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Alternate titles: Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Deutschland, Federal Republic of Germany
By
James J. Sheehan
See All
•
Last Updated:
Aug 31, 2022
•
Edit History
Audio File:
Anthem of Germany ( see article )
Head Of Government:
Chancellor: Olaf Scholz
... (Show more)
Capital:
Berlin 3
... (Show more)
Population:
(2022 est.) 83,200,000
... (Show more)
Currency Exchange Rate:
1 USD equals 0.998 euro
... (Show more)
Head Of State:
President: Frank-Walter Steinmeier
... (Show more)
Where is the Great Fence? What is Rhodesia now called? And which country’s name means "silvery"? It’s a country challenge--are you up for it?
Experience the transformation of Berlin into a modern and cosmopolitan city after the fall of the Berlin Wall
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Germany , officially Federal Republic of Germany , German Deutschland or Bundesrepublik Deutschland , country of north-central Europe , traversing the continent’s main physical divisions, from the outer ranges of the Alps northward across the varied landscape of the Central German Uplands and then across the North German Plain .
One of Europe ’s largest countries, Germany encompasses a wide variety of landscapes: the tall, sheer mountains of the south; the sandy, rolling plains of the north; the forested hills of the urbanized west; and the plains of the agricultural east. At the spiritual heart of the country is the magnificent east-central city of Berlin , which rose phoenixlike from the ashes of World War II and now, after decades of partition, is the capital of a reunified Germany, and the Rhine River , which flows northward from Switzerland and is celebrated in visual art, literature, folklore, and song. Along its banks and those of its principal tributaries—among them the Neckar , Main , Moselle , and Ruhr —stand hundreds of medieval castles, churches, picturesque villages, market towns, and centres of learning and culture , including Heidelberg , the site of one of Europe’s oldest universities (founded in 1386), and Mainz , historically one of Europe’s most important publishing centres. All are centrepieces of Germany’s thriving tourist economy, which brings millions of visitors to the country each year, drawn by its natural beauty, history, culture, and cuisine (including its renowned wines and beers).
The name Germany has long described not a particular place but the loose, fluid polity of Germanic-speaking peoples that held sway over much of western Europe north of the Alps for millennia. Although Germany in that sense is an ancient entity , the German nation in more or less its present form came into being only in the 19th century, when Prussian Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck brought together dozens of German-speaking kingdoms, principalities, free cities, bishoprics, and duchies to form the German Empire in 1871. This so-called Second Reich quickly became Europe’s leading power and acquired colonies in Africa , Asia , and the Pacific. That overseas empire was dismantled following Germany’s defeat in World War I and the abdication of Emperor William II . Economic depression, widespread unemployment, and political strife that verged on civil war followed, leading to the collapse of the progressive Weimar Republic and the rise of the Nazi Party under Adolf Hitler . After gaining power in 1933, Hitler established the Third Reich and soon thereafter embarked on a ruinous crusade to conquer Europe and exterminate Jews, Roma (Gypsies), homosexuals, and others.
The Third Reich disintegrated in 1945, brought down by the Allied armies of the United States , the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union , France , and other countries. The victorious powers divided Germany into four zones of occupation and later into two countries: the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), separated for more than 40 years by a long boundary. In East Germany this boundary was, until the fall of its communist government in 1989, marked by defenses designed to prevent escape. The 185 square miles (480 square km) of the “island” of West Berlin were similarly ringed from 1961 to 1989 by the Berlin Wall running through the city and by a heavily guarded wire-mesh fence in the areas abutting the East German countryside. Although Berlin was a flashpoint between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War , the city declined in national and international significance until 1989–90, when a popular and peaceful uprising toppled the East German government and soon after restored a united Berlin as the capital of a reunified Germany.
Since World War II, Germany has made great efforts to both commemorate the victims and redress the crimes of the Holocaust , providing strong material and political support for the state of Israel and actively prosecuting hate crimes and the propagation of neo-Nazi doctrine ; the latter became an issue in the 1990s with the rise in Germany of anti-immigrant skinhead groups and the availability of Hitler’s Mein Kampf over the Internet. Clearly, modern Germany struggles to balance its national interests with those of an influx of political and economic refugees from far afield, especially North Africa , Turkey , and South Asia , an influx that has fueled ethnic tensions and swelled the ranks of nationalist political parties, particularly in eastern Germany, where unemployment was double that of the west. Tensions became especially acute in the second decade of the 21st century, when more than one million migrants entered Germany in the wake of the revolutions of the Arab Spring and the Syrian Civil War .
The constitution of the republic, adopted in 1949 by West Germany , created a federal system that gives significant government powers to its constituent Länder (states). Before unification there were 11 West German Länder (including West Berlin, which had the special status of a Land without voting rights), but, with the accession of East Germany, there are now 16 Länder in the unified republic. The largest of the states is Bavaria (Bayern), the richest is Baden-Württemberg , and the most populous is North Rhine–Westphalia (Nordrhein-Westfalen).
