101-783: CDU/CSU , unofficially the Union parties ( German : Unionsparteien , pronounced [uˈni̯oːnspaʁˌtaɪən] ) or the Union , is a centre-right Christian democratic and conservative political alliance of two political parties in Germany : the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) and the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU). The CSU contests elections only in Bavaria , while
202-465: A de facto official language of Namibia after the end of German colonial rule alongside English and Afrikaans , and had de jure co-official status from 1984 until its independence from South Africa in 1990. However, the Namibian government perceived Afrikaans and German as symbols of apartheid and colonialism, and decided English would be the sole official language upon independence, stating that it
303-402: A second language , and 75–100 million as a foreign language . This would imply the existence of approximately 175–220 million German speakers worldwide. German sociolinguist Ulrich Ammon estimated a number of 289 million German foreign language speakers without clarifying the criteria by which he classified a speaker. As of 2012 , about 90 million people, or 16% of
404-612: A "commonly used" language and the Pan South African Language Board is obligated to promote and ensure respect for it. Cameroon was also a colony of the German Empire from the same period (1884 to 1916). However, German was replaced by French and English, the languages of the two successor colonial powers, after its loss in World War I . Nevertheless, since the 21st century, German has become
505-647: A Bavarian party. With a CDU in Bavaria, the CSU would fall from 47 to 30 percent in Bavaria. A federal CSU was again discussed prior to the general elections of 2021. CSU leader Markus Söder was unhappy about the CDU decision to declare CDU leader Armin Laschet the chancellor candidate and successor of Angela Merkel. In September 2020, the CSU created online memberships for people not living in Bavaria. A survey in May 2021 foresaw that
606-449: A Protestant and the long-standing mutual animosity between Bavaria and Prussia. For short periods of time, there existed Alliance for Germany was a coalition for the 1990 East German general election consisting of the CDU, the DSU and Democratic Awakening which merged into the CDU. During the 1970s and then again after 2015, several CSU leaders have expressed the wish to make the CSU
707-703: A common youth organisation, the Young Union , a common pupil organisation, the Pupil Union of Germany [ de ] , a common student organisation, the Association of Christian Democratic Students and a common Mittelstand organisation, the Mittelstand and Business association [ de ] . Both the CDU and the CSU were established after World War II and share a perspective based on Christian democracy and conservatism and hold
808-555: A federal CSU may win at least 9 percent of the votes, especially in Eastern Germany and among FDP voters. Both parties suffered heavy losses in elections after 2017. In the Bavarian state elections of October 2018, the CSU lost 10.5 percent. With 37.2 percent, this was its worst election result since 1950. In the federal elections of 2021, the CDU lost 7.9 percent and the CSU 1.0 percent of the (party list) votes. The CDU and
909-404: A federal CSU was discussed again among party members and journalists. For example conservative Welt columnist Ansgar Graw wrote in 2016 that CDU and CSU lost its stance as a law and order party. As Merkel's CDU could not move to the right without losing credibility, Graw called the CSU to become a federal party, a right wing party that rigorously deports asylum seekers without right to stay. On
1010-559: A greater need for regularity in written conventions. While the major changes of the MHG period were socio-cultural, High German was still undergoing significant linguistic changes in syntax, phonetics, and morphology as well (e.g. diphthongization of certain vowel sounds: hus (OHG & MHG "house") → haus (regionally in later MHG)→ Haus (NHG), and weakening of unstressed short vowels to schwa [ə]: taga (OHG "days")→ tage (MHG)). A great wealth of texts survives from
1111-427: A joint election manifesto for the federal elections. Sometimes the CSU additionally published a manifesto of its own. Both parties always gather behind a joint candidate for the chancellorship. There is no approved procedure to select this candidate, creating tensions between both parties from time to time. During the federal campaign, the CSU may decide to present mainly Bavarian candidates on the election posters and not
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#17327649719601212-458: A native tongue today, mostly descendants of German colonial settlers . The period of German colonialism in Namibia also led to the evolution of a Standard German-based pidgin language called " Namibian Black German ", which became a second language for parts of the indigenous population. Although it is nearly extinct today, some older Namibians still have some knowledge of it. German remained
1313-458: A payment plan for reparations. Its passage required a two-thirds majority due to the constitutional amendments necessary, meaning both SPD and DNVP support was needed. The former supported the plan, while the latter was deeply divided: after a controversial session, about half of the DNVP delegation voted in favour, enough to secure its passage. With this major issue resolved, the cabinet negotiated for
1414-696: A popular foreign language among pupils and students, with 300,000 people learning or speaking German in Cameroon in 2010 and over 230,000 in 2020. Today Cameroon is one of the African countries outside Namibia with the highest number of people learning German. In the United States, German is the fifth most spoken language in terms of native and second language speakers after English, Spanish , French , and Chinese (with figures for Cantonese and Mandarin combined), with over 1 million total speakers. In
1515-483: A result, the surviving texts are written in highly disparate regional dialects and exhibit significant Latin influence, particularly in vocabulary. At this point monasteries, where most written works were produced, were dominated by Latin, and German saw only occasional use in official and ecclesiastical writing. While there is no complete agreement over the dates of the Middle High German (MHG) period, it
1616-560: A strong effect on CDU state politicians. Saarland 's former CDU Minister-President Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer heavily opposed same-sex marriages in July 2017 while the CDU in Schleswig-Holstein was in favor, with Saarland having the largest share of Catholic Christians in any German state. CDU and CSU are two separate parties with separate organization. While the CDU is a federal party with members and local affiliations in 15 of
1717-587: A truly independent party without formal ties to the CDU. Usually they combined this wish with an expansion to the rest of Germany. After 1969, CDU and CSU were in the opposition in the Bundestag. CDU leader Kohl wanted to win the liberal FDP again for a coalition with the CDU/CSU, while the CSU leader Strauß had different plans. He aimed for a right wing majority without the FDP. Additionally, Strauß thought little of
1818-597: Is 'given' to the CSU. In the past, the CSU often lead the departments for postal services (when this ministry still existed), transportation, constructions, or agriculture. In European elections , CDU and CSU have separate party lists. In the European Parliament, they form a group within the parliamentary group of the European People's Party . German language German (German: Deutsch , pronounced [dɔʏtʃ] )
1919-663: Is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family , mainly spoken in Western and Central Europe . It is the most spoken native language within the European Union . It is the most widely spoken and official (or co-official) language in Germany , Austria , Switzerland , Liechtenstein , and the Italian autonomous province of South Tyrol . It is also an official language of Luxembourg , Belgium and
2020-601: Is a recognized minority language in the following countries: In France, the High German varieties of Alsatian and Moselle Franconian are identified as " regional languages ", but the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages of 1998 has not yet been ratified by the government. Namibia also was a colony of the German Empire, from 1884 to 1915. About 30,000 people still speak German as
2121-612: Is also notable for its broad spectrum of dialects , with many varieties existing in Europe and other parts of the world. Some of these non-standard varieties have become recognized and protected by regional or national governments. Since 2004, heads of state of the German-speaking countries have met every year, and the Council for German Orthography has been the main international body regulating German orthography . German
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#17327649719602222-558: Is an Indo-European language that belongs to the West Germanic group of the Germanic languages . The Germanic languages are traditionally subdivided into three branches: North Germanic , East Germanic , and West Germanic . The first of these branches survives in modern Danish , Swedish , Norwegian , Faroese , and Icelandic , all of which are descended from Old Norse . The East Germanic languages are now extinct, and Gothic
2323-478: Is called the "German Sprachraum ". German is the official language of the following countries: German is a co-official language of the following countries: Although expulsions and (forced) assimilation after the two World wars greatly diminished them, minority communities of mostly bilingual German native speakers exist in areas both adjacent to and detached from the Sprachraum. Within Europe, German
2424-430: Is complicated by the existence of several varieties whose status as separate "languages" or "dialects" is disputed for political and linguistic reasons, including quantitatively strong varieties like certain forms of Alemannic and Low German . With the inclusion or exclusion of certain varieties, it is estimated that approximately 90–95 million people speak German as a first language , 10–25 million speak it as
2525-535: Is generally seen as ending when the 1346–53 Black Death decimated Europe's population. Modern High German begins with the Early New High German (ENHG) period, which Wilhelm Scherer dates 1350–1650, terminating with the end of the Thirty Years' War . This period saw the further displacement of Latin by German as the primary language of courtly proceedings and, increasingly, of literature in
2626-611: Is generally seen as lasting from 1050 to 1350. This was a period of significant expansion of the geographical territory occupied by Germanic tribes, and consequently of the number of German speakers. Whereas during the Old High German period the Germanic tribes extended only as far east as the Elbe and Saale rivers, the MHG period saw a number of these tribes expanding beyond this eastern boundary into Slavic territory (known as
2727-565: Is less closely related to languages based on Low Franconian dialects (e.g., Dutch and Afrikaans), Low German or Low Saxon dialects (spoken in northern Germany and southern Denmark ), neither of which underwent the High German consonant shift. As has been noted, the former of these dialect types is Istvaeonic and the latter Ingvaeonic, whereas the High German dialects are all Irminonic; the differences between these languages and standard German are therefore considerable. Also related to German are
2828-435: Is one of the major languages of the world . German is the second-most