Me: "I want to learn German."
Them: "Why would you do that? Don't bother!"
Me: "Because I spend half my time on the Fediverse clicking on the 'Translate' button."
I can't help it if so many of the awesome accounts I follow are in German. And I want to be able to understand their messages without clicking on 'Translate' 50+ times a day. Plus this way I would understand / could attend ALL the talks at Berlin #FediDay.
I'm putting this here so that people hold me accountable 😅🤗
@_elena@mastodon.social Honestly I get it. I have been considering taking up German again too being on here.
@_elena@mastodon.social It can be frustrating to learn „the awful German language“ (Mark Twain) as an adult, but as with other things on the Fediverse, everything is possible with enthusiasm and interest!
@johl@mastodon.xyz haha when I mentioned at FediDay that I wanted to learn German, someone immediately recommended this essay. I'm almost scared to read it (I don't want to be discouraged) 😅
@_elena@mastodon.social He picks out things that are strange to English speakers. As a speaker of Italian and French you might not be as confused as Mark Twain by the fact that nouns have grammatical genders 😀
@johl@mastodon.xyz ha! actually I think genders are going to trip me up because a word may be masculine in Italian, feminine in French and then I would have to remember what it is in German... Plus German has neutral !
I have so much love for the English language as it is genderless.
I remarked that natural disasters and horrible things are typically "feminine" in Italian and French (death, destruction, calamity...). Bloody patriarchy 😆
@_elena@mastodon.social @johl@mastodon.xyz Der Tod (death, masculine in German), die Zerstörung (f), das Unglück (neutral). Clear improvement, I'd say.
@_elena@mastodon.social @johl@mastodon.xyz Estonian and finnish are completely genderless, everybody is they (tema in estonian). I think all finno-ugric languages are.
@_elena@mastodon.social
Die Sprachfolge an meiner Schule war Französisch, Latein, Englisch. Es war schlimm. Und besonders schlimm fand ich - wie du - die unterschiedlichen Geschlechter von Nomen in den verschiedenen Sprachen. Vor allem bei Worten die im Deutschen Neutrum sind: Das Brot - le pain. Das Auto - la voiture. Deshalb möchte ich dir einen Tipp geben: Nutze auf Deutsch immer das Neutrum. Das versteht jeder und ist sehr oft richtig :D
@johl@mastodon.xyz
@_elena@mastodon.social @johl@mastodon.xyz how big does a boat have to be in English to be "she"? I ask that as a native speaker.
@_elena@mastodon.social Keine Angst!
Twain was from the USA ...
You are never too old to learn languages. I emigrated to France with merci and bonjour only, and now speak it fluently. And as I'm German, I can say: it's much more complicated!
Learning by doing is the best! I e.g. button-translate Spanish posts, and I'm happy that I begin to understand more and more only by doing this, comparing the words ....
@NatureMC@mastodon.online do you have a classic German children's books / cartoon character to recommend? I typically start there, with the simple language of cartoons
@_elena@mastodon.social Spontaneously ... Biene Maja? It was a children's book by Waldemar Bonsels in 1912, but exists as films (2D and 3 D). You can find it on https:// www.kika.de because the animation character just had it's 50th anniversary.
I also recommend childrens' news: short and with simple language https://www.logo.de
You are in France? Then you can switch languages on ARTE.
But don't make my mistake:I learnt French by imitation and a TV thriller series Le commissaire is angry and cries XY...
@_elena@mastodon.social I like very much "Ritter Rost" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uHM0lHxxCbQ
Unfortunately, the ZDF Mediathek has a geoblock for France, like so often
@_elena@mastodon.social @NatureMC@mastodon.online Momo by Michael Ende is a true classic that I loved.
If you look for something for younger children: the Pumuckl stories by Ellis Kaut are something that everyone knows here (at least from the tv show). "Die kleine Hexe" from Otfried Preussler could also be something that you might like.
@_elena@mastodon.social
Did you read Asterix comics as a kid?
They're French, but as Germany doesn't have a comparable culture with regards to comics/cartoons, we adopted them as ours.
