German is the standard language that is used above all in Germany, Austria and parts of Switzerland. But how did German come to be the standard language? And how has the perception of standard German ...

People walking in Munich earlier this year. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Sven Hoppe Learning German or just curious about it? We've compiled some facts to help you understand the importance of the ...

The wrangling about the German spelling reform in the 1990s could hardly have been more acrimonious. What caused this heated row in the German press and public administration, in schools and even in ...

The letter ß (eszett) is an integral part of the German language, but continues to leave non-native speakers bewildered. Although the eszett may look like the letter ‘B’, it is actually shorthand for ...

“IN GERMAN, A young lady has no sex, while a turnip has,” grumbled Mark Twain in his essay “The Awful German Language”. The rules governing gender in German are indeed baffling: why die Rübe (feminine ...

GERMAN is more gendered than many other languages. In English, for example, “professor” can describe an academic of either sex, whereas in German “Professor” is strictly male and “Professorin” is ...

Medium Ævum, which first appeared in 1932, is one of the leading international academic periodicals in medieval studies. It is published twice yearly and its present editors are Professors Nigel F.

BERLIN -- Some German words, as Mark Twain observed in despair, seem not to be words at all but “alphabetical processions.” He would have been delighted to hear ...