Talk:Mock German

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The following section was written, but left out of the article on grounds of WP: and WP:NOR. It is, as far as I can tell, true... but I cannot find any sources for any of the claims below. (Of course, my searching was limited to google).

I find it hard to believe that some linguist somewhere hasn't published a study on mock German... perhaps someone else could provide a citation? Also, a knowledgeable linguist probably can clean the following up a great deal.

--EngineerScotty 05:39, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Description 1.1 Phoneme and letter substitution 1.2 Word substitutions 1.3 German prefixes and suffixes 1.4 Other imitations of German grammar 1.5 Stock phrases 2 Mock german in Top Secret!

[edit] Description

Mock German is typically formed from English by subsitution of German (or Germanic-sounding) phonemes, words, word endings, phrases, and grammatical forms for English ones. As mock German is an ad-hoc phenomenon, there are no hard-and-fast rules for its construction; the same phrase may be rendered differently by different speakers. However, several common traits of mock German emerge:

[edit] Phoneme and letter substitution

• The sound v is substituted for the English w, as the letter w in German is pronounced similar to the English v. Substitution of the actual letters occurs, so the word wet is rendered as vet. Occurrences of wh in English are converted into v as well, as opposed to vh--thus where becomes vere. However, uses of wh which are pronounced as h are left alone: who instead of vo or vho.
• By analogy, the sound qu is spelled--and pronounced--as kv, similar to how the letter combination qu is pronounced in actual German. Thus quick is rendered as kvick.
• The sound f is substitued for the English v, though this substitution is less common when the v is found at the beginning of a word. The letter combination ve at the end of a word is replaced with ff or f.
• The sound th, as in there, is often replaced with either z or d. The letter combination th as in thin is (less frequently) replaced with s or t.
• The letter c, occurring by itself or in pairs, is replaced with k, kk, or s as appropriate. The combination ck is less frequently replaced with kk'.
• The letter s, particularly at the beginning of a word or syllable, may be replaced with z; i.e. zexy.
• The letter j is sometimes replaced with y.
• The letter combination sh (and the "soft" ch) is often replaced with sch.
• The letter combinations ch and tch may be replaced with the German equivalent, tsch.
• Umlauts may be introduced, without regard to whether or not they would occur in the equivalent German word(s), and even on letters other than a, o, or u (which are the only German letters which take umlauts). See also heavy metal umlaut
• Vowels are generally pronounced as in German.

[edit] Word substitutions

Often times, German words which are well-known to English speakers (with no German training) are subtituted wholesale for their English counterparts. This is especially common with pronouns (ich, mich, mein, du), articles (die, der, das, ein(e)), prepositions (über, unter, mit, für, von, zu), ja, nein, nicht, stative verbs (ist) short adjectives (groß, klein), and such. Such substitution are typically made in complete ignorance of German grammar, and accomodations for the English alphabet (such as dropping umlauts, as in fraulein) are often made. Also, German words can be used if they are similar enough to the English words.

[edit] German prefixes and suffixes

Often times, English prefixes and suffixes, used to indicate things such as verb tense, are dropped and replaced with German forms--in many cases, incorrectly.

• The English suffix -ed, often used in English to form the preterite, is replaced with the suffixes -t or -et.
• The English suffix -ing, when used with gerunds, is frequently replaced with the German equivalent -ung. This is also occasionally done when -ing is used with the present participle--an English verb tense which is far less common in German.
• The past participle form of English verbs is translated to mock German by adding the infinitive suffixes -en or -n; and/or the prefix ge-. For example: Ich haf geverkt für elefen hours straight. Occasionally, the present participle receives this treatment as well: Ich am geverken on zee problem at zis very moment.

[edit] Other imitations of German grammar

Other attributes of German grammar are frequently mimicked in mock German, especially by users who are speakers of real German:

• Capitalization of nouns.
• The fusional aspects of the German language appear in mock German, as words (typically nouns along with modifying adjectives and/or phrases) are concatenated together into larger words--often in ways which are not found in true German. The Blinkenlights sign is a canonical example of this.
• The migration of non-auxillary verbs to the end of the sentence. The example given above may also be rendered as Ich hav für elefen hours straight geverkt.
• Use of ja as an intensifying particle, as in She ist ja ein very zexy voman!

[edit] Stock phrases

Some stock phrases are frequently written in their entirity in mock German. A well-known example of this is the interrogator's boast: Vee haf vays to make you talk! (or on a more sophisicated level, "Wir haben wegen you talk zu machen")

[edit] Mock german in Top Secret!

As native german speaker I love to see this film in the original language version (Originalfassung, ohne Synchronisation), because the movie is filled over and over with pseudo german (much yiddish, but the Pseudodeutsch is really funny, like: "Der Pizzahaus", "Switchen das Fencen off"). :-) Greetings from the german Wikipedia! --Rollo rueckwaerts 19:36, 12 November 2006 (UTC) (de:user:Rollo_rueckwaerts)