Is your Eierschalensollbruchstellenverursacher as nifty as this one?

Have to say I prefer the second outcome, it would result in speedier soldier dipping**

** assuming egg is perfectly boiled with soft yolk

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I always heard that people who learn German as a second language end up sounding like Hitler, especially if they’re American. The reason I’ve always accepted was that Americans don’t hear much German outside of WWII movies, but it’s probably more complicated than that.

When you say that people try to roll their r’s when learning German, do you mean like in the Slavic languages where r almost sounds like d in some words? Surely not the Spanish r roll, that would be too weird. Either way, I’ve always heard the German r as more swallowed than rolled. Is this correct, incorrect, or am I trying to be too correct?

In addition to that much of the “Hitler accent” really is Hitler adopting a traditional stage accent for his public persona.

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I’ve seen this thing in some households, but I never got it. I have a eierschalensollbruchstellenverursacherfreie Küchenutensiliensammlung.

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No, more the Hitler r or the pirate Arrrr! Because it should be pronounced that way, but nobody does it and nobody can do it. In my experience, especially people from northern Europe (who can roll the r perfectly) overdo it and sound really weird.

For locals (depending on the locality, German is surprisingly diverse), it’s mostly pronounced like “ah”. So “wer” (who) ist not pronounced as we-rrrr, but as we-ah.

Yeah, his way of talking was super fake. He was from Upper Austria, for goodness sake, nobody understands them, and nobody wants to.

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Makes sense. I’ve always pronounced it closer to “ah”, more swallowed than rolled, because that’s how I’ve always heard it. I assumed this was the correct way.

It’s the correct way in everyday life. So stick to it :slight_smile:

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I’ve started calling it the Rammstein R, mostly because Till Lindemann is the only one I know who uses it nowadays.

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Damn, I wish I would have come up with that reference. Since Rammstein is super popular worldwide, a lot of people have a really weird impression of the german language.

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“Every other time”? Are you trying to belittle the quality of German engineering and manufacturing?

It’s pretty clear from the video that 50% of the times, it works every time.

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German “r” is pronounced differently in syllable-initial and syllable-final position.
At the end of a syllable, it becomes something like a short “a”. Actually pronouncing a final “r” is perceived as hypercorrect. People will use it to clarify the spelling of a word rather than resorting to spelling it out letter by letter. But even in very formal speech, people will usually pronounce it /ɐ/.
Look at all the /ɐ/s:

Eier → /ˌaɪ̯.ɐ/
Verursacher → /fɛɐˈuːɐˌza.xɐ/

This extends to some word endings like -ren → /ɐn/.

Syllable-initial r really exists, and is usually pronounced gutturally, slightly in front of where the French pronounce their r. Slight rolling is OK, but not necessary, and can quickly start to sound exaggerated. For IPA people, [ʀ] or [ʁ].
Some variants of stage speech and allegedly some variants of the Bavarian dialect use a tongue-tip rolled [r], but as an Austrian who technically speaks a Bavarian dialect of German half of the time, I have never met anyone who actually pronounces it that way.

[citation needed]
There is not, and has never been, a single agreed-upon prescriptive pronunciation standard for the German language as a whole.

Descriptively speaking, neither Hitler nor stereotyped pirates are among the popular variants.

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Hope this file hosting thing works (autoplay!):

Eierschalensollbruchstellenverursacher

Eierschalensollbruchstellenverursacherfreieküchenutensiliensammlung

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I find a messergriff works pretty well and doesn’t take up as many letters.

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Back on the topic of cracking eggshells, I think the video shows a problem with sticky eggshells, rather than a faulty contraption.

My kitchen fire extinguisher doubles as a rolling pin.

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We all have to start somewhere. Baby steps. Baby steps.

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I don’t mean this in an asshole way, but you seem to know way more about this than I do, Zathras (or Zathras. or the other Zathras). I learned in school that northern German is the “right” way, which also leads to oddities like “König” should be pronounced as “Könich”.

Anyhoo, I speak the way I like, I can spell decently enough. And I enjoy driving Germans nuts with putting the emphasis on the first syllable.

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König isn’t really pronounced Könich? The way I learned it, -ig is pronounced -ich but not -isch.

Exactly how much regional variation is covered by the umbrella of Standard German is a touchy subject, but pronouncing “König” with a /k/ is a very southern thing.

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