@NatureMC@mastodon.online
Good luck! My own personal experience is that I had German for five years in school and still have to click Translate most of the time. I blame the school, not myself. 🙂
@_elena@mastodon.social
Hallo Elena, dann viel Spaß! Eine weitere Sprache zu lernen, schadet ja nie :-)
Oh. You mean there is an actual affinity for German out there and I may not have to feel guilty about posting predominantly in English rather than in my native language?
That's a genuine surprise.
If you intend to go through with this, may I suggest the mighty Anki for vocabulary and grammar: https://apps.ankiweb.net ?
Open source and available across platforms, it has been extremely helpful for me over the years. It really shines when learning languages, where a lot of the effort is memorisation.
Good luck!
Ich hoffe, dass Ihre Erfahrung beim Deutschlernen gut verläuft! 😀
Vielleicht fragst du mal bei @janbeta@chaos.social nach, ob er Tipps und Tricks hat, wie man Leuten beim Deutschlernen helfen kann? 🙂
@_elena@mastodon.social Vielen Dank, dass du dir die Mühe machen möchtest meine Muttersprache zu lernen. Ich durchsuche gerne meine Linkliste für Deutsch als Fremdsprache Inhalte oder unterhalte mich so mit dir, denn deine Artikel lese ich sehr gerne.
Thank you for making the effort of learning my language. I will look through my links for German as a second language or talk to you because I appreciate your articles
@jpw_owl@bildung.social thank you! I typically start simple, with children's media (classic book characters, cartoons) and take it from there. so if you can recommend any German classics, I'm all ears :)
@_elena@mastodon.social @Su_G@aus.social @jpw_owl@bildung.social One of my friends learned to read Japanese by starting with Crayon Shinchan comics.
@_elena@mastodon.social Falls du viel unterwegs bist, kann ich dir deutschsprachige Hörspiele sehr empfehlen! Die kannst du einfach beim Joggen/Bahnfahren/Autofahren etc. hören und mitnehmen was du verstehst.
Ich weiß nicht, ob es das in Italien auch gibt, aber in Deutschland ist das ein riesigen Markt.
Vor allem „die drei Fragezeichen“ kann man hier gut empfehlen: das sind spannende Geschichten für Jugendliche, aber ehrlicherweise hören das sowieso meistens die Erwachsenen. 😉
@_elena@mastodon.social zum Beispiel : https://learngerman.dw.com/de/anf%C3%A4nger/s-62079021
@_elena@mastodon.social @jpw_owl@bildung.social Hier ist das Archiv einer sehr guten deutschen Kinder Fernsehen Serie:
https://www.wdrmaus.de/filme/sachgeschichten/a-bis-z.php5 (kurze Filme zu Wissen)
https://www.wdrmaus.de/index.php5 Startseite
Viel Erfolg!
@biokistenversteher@mastodon.social OMG this is AMAZING!!! Thank you so much. My favorite way to learn a new language 😊 @jpw_owl@bildung.social
@_elena@mastodon.social @jpw_owl@bildung.social I whatched it as an child more then 40 years ago and I still love whatching it with my children now.
There are some legendary episodes:
How internet works:
https://www.wdrmaus.de/filme/sachgeschichten/internet.php
Nuclear power:
https://www.wdrmaus.de/filme/sachgeschichten/atommaus.php5 (when Tschernobyl happend 😢)
How do mobile phones work:
https://www.wdrmaus.de/filme/sachgeschichten/handy.php5
Oil:
https://www.wdrmaus.de/filme/sachgeschichten/erdoel.php5
…
Sorry for my non existent 🇮🇹 !
@_elena@mastodon.social leider nicht. @thomasrocafull@epsilon.social is coming back now, and I couldn't bring it to him because I just started German classes. 🙈 I don't trust Le Post anymore, but hopefully I'll find someone going to Paris soon. My friend travels too often.
@_elena@mastodon.social Deutsch ist eine schwierige Sprache, aber wenn man die Zeit investiert, dann kann man auch viel davon haben. Mir gefällt es sehr gut, dass man mit guten Deutschkenntnissen häufig auch andere europäische Sprachen aus dem Kontext her verstehen kann.
So ist es mit gutem Deutsch + Englisch häufig möglich niederländische, dänische, oder schwedische Texte zu verstehen.
Viel Erfolg auf jeden Fall :)
@_elena@mastodon.social Oh! Sono felice che tu voglia imparare la mia lingua madre!
