Language
The official language of Austria is German, and the standard used is called Austrian German since German is considered a pluricentric language. Austrian German is defined by the Austrian Dictionary (German: Österreichisches Wörterbuch), published under the authority of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture. Thus, all websites, official announcements and most of the media are carried out in Austrian German. The minority languages Slovene, Croatian and Hungarian are spoken and officially recognized.
In terms of native language, it is generally not Austrian German that is used, but instead local dialects of the Austro-Bavarian and Allemannic (in Vorarlberg and the Tiroler Außerfern) family. The Austro-Bavarian dialects are considered to belong either to the Central Austro-Bavarian or Southern Austro-Bavarian subgroups, with the latter encompassing the languages of the Tyrol, Carinthia, and Styria and the former including the dialects of Vienna, Upper Austria, and Lower Austria. The vast majority of Austrians are however able to speak Austrian Standard German in addition to their native dialect, as it is taught in all modern day schools.
Read more about this topic: Austrians
Famous quotes containing the word language:
“It would seem as if the very language of our parlors would lose all its nerve and degenerate into palaver wholly, our lives pass at such remoteness from its symbols, and its metaphors and tropes are necessarily so far fetched.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Any language is necessarily a finite system applied with different degrees of creativity to an infinite variety of situations, and most of the words and phrases we use are “prefabricated” in the sense that we don’t coin new ones every time we speak.”
—David Lodge (b. 1935)
“Poetry is the universal language which the heart holds with nature and itself. He who has a contempt for poetry, cannot have much respect for himself, or for anything else.”
—William Hazlitt (1778–1830)