Linguae Europaeae

by Jonathon Prinz Jonathon Prinz is a senior in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in International Engineering and Germanic Studies. After graduation, Jonathon is planning on working for UOP Honeywell as a mechanical engineer in Des Plaines, Illinois. He is planning on traveling the world after a study abroad experience in Germany last summer sparked his interest in other places and cultures. He wrote this blog post as a student enrolled in 418 ‘Language and Minorities in Europe’. Turkish/German flag flying in Germany [ Image Source ] When people think of Germany, many tend to think of the typical German stereotype: beer, pretzels, and lederhosen.  While this is true in part, people usually never conjure up images of a nation of immigrants.  This is because the textbook German identity is popular, yet is not a realistic depiction of what Germany actually is today. After the Second World War, Germany has seen an enormous increase in immigrants entering as guest work...

by Andrew Schwenk Andrew Schwenk is a first year graduate student in European Union Studies at the University of Illinois at Urana-Champaign. Andrew is planning on graduating in December 2016 and is interested in heritage management in Europe. He wrote this text in 418 ‘Language and Minorities in Europe.’ Image Source In Thomas Mann’s perpetually popular debut novel from 1901, Buddenbrooks, the German author helps make the Buddenbrook family’s unnamed hometown more real through the language he uses. The novel’s characters use a mixture of Standard German, Low German, Lübeck merchant slang, and French. All of this helps situate the family in their mid-19th century, northern German (Low German), upper-class (French) context (Wolf). If Thomas Mann was born a century later, however, would he still use Low German to give his characters their north German credentials? And what even is Low German anyway? Low German, known in German as Plattdeutsch, is a German dialect located in the...