Io (dall'Austria) mi sono divertito imparando l'italiano. Come in tedesco, anche la parola scritta si pronuncia così, non come per esempio in inglese o francese.
Buona fortuna!
Viel Glück!
@_elena@mastodon.social as I scrolled up from the previous post (in German), I thought it would be great to have a simpler client side translate option.
Swipe, double tap (pick your gesture).
The... Translate is too buried.
Would be cool to have a text to speech option too. Maybe that way you could learn the language and technical jargon in situ.
@_elena@mastodon.social I'd hold you accountable but I've been meaning to do the same thing for a few years now... 😬
@_elena@mastodon.social Meine rudimentären Englischkenntnisse klicken gerne auf den Übersetzungsknopf. Nicht nur bei Englisch. Besser schlecht übersetzt als gar nicht verstanden. Aber ja, ich wünschte, ich könnte es lernen. Aber für mich sind gesprochenes und geschriebenes Englisch zwei völlig verschiedene Sprachen. 🫠
@_elena@mastodon.social Definitely do learn German. It's a fun language, Mastodon is a German app, we have the C3 (The Chaos Communication Congress Hacker Conference/Party) aaaaand, yeah, I love hearing non-natives speak German. It sounds so cool :)
@_elena@mastodon.social
I don't know if this helps or not but..
German would be my (very distant) 3rd language. I avoid using translation wherever possible to keep my neurons whirring & actually learn more by doing it this way. I'll translate a word here & there when it's unfamiliar to me or I can't figure it out from the context.
Have fun 🙂
@_elena@mastodon.social miau ;)
Wir haben Dich auch gerne im deutschsprachigen Fedi.
(scusi, mi italiano no e bene per scrivere lo)
@_elena@mastodon.social sicher eine gute Idee.
Was fuer ein Sprachinveau auf Deutsch hast du denn?
So das wir Dir ein wenig helfen koennen.
@_elena@mastodon.social 💪🏾 If „not clicking the Translate button“ is your main goal, you’ll be fine as you’re eliminating the two worst frustrations about our language:
Have fun! 😊
@_elena@mastodon.social The fun begins when you start comparing the output of the Translate button with the structure of the original sentence and realising that it's missed important-looking words like "nicht" out . . . I think once you know the tiniest bit of the grammar of the language you're learning, it's time to start applying it, even if most of the vocabulary is unfamiliar.
@_elena@mastodon.social
Ich muß vieles ins Deutsche übersetzen. I translate english into german many times a day.
@_elena@mastodon.social
Lingua franca of fediverse:
German with a lot of english tech terms, meme and 1337 speach.
@_elena@mastodon.social Viel Erfolg! Es gibt mittlerweile auch viele NAchrichtenseiten, die zweisprachig sind, z.B. Spiegel.
@Amboss_der_Agitator@piraten-partei.social awww 😂 please if you do select "German" as your language, or else it's a little diabolical, as I would have to copy and paste your messages into a language translator (instead of simply clicking on "translate"). But thank you for the challenge!
@_elena@mastodon.social Wo sollte ich Deutsch als meine Sprache wählen? Auf einem Handy? So etwas besitze ich nicht. Oder gibt es bei Mastodon so eine Auswahlmöglichkeit?
@Amboss_der_Agitator@piraten-partei.social on Mastodon it's typically in the "compose" window. Same with GoToSocial...
@_elena@mastodon.social Oh, I understand you so much! I used to learn German for nine years and I haven't actively used it for 20 years at least. But now I'm finding it super useful during mornings when the trending page is half in German until folks across the pond wake up :D I'm glad I can understand most of the toots. Just one downside: I am no longer able to feel smug about saying my secondary school German teacher that I won't ever be able to use the knowledge. Dang, I hate that she was right 👿
@_elena@mastodon.social I think you will love the super power of creating new words by combining two or more words.
@_elena@mastodon.social ma che interfaccia usi? Io non ho "Translate", mi devo copiare tutti i post (in finlandese) per tradurli da un altra parte
@umbeebmu@mastodon.sdf.org sul computer, connessa a Mastodon nel mi browser, c'è un link "translate" sotto i messaggi in lingua straniera. Sennò su Ivory (iOS) c'è un bottone "translate" che ti fa vedere il post d'origine e sotto la traduzione
@_elena@mastodon.social somehow, and I really don't know why, books are also cheaper in German, I always take that advantage specially if looking for second hand books 😆 so another reason to!
