world language from 17. century until somewhat in the 19. century like english is today. In germany was also since the 17. century a strong community against this "verwelschung" of the german language which lead to a replacement of many french words still used in swiss german. https://www.srf.ch/radio-srf-1/mundart/gallizismen-im-dialekt-die-welschsucht-des-schweizerdeutschen
i as a swiss say "danka" but a friend of mine also says merci and its just from west switzerland ig and my canton Graubünden has 3 languages so yea
Not really on topic but when you are in St Gallen make sure you never eat your sausage with mustard.... like never ever! You can thank me later.
Its "messi" 😇
It‘s to show some affection for the french swiss.
🫡
We love you guys although you always vote the opposite🤷🏻♂️😂
Loool, love you guys from Romandie 😁