For those who speak German...

[reimero]

<bg>
I'm American, but spent 5 years living in Austria and learning the language through immersion. In that time, I became fluent in Hochdeutsch and in the local dialect.
</bg>

The OP is absolutely correct in that German has a ludicrous amount of dialects in a very confined area. Many of the differences are subtle, but they're there. To the untrained ear, the Swiss, Liechtensteiner, Vorarlberger and some of the Bavarian dialects sound very similar. In truth, while they share common roots, they're different enough that a native can tell instantly where a speaker is from. (As an aside, there is no "Swiss" or "Vorarlberger" dialect: what's spoken in Zurich is different from what's spoken in St. Gallen, and what's spoken in Dornbirn is distinct from the Bregenzer Wald, and don't even get me started on Lustenau.)

Anyway... I can understand people from the Lower Rhine Valley up to Lake Constance with no problem whatsoever, and have very little problem understanding Swiss and Bavarians in general. By the time you hit Salzburg and Vienna, I struggle a little bit, but am generally ok. I really have to focus to understand Berliners. It's really hard to equate German dialects to English because the dialects really are different-yet-very-similar languages.

Also in German, the verb does NOT always go at the end of the sentence. That only applies in the event of a subordinate clause or if it's a compound verb (I have... eaten).

[blas]

I gave up on German after 2 years of it. I took 4 years of French, but I still can't speak it to save my own life. I can read and write it very well, though.

[teh_blumchenkinder]

I was always told that a German-speaking person would always be understandable by another German-speaker, even with the difference in dialect.

This is a good point-- in my look at Pennsylvania German/Dutch, I read somewhere that a German and a person who spoke PG could understand each other, but would have to focus and speak carefully/slowly. And they've been separated by 300 years, an ocean, several cultural upheavals, and PG isn't a 'writing' language, it's more spoken, and only recently has been a language to write stuff like poetry and literature in! (Languages not written tend to mutate more/more quickly).

I knew a French teacher when I lived in North Dakota who would disagree that French Canadian is actually French. "I don't know what language they're speaking, but it's not French," was how she put it to me . . . which I thought was rather funny as I have been to Quebec many times and run into French snobs from there who refuse to communicate in English to non-French speakers.

I've taken 6+ years of French, and listening to Quebecois (yes the cedilla, but I don't have the tech-how to figure it out ) it sounds as different as Deep South English does to what's spoken around my neck of the woods (inland Pacific Northwest)-- to my ear. Also, there are a lot of politics that Quebec is embroiled in, mostly because the French-speaking population sees themselves as very different from the rest of Canada. There's been almost-passing referendums of secession in recent years...

You may find that if you speak in Parisien French in Quebec that you may be ignored, or be rudely told to just speak English. Hopefully that won't be the case - there are friendly Quebecois, I know several! A lot depends on where you are though.

1st point: fascinating... 2nd point, they're Canadians! Of course they're friendly and are probably polite too! (/stereotype)

A friend who used to live in Montreal said that a common greeting is "Bonjour hi" and that it's the speaker's way of saying, "I speak both languages, which do you speak?" I'll be there for a conference, so I doubt I'll be out and about much, so hopefully it won't be an issue. (But I will be getting some poutine gosh darn it.)

Nifty! I need to remember that. Enjoy the gravy-cheese-fries!

I think the worst language for different dialects is Chinese.

The way I understand it, is that the 'only reason why it's Chinese is because the writing/what people write is the same across the dialects.' That's probably not strictly true. I also hear that dialects and actual language separation is determined by a dart-board, and proximity.

And I love the whole "make a new word by stringing existing words together" part! It's awesome!

Yes, yes it is.

Actually, Quebecois French is very similar to rural Normandy French. There were many instances in World war 2 where the Quebec Regiments would be invited into villages in Normandy and everyone could talk perfectly to one another due to the extremely similar accents and inflections.

Cool!

The way I read about it, Switzerland and Austria and other-countries-not-Germany acknoweldge the German from Germany (in all it's varied glory) as "more proper," but not superior/theirs as inferior, just preferred. I need to find that passage. Also, the German in Switzerland is different spoken and written-- written, Germans can understand it. Spoken, like reimero said, it's different.

Thanks for all the feedback! This is fun!

[BookstoreEscapee]

All I know of German is if I google my first name I find a lot of stuff in that language. (My name is not pronounced like the German word it looks like, however. It may or may not have been intended to mean the same thing.)