Where is this Translate button? I think that it is something that the administrator has to enable?
If so, @mathieugp@jasette.facil.services , could you enable this button? That would be cool.
Before I went on stage at Berlin #FediDay the MC mistakenly said "the following presentation will be in German." My friends in the audience giggled because they know I don't speak it.
And then surprise!
I started my presentation with "Hallo zusammen. Vielen Dank an alle Organisatoren des Berlin Fedi Day."
@samvie@chaos.social's reaction - who was sitting in the front row - was priceless 😂
Special thanks to @Tobias@social.diekershoff.de and a couple of FediDay angels for letting me practice with them.
Next year: 4 sentences!
@_elena@mastodon.social
😂 😂 😂
I can imagine the stunned faces! I hope someone took a picture for you!
@paulk@writing.exchange @samvie@chaos.social @Tobias@social.diekershoff.de sadly no reaction shot, the video recorder was pointed at me.
But I loved the reaction so much, LOL. Especially considering the mistake by the MC... well, "surpriseeeee" the first sentence at least was in German 😂
@_elena@mastodon.social that's more German than I've managed to learn in th last 4 years, living in Germany!
@_elena@mastodon.social @samvie@chaos.social @tobias@social.diekershoff.de What a great way to surprise your audience :)
@_elena@mastodon.social @samvie@chaos.social @Tobias@social.diekershoff.de Brilliant! I love these kinds of practical jokes.
@_elena@mastodon.social Good luck! As a german I find it problematic, that so many parts of the fediverse are german. The Fediverse needs to spread more around the world to be a real competitor to X, Bluesky and all other alternatives that pop up nowadays. I like it here, but Mastodon lacks so many interesting people that use Bluesky or sometimes X. Especially in science and nature conservation related topics.
@_elena@mastodon.social it would also be helpful if the translate option was located at the 🔝 of a post rather than the bottom.
@_elena@mastodon.social Ich habe Dich gerade zum ersten Mal im Fediverse gesehen und Dein Einführungsvideo angesehen.
Es ist großartig, Danke dafür!
Ich zeige es jetzt meinen Freundinnen und Freunden (leider per WhatsApp) 😀
@_elena@mastodon.social Seeing a few recommendations here to start with learning German I wonder if there is perhaps something similar to https://waywordradio.org/ for German? It's a radio show with two linguists taking questions from audience and it is such fun! I always wondered how they did it, answering the questions on the spot so well. Anyway: Question to your audience (If I may): Is there something similar for German?
@_elena@mastodon.social I post on two accounts, one in English, one in German. I often translate to the second language, so you'd often get the same post in English and German. If what I generally do is interesting to you, it might help. :)
This is one of the best reasons to learn a language. :)
Oh. And do you know LanguageTransfer? It is a really good free language course taught in English audio. It focuses on understanding. I used it to learn Spanish.
@_elena@mastodon.social I'm right there with you! Every time that I look at my Fediverse feed I want to learn German, not only to read the posts here, but because of all the cool events that I see happening in Berlin.
I was complaining to a friend the other day that I cannot find any in-person Free Software, BSD/UNIX, etc. meetups in my area (there were several regularly scheduled ones pre-COVID, but now, none), and concluded that I need to move to Germany.
However I’m happy that the Fediverse seems to be a "German thing". ;)
(Taking into account the other current "German Things" …)
@_elena@mastodon.social I don't speak it, but I understand some basic Te Reo, because of all the awesome New Zealanders one of my alts follows - they have a habit of using a lot of names from the indigenous people of those islands, as well as other words.
I also speak Doric, a variant of Scottish, which oddly pronounces "wh" as "f", something it shares with Te Reo.
@_elena@mastodon.social As someone from Germany I don't get it, but I still wish you good luck on your journey. Honestly I'm ready to face the fact that I might have to leave Germany in the future if shit hits the fan and if that happens I would rather forget my native language. Might be a bit cynical, but oh well.
