[Foobar8568]

And if you ever work in any other countries, you would see the same in different language. Work in a Swiss company? Hope you enjoy German. At one stage, French people has to stop this self deprecating and think elsewhere is much better and only French does this or that. It is not.

[musiciangames]

Not my experience in Swedish company. n=1. It's not just business. Initially I felt awkward in shops, asking directions, etc using English. People just drop into English seamlessly.

[bombolo]

And drop back to swedish without a care for the immigrant coworkerks :)

[sealeck]

Depends on the Swiss company – some speak French!

[fakedang]

We're a Swiss company and we speak everything! English is the main language, but the engineers are mostly Eastern European but French-educated so they speak French. Some of the team is German/Czech/Polish, so they speak some German.

The common policy though is that if someone does not speak the language of the ongoing conversation in the room, everyone switches to English. A policy that I picked up from my Japanese internship days.

[palata]

And some speak Italian!

Small note though: I highly doubt they speak German... that would rather be Swiss-German.

[Glawen]

So in Scotland they speak Scottish-English? Irish-english in Ireland? What's your proficiency in these languages ?

[anakaine]

They need not be proficient to understand that Swiss German is distinctly different from German. Its reasonably common knowledge.

Swiss German is based around Alemannic dialects rendering it often and frequently unintelligible to traditional German speakers.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_German

[Glawen]

It is a dialect, written form is German. It is like hearing French spoken in sub Saharan Africa, it is hard to grasp but eventually you get it

[lapinot]

> It is a dialect, written form is German.

Both things are wrong. It's not a dialect in the sense that it is not the same language with special intonation, some new words and new idiomatic sentences. It has its own (much simpler) conjugation and declension scheme. Much closer in feel to a creole.

Its written form is also not german. Good luck reading some of the züri by mike comic strips as a german reader.

[palata]

> it is hard to grasp but eventually you get it

If by "eventually you get it" you mean "after putting enough effort into learning it", then yes. But that's the same for every language.

If you mean "you need a few hours to get used to it and then you understand almost everything", then... well... not at all.

[bombolo]

French and Sicilian are dialects of Latin. Do you think French people can travel to Sicily and start chatting?

[palata]

I don't know about Scottish-English and Irish-English, to be honest. Would an English native understand them?

Germans don't understand Swiss-German, and Swiss-Germans don't consider German as their mother tongue. Whereas the French being spoken on the French part of Switzerland is slightly different from the French from France, but people still consider that French is their mother tongue.

Not sure if that answers your question, or if you were just complaining about the fact that I made a difference between German and Swiss-German :-).

[walthamstow]

> Would an English native understand them?

Depends where in Scotland and how much they've had to drink.

On a serious note, words like ken, bairn, breekies, stramash are not that well understood by English people. But it's unlikely a Scot would use them when talking to an Englishman.

[palata]

Right. But is it then that a Scot would just not use some local words, but still speak in their language?

That's different with Swiss-German. If a Swiss-German person talks to you in German, then they are not talking in their language.

[benj111]

Depends where in England.

Bairn is northern English too.

[Glawen]

I learnt German in Germany, and I understand the Swiss. When you are waiting 4h to cross the gottard tunnel, you have plenty of time to listen to the radio. It is hard to understand just like any dialect when you are not used to it, but I would not call it a different language.

It is very unlike a French hearing Italian even though it is the same Latin root and words look the same on paper, grammatically it is very different.

[palata]

> and I understand the Swiss

Apparently not enough to learn that nobody in Switzerland would ever call that "the Swiss"? There is not even "one Swiss-German".

> grammatically it is very different.

In your 4h in the Gotthard tunnel, did you get to see how Swiss-German is written differently than German? Also the grammar is fairly different.

But yeah those are dialects, nobody said they weren't. I just said "they don't speak German, but Swiss-German" (more as a "fun fact" than trying to be pedantic), and they would definitely correct you if you said it is the same. Whereas a Suisse Romand (the French speaking Swiss) will tell you that they speak French, just like a French-Canadian from Quebec.

[bombolo]

germans can't understand swiss german.

[Glawen]

Pretty much doubt it.

[bjoli]

As a German speaker that has worked in Zürich, the parent is correct.

Wikipedia has the following to say:

The dialects that comprise Swiss German must not be confused with Swiss Standard German, the variety of Standard German used in Switzerland. Swiss Standard German is fully understandable to all speakers of Standard German, while many people in Germany – especially in the north – do not understand Swiss German.

[bombolo]

Are you a german speaker who has ever been in switzerland?

[ekianjo]

Just like Quebecois is not really French

[palata]

Hmm, I would still say that Quebecois is French, but with some (maybe many) local words. Swiss-German is really a dialect (actually multiple dialects).

[fakedang]

Weekend in Quebecois: Le fin du semaine

Weekend in French: Le weekend

[Glawen]

So much this, try in Germany, you will eventually get ghosted if you don't make the effort of learning German.

[wkat4242]

I don't work in france though.