Niemcy forum < Are Germans rude??

  • Idź do René K. profilu

    Germans a story for itself

    dodane przez  René K. w  Niemcy forum 

    Just to give my two cents to this conversation.

    I'm German and grew up in the most southern point of Germany (near Lake Constanz). As many of you already said, there are huge differences in which region you are, and I really have to mention "Yes thats true. I also do not get jokes by people from nothern Germany. And sometimes I feel offended by them." so this means in fact that you can not generalize "The Germans" as one race.
    I think the most common mistake people do when they are coming to Germany, or any other county, is to see through their own eyes, of their culture. Means, not everything that seems to be unkind or even offending is actually meant that way.
    There is this nice study of pragmatics which tells us that communicating is a very heavy and underestimated process. And since I study English I realized the problems of intercultural communication. A Spanish guy whould love to be treated in one way but a German, at the same time, would be completely embarrassed about one's behaviour.
    I have been to several English speaking counties (England, US, Malta...) so I dare to claim that I know what I am talking about.
    Right now I am studying in Heidelberg truely said the #1 American tourist city. I never saw an English speaking guy around here who looked misunderstood. But tourist cities are probably not representative.
    To speak of myself I do not make any difference when there is an Indian, Russian or someone from another country. I (try) to treat them in the same way as a German.

    Always beware of the fact that here are different "game rules" involved. The Americans e.g. like to have some sort of vague contact to the other people they see, including strangers. This may well be a holdover from frontier days, when it was vitally necessary to have some sort of idea who the other people in town were.

    But Germans play by different rules. You have people you know, who are your friends; and people you don't know, who are strangers. You deal very differently with these two very different types of people. You usually have contact with strangers only when there is some reason for this, and then you show considerable reserve and politeness. (linguistical said: to be aware of someone's "negative face" - negative means not bad or evil it is just the opposite of the positive face, which is a team playing face.) By the way every one of us has both of this faces.

    Further on this is not being "unfriendly," but more a way of showing tacit respect and not intruding unnecessarily on the other person.

    But I really do not want to bore you with some scientifically expressions.
    Briefly speaking accept us as we (normally) accept you and everything will be fine.

    <3 you guys.

    Eventually, please let this "Nazi" things out of topic it is more than 60 years ago and please do not call people "Nazi" before you really had the chance to know them.

    Hope to clear so things up. Even tried to.
    Would like to hear some statements.
    All the best

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