Visiting the Bernese German course for Romands: Welsch a Chrampf!

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“Mon dieu, that’s difficult!” says Claudine Roubaty (67). She sighs. At the front of the blackboard, teacher Salem Erni (38) tries to explain the numerous meanings of the Bernese-German verb ‘möge’ to her students. It is not only Claudine (we speak by her first name during the Swiss German course) whose confusion is visible on her face. “I ma di guet” or “The word hei ne möge”: The fact that one and the same word means something positive in one context, but something negative in another context, causes incredulous astonishment.

There is an increasing demand for Swiss German

It’s early Tuesday evening and we are sitting in a somewhat outdated classroom at the Migros Club School in the center of Freiburg. A retired judge, a biochemist, a sales representative and a handful of other women and men meet here once a week to learn Bernese German. With one exception, the students, mainly retired, are native speakers of French. For about a year and a half, they have been pursuing the goal of learning the dialect in addition to their good knowledge of German.

The club school also offers such Swiss German courses in western Swiss towns further away from Röstigraben. They are a “niche product in the club school’s varied offering,” says spokeswoman Ariane Lang. But demand is increasing. Bettina Bucher Martin, director of the Allemand-plus language school in Lausanne, also notices this. The range of dialect courses has expanded considerably in recent years, she says. Zurich German is particularly popular. Your customers are, for example, people who study in German-speaking Switzerland or move there for a management job and want to integrate more quickly.

Will dialect become mandatory?

In the canton of Vaud, Swiss German could soon become compulsory for schoolchildren. Last November, the cantonal parliament instructed the government to consider making dialect lessons mandatory in schools.

“It is not about teaching Swiss German at the expense of German,” explains Greens councilor David Raedler (36), who submitted the proposal. Instead, he calls for some Swiss German to be integrated into German lessons in the future. “It is essential that Romans at least understand Swiss German in order to integrate not only in the professional world, but also in terms of cultural and social life,” he believes.

So far there are only voluntary offers for students, including in other French or bilingual cantons. In Neuchâtel, schools have been offering so-called awareness courses for Swiss-German towards the end of compulsory education for a few years now, also at the initiative of a Green canton councilor. Such courses have been available in Geneva since 2012. In addition, schools offer exchange programs to get in touch with fellow citizens who speak German or Swiss German.

A “chrampf” that is fun

The Swiss-German students from Freiburg can benefit greatly from the demand for compulsory Swiss-German lessons. “That would certainly be welcome for the cohesion of the country,” says Claudine. Although German-speaking Swiss usually make an effort to speak Standard German with Romans, Annelyse Bays (67) has the experience: “After five minutes at the latest, they switch to Swiss German.”

The participants have very different reasons for learning Swiss German. Yoann works for a company with its headquarters in Eastern Switzerland, Annelyse wants to ‘stay fit in her head’ and German-born Joachim Schmidt (68) cites family reasons. And Claudine simply finds Swiss German a very entertaining language.

In the classroom there is not only sighing, but also a lot of laughter. Teacher and participants clearly enjoy the lessons, despite the difficult subject matter. This evening the participants struggle with the word combination ‘unufffüigi Brülle’ – or pronounced in Bernese: ‘unuffäuigi Briue’. The students’ helpless attempts at pronunciation initially seem more like oral acrobatics than speaking.

Pronouncing and distinguishing “ds Buech”, “dr Buuch” or “d Bueche” also gives some participants a headache. “Le beurre, c’est ça?” student Yoann Mercier (33) asks confused. No, that means ‘Anke’, the course instructor explains with a laugh. But that would be another topic.

Also a challenge for the teacher

Salem Erni taught German and English. She taught herself to give lectures in dialect. The basis is a textbook that is now open to her and the students.

During the course they also learn to read texts in Swiss German. A very difficult undertaking, as there are no binding spelling rules. “It’s the writing that causes the most problems for students,” says Erni. The lessons are also a challenge for the dedicated language teacher. The course instructor occasionally has difficulty finding explanations – because for some dialect features they do not really exist. Just say it like this.

In Freiburg the class ends after almost 90 minutes. Fitting the topic – the different meanings of the verb “möge” – Erni asks the group: “Mögeter no?” She can read the answer from her students’ faces. But there is one consolation, Joachim says smiling after class: that people from Zurich also have difficulty pronouncing ‘Briue’.

Source:Blick