@_elena@mastodon.social do learn German and/or any other language. Every extra languagge you learn will open up new perspectives and will give you more understanding of how language and culture are connected.
I have been slowly resuscitating the part of my brain that took a few years of French in the early 90s because I see lots of interesting French-language posts.
@_elena@mastodon.social what really made it natural for me, after I did a few courses across 1,5 years was to be forced into a work environment where I was the only English speaker. So find some environment where you have to use it and that will definitely help. Viel Erfolg und viel Spaß beim lernen!
German is a fabulous language.
One can express oneself SO precisely, and the language can be so very beautiful.
I am glad I don't have to learn it as a 3rd language as I would be too lazy (if not too stupid), it is very complicated.
My English teacher at the High School told my mom that I would never learn English well enough to have a conversation.
That's when I gave up doing my Engl.homework and my 'Vokabelheft' remained blank.
@_elena@mastodon.social German is very high on my languages to learn list because I keep encountering so many german-speakers online. Sure it's usually written by folks who are bilingual but how much cooler is it to learn another language than to translate or make more work for others?
But first I need to get up to a better level of Italian comprehension before I start on another language
@_elena@mastodon.social Das ganze Födiversum wird nur noch auf Deutsch mit dir kommunizieren. Oder Italienisch, wenn jemand ein Sprachtandem wünscht.
@_elena@mastodon.social Viel Erfolg! I'm one of the few people here who've learned German as a foreign language. Now I realize that I've been taking for granted that I can read basically half of the content here 😅
If you have questions or need help you can hit me up. I'm a linguistics student in Germany who's been studying the language for years and used to moderate one of the biggest German-learning communities online.
Ooo, how do you get a translation of a single post? Firefox doesn't offer to translate the whole page because the UI is in English. I usually have to copy/paste individual posts to ddg's translator, but I'd rather use the browser's local translate if possible.
@_elena@mastodon.social Seeing posts in languages I don't understand is actually one of my favourite things about the Fediverse.
As an English speaker it's really easy to assume that everyone else speaks English too, but the Fediverse keeps politely reminding me that quite a few don't. ;)
@_elena@mastodon.social Them sounds stupid. Like the people who drove me out of /r/c++ because I posted something I thought was cool and couldn't tell them why they'd want to use it, or why anyone would, and adamantly refused to even try answering that irrelevant question.
I don't even understand Them and don't want to.
@_elena@mastodon.social you could read some good books written by germans to practice, like the zamonia books by walter moers, the kangaroo chronicles by mark-uwe kling, or das kapital by obsure german author karl marx 🙃
@_elena@mastodon.social "I can't help it if so many of the awesome accounts I follow are in German."
I don't feel that is entirely accurate.
@_elena@mastodon.social I can tell you, learning a new language at our age is going to be a challenge, but incredibly rewarding. You’ll feel your brain forging new pathways, and it’ll get a bit easier. Learning German will pave the way to other Germanic languages :)
Don’t worry too much about grammar; you’ll get it at some point. In my experience, Germans tend to be extremely tolerant of mistakes and very willing to help. Even if your .. my mistakes are so bad they cause confusion they’ll lovingly help clarify.
@_elena@mastodon.social Great!! How many languages do you know right now? 😀😀🙃🙃 I'd like to learn German too also French and Spanish 😆 I don't have patience!! 😭
@FrankDmt90@mastodon.uno 3: Italian, English and French 😅
German is a must for Fedi advocacy, for CCC Congress, Berlin Fedi Day and Re:Publica. I wanna be able to engage in discussions without needing translations. Give me 5-10 years
@_elena@mastodon.social Vorsicht vor #Denglish-Sprechern! Bei vielen jungen und/oder studentischen und/oder im Marketing aktiven Leuten ist es üblich, die deutsche Sprache mit einzelnen englischen Wörtern zu mischen oder ganze englische Sätze einzubauen, oft Zitate aus popkulturellen Kontexten wie Filmen, Serien oder Musik. Es dürfte zusätzlichen Aufwand bedeuten, das alles aus der eigentlich deutschen Sprache herauszufiltern, zumal auch Wörter verwendet werden, die so im Englischen nicht üblich sind. #Handy
@_elena@mastodon.social Sehr gut! 🙂