Hitler youth
Ernest Blaschke (aa568@FREENET.TORONTO.ON.CA)
Sat, 25 May 1996 23:57:09 -0400
Further to Lotte Evans's comments on the "Hitler youth" groups in
Vienna during WW2 I'd like to add a few comments which might
be of interest to linguists studying the German language.
Strictly speaking the "Hitler youth" was designated by the
abbreviation HJ (Hitler Jugend), and was really only applicable
to young men 15-19(?) years old. Younger boys in the 10 -14 year
age group were conscripted into the DJ (Deutsche Jugend), and
girls joined the BDM (Bund deutscher Maedchen). Each one of these
groups had to dress in uniforms, and I remember the BDM girls
wearing an attractively knotted scarf and a pretty skirt as part
of that uniform <g>. There was one interesting linguistic aspect
regarding the Hitler youth movement:
To understand it one has to realize that German spoken in
Northern Germany, say in Berlin, sounds quite different to the
German spoken in the Southern part such as in Bavaria or in
Austria. In addition there is one letter of the alphabet (j)
which is pronounced differently in Northern and Southern
Germany. (Much like "z" being pronounced "zed" in England or
Canada, but "zee" in the United States).
In Northern Germany "j" is called "yot", in the South or in
Austria it is called "ye". Since the official designations of the
HJ and DJ groups originated in Berlin, they were known all over
as "huh-yot" and "day-yot", which reminded the Viennese of the
typical, disliked Northern Dialect. (A similar dislike for the
southern pronunciation exists in the Northern part of Germany.
Many jokes in German are told in both areas making fun of the
pronunciation of the language in the other part).
Although the German propaganda machine was known to be efficient,
they slipped up by not picking a name without "j" for their
youth movement. As it was, half the country perceived HJ and DJ
as somewhat "foreign" sounding, which certainly would not have
been the intention of the creators of the youth groups.
I apologize to those of you who might think I have strayed too
far off the given topics of "what life was like" by introducing
linguistic oddities.
Ernest.