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Seeking advice: German or Swiss German for moving to Basel
I am planning a move to Basel and have no background in either German or Swiss German. My work language is English, in which I am already fluent enough, so I am exploring which language would be more advantageous for social integration and daily life in Basel. I am interested in understanding the benefits of each language in the context of non-professional interactions and community engagement. Additionally, I am looking for recommendations on effective learning resources for either language. Any shared experiences, advice, or information would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Everybody in Switzerland is fluent in Standard German and the local dialect isn't something that you can really learn from a book. There are resources on the internet as far as I'm aware but you need the daily interaction to learn it meaningfully. Additionally, there are many foreigners in Basel that will speak the language as an L2 and are fluent in English (as are the Swiss themselves) so you'll have time to really delve into it once you move.
I recommend you forget about the dialect and just go for Standard German, you'll have a much easier time with it since it's standardized. In a way Basel German is quite easy to learn from there since it's really close to Standard German anyway, closer than other dialects at least.
Sorry for the hurried reply but I'm on my phone, I'll try to remember to expand a bit when I'm home. I'm a native dialect speaker btw.
^This. I am a native English speaker and reached L2 German (I didn't officially test, but while I definitely would have had a challenge at L3, I had a practice L2 test from a local Uni and it seemed quite easy), and I got by just fine in Switzerland and briefly in Basel. Granted, I wasn't using any technical terms, just the typical tourist jargon, but no one tried using English on me which always made me feel successful in speaking German.
I learned German in the US and moved there (Hesse). It was like learning Queen's English and moving to Texas: I knew the proper pronunciations and grammar, but whilst I had a wonderful teacher who taught us a lot of slang and whatnot, the accent and regional terminology is just something you'll have to pick up over time. I later moved to Bayern and that was another language shock, where everything I got comfortable with in Hesse went out the door.
So ultimately, just learn German and have fun learning the nuances once you're in a German-speaking region.
Thanks. I'm an Italian expatriate in my early 30s, working in the biomedical field in the US. I understand that it's easy to make friends with fellow expats, as our life experiences tend to become more similar the more we move around the world, especially for those of us who have gone through analogous paths in academia. That's why I had actual Swiss people in mind when asking my question. Communicating with locals has been easy here, given my proficiency in English, but I'd hate to miss out on the connections and culture, even though I realize Americans might be friendlier and more extroverted on average. Regarding activities, it's very likely that I'll join a gym soon after moving. I go on a lot of day hikes from May to October. Nightlife is not particularly my thing, but I don't entirely avoid it.
this!
making friends in switzerland is hard. I mean, really hard.
but once you get one, you will be adopted into their circle of friends and it gets easier.
definitly join a club, or better two or three. meeting people for a long time over and over again seems to be the only way to get acepted and the befriended.
nobody I ever met that is not born in switzerland speaks swiss german
I think the main thing with Swiss German is to be able to understand it (which isn't automatic if you speak German, it takes a bit of work). I've lived in Switzerland for several years and generally the Swiss do expect you to learn German, but don't expect you to learn Swiss German. Also, Swiss German dialects tend to be situated on a spectrum, and there's a correlation where more educated people have a less strong dialect. If you can develop a Swiss Standard German accent (not hard if you listen to SRF from time to time) it helps.
Thank you cfabbro for adding tags. I'll keep that in mind for future topics.
NP. And no worries. Tildes is a collaborative effort. :)
Huh. How does one know when another user adds tags to their post?
Topic Log in the right sidebar shows any edits that have been made to that topic, and by whom.
Can I hijack this briefly to find out how Swiss German is different from German German? Is it like British English versus American English or…?
It's much more than the distance between British and American English. This YouTube video seems to do a good job in outlining the differences.