Landeskunde

Landeskunde

Landeskunde allgemein [=in general]

Politik
Tourismus & Geographie

Geschichte
Migration Dialekte und Schwyzerdütsch

Landeskunde allgemein [=in general]

  • Statistisches Bundesamt: Zahlen & Fakten Fantastic site with all manner of official statistics about Germany
  • Goethe Institut Great resource for language instruction and cultural info about Germany
  • Germany.info Collaboration of the German embassy and consulates, and the German Information Center. Offers all kinds of political and cultural information and news.
  • American-German Cross-Cultural Consulting Click on “Artikel/Articles” to see a list of downloadable articles on topics such as “US-German Communication Styles” etc. There are also articles on countries other than Germany. Most are by the website’s author, Patrick Schmidt. You can also order his books on cross-cultural differences from the site.
  • Study in Germany Official site with info on student life and resources for studying in Germany.
  • The German Way Information on various aspects of everyday German culture.

Politik

Tourismus & Geographie

Photos/Images

City Homepages

Geschichte

  • Zeitklicks Great site, made for kids, that lets you click through timelines (“Zeitstrahl”), text, images and videos on 20th century German history. Click on “Hilfe” at the top to get an overview. Or click the arrow on the right to choose a time period, and then play around. Note also the “Teste dich” and other options that appear at the bottom of the screen once you’ve chosen a time period.
  • Lebendiges Museum Online Online museum of German history since 1900.  A fantastic site!
    • Zeitstrahl = timeline; Zeitzeugen = “witnesses of the time” ==> this tab gets you to a collection of first-person accounts; Bestand = inventory, holdings ==> this gets you to an inventory of resources available on the site, incl. Note in particular the “Biografien” and “Videos” options.
  • German History in Documents and Images Awesome collection of primary source materials documenting Germany’s political, social, and cultural history from 1500 to the present. It comprises original German texts, all of which are accompanied by new English translations, and a wide range of visual imagery. Site can be navigated in German or English.
  • Deutsches historisches Museum Berlin

DDR-Links

Migration

  • Migration.Integration.Regionen Maps (Karten) showing statistics on people from other countries (Ausländer*innen) and people seeking protection or asylum in Germany (Schutzsuchende). Use the pulldown menu at the top right to select the information you want to see. Most pages include a circle marked “Kurz erklärt,” which you can click on for brief explanations in German [“kurze Erklärungen”] about the info on that page.
    • insgesamt = in total [==> total numbers]
    • Ausländische Bevölkerung = population with foreign citizenship
    • nach Staatsangehörigkeit = by citizenship
    • nach Aufenthaltsdauer = by length of stay
    • Aufenthaltsrechtlicher Status = legal status relative to the immigration laws [Freizügigkeit nach EU-Recht = right to move about freely by EU law (i.e. for citizens of EU states); unbefristeter Aufenthaltstitel = indefinite residency permit; befristet = of finite duration; Aufenthaltstitel zum Zwecke der Erwerbstätigkeit = residency permit for the purpose of gainful employment; Aufenthaltsgestattung = temporary residency permit; Duldung = toleration, i.e. temporary permission to stay in the country without a permit: “temporary suspension of deportation”]
    • Anteil an der Bevölkerung insgesamt = proportion of the total population
    • Veränderung = change
    • Integrationskurse = “integration courses” consisting of a language course and an “orientation” to Germany (successful completion can facilitate procedures for acquiring citizenship or permanent residency, and may be required in some cases)

Dialekte & Schwyzerdütsch

  • Dialektkarte.de Just click on a marker in the region you’re interested in and then listen to the sample sentences for that region!
  • Easy German: Regional German Dialects Short video with some informal samples of the main German dialects. People are asked to say what they had for breakfast.
  • Deutsche Dialekte A list of links for each dialect. If a target link is broken, just scroll down the page. Most of the links lead to written information, and some of the “real” links are broken, but this is a great starting point for exploring the various German dialects.
  • Atlas zur deutschen Alltagssprache Brilliant overview of regional language variations. Click on “Erste Runde,” “Zweite Runde” etc. on the left to see the various terms covered in each “round” of the project. Clicking on a term shows you the geographical distribution of the variants of that term. The maps are less detailed than for the Spiegel Dialekt-Quiz below, but this project covers many more terms.
  • Spiegel Dialekt-Quiz [Currently under (re-)construction ==> this page just describes it] Native German speakers can take this quiz about how they would say various things and get a surprisingly accurate short-list of guesses as to where they are from. As a non-native speaker, it’s fun to take the quiz just to see the questions and possible answers. Click here to see the overall results of the survey. The results are shown on the map in the MIDDLE of the article. Use the arrows at the top of the map to navigate between terms.
  • Deutsche Welle Dialektatlas Click on the dialect you’re interested in to see a page with various articles related to it, and a 15-20 minute audio “report” with samples of the dialect
  • Sprechen Sie Wienerisch? A small online dictionary of Viennese expressions (“aber kein Dialektwörterbuch,” it says), including a special “Kulinarisches Wörterbuch.”

Schwyzerdütsch [Note that there is a LOT of regional variation between the various Swiss German dialects – even in the term “Schwyzerdütsch” itself!]

Andere Dialekte

  • WIKITONGUES Texas German Great example, very comprehensible. Note her use of “mir” for “wir,” which is also typical of dialects in southern Germany and in the Rhineland.