Matters of national importance, such as defense and foreign affairs, are reserved to the federal government. At both the state and federal levels, parliamentary democracy prevails. The Federal Republic has been a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) since 1955 and was a founding member of the European Economic Community ( see European Union ). During the four decades of partition, the Federal Republic concluded a number of agreements with the Soviet Union and East Germany, which it supported to some extent economically in return for various concessions with regard to humanitarian matters and access to Berlin. West Germany’s rapid economic recovery in the 1950s ( Wirtschaftswunder , or “economic miracle”) brought it into a leading position among the world’s economic powers, a position that it has maintained.
Much of Germany’s post-World War II success has been the result of the renowned industriousness and self-sacrifice of its people, about which novelist Günter Grass , winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1999, remarked, “To be a German is to make the impossible possible.” He added, more critically,
For in our country everything is geared to growth. We’re never satisfied. For us enough is never enough. We always want more. If it’s on paper, we convert it into reality. Even in our dreams we’re productive.
This devotion to hard work has combined with a public demeanour—which is at once reserved and assertive—to produce a stereotype of the German people as aloof and distant. Yet Germans prize both their private friendships and their friendly relations with neighbours and visitors, place a high value on leisure and culture, and enjoy the benefits of life in a liberal democracy that has become ever more integrated with and central to a united Europe.
The Racial Slur Database, since 1999. Not copyrighted in any way, shape or form.
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Hitler, of course. Generally thought of the worst person ever.
"Bazi" is a Bavarian/Southern German term for a loveable crook. Pronounced "baht-see"
Refers to the shape of their heads. Term dates back to the beginning of time. Used a lot by Charles M. Schulz in "The Peanuts" comics & cartoons.
The French called the Germans this in WWII. "Boche" is short for "alcaboche" or cabbage-head.
French WW2 term. Name of a big german tool and machine producer?
Germans typically have, or are thought to have, rather square heads.
"Fish-head" used by southern Germans for northern Germans
Russians in WWII called Germans Fritzes, a common German name in those days (short for Friedrich). Also, Germany was ruled by several emperors (Kaiser) with the name Friedrich.
Being a plague to humans, sickening them
Possibly from the root name, "Hein."
Herman the German - self-explanatory.
When the Europeans united to crush the Chinese boxer rebellion, Kaiser Wilhelm II said something like "let the Germans strike fear into the hearts, so hell be feared like the hun!" Europe laughed, name stuck.
Apparently used since World War I. Jerry was a British nickname for "chamberpot", and was a reference to the shape of the helmets the germans wore in WWI.
Refers to Jewish Holocaust during WW2.
Called this by foreigners because they think Germans eat a lot of potatos (Kartoffel)
Cossack tribes who lived in Northern Germany
Short for sauerkraut, a popular German food.
Used by the Dutch in the 2nd World War.
Pronounced "pif - ka." Used by Bavarians/Austrians to refer to North Germans (after a famous Prussian with the last name "Pieffke").
Austrians and Bavarians use it for Northern Germans. Preiss is Austrian dialect for Preusse (Prussian) and a Sau is a female pig.
Frech slur during WWI; common German consonant combination that is unpleasent sounding to French speakers
WWII term for a German soldier, derived from a machine gun of the same make.
Feces eating is a fetish that originated in Germany, otherwise known as scat sex or shit sex eg. shit eating, rubbing shit, etc.
Hay/Farm Implements
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Hyde Flippo taught the German language for 28 years at high school and college levels and published several books on the German language and culture.
Flippo, Hyde. "German Spelling With a Double S or Eszett (ß)." ThoughtCo, Aug. 28, 2020, thoughtco.com/spelling-reform-double-s-words-german-4069735.
Flippo, Hyde. (2020, August 28). German Spelling With a Double S or Eszett (ß). Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/spelling-reform-double-s-words-german-4069735
Flippo, Hyde. "German Spelling With a Double S or Eszett (ß)." ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/spelling-reform-double-s-words-german-4069735 (accessed September 3, 2022).
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A unique feature of the German alphabet is the ß character. Found in no other language, part of the uniqueness of ß—aka " eszett " ("s-z") or " scharfes s " ("sharp s")—is that, unlike all other German letters , it exists only in the lower case. This exclusivity may help explain why many Germans and Austrians are so attached to the character.
Since being introduced in 1996, spelling reform ( Rechtschreibreform ) has shaken the German-speaking world and caused raging controversy. Even though the Swiss have managed to live peacefully without the ß in Swiss-German for decades, some German-speakers are up in arms over its possible demise. Swiss writers, books, and periodicals have long ignored the ß , using double-s (ss) instead.
That's why it's all the more puzzling that the International Working Committee for [German] Spelling ( Internationaler Arbeitskreis für Orthographie ) chose to keep this troublesome oddity in certain words while eliminating its use in others. Why not just toss out this troublemaker that non-Germans and German beginners often mistake for a capital B, and be done with it? If the Swiss can get by without it, why not the Austrians and Germans?
The rules for when to use the ß rather than "ss" have never been easy, but while the "simplified" spelling rules are less complex, they continue the confusion. German spelling reformers included a section called sonderfall ss/ß (neuregelung), or "special case ss/ß (new rules)." This section says, "For the sharp (voiceless) [s] after a long vowel or diphthong, one writes ß, as long as no other consonant follows in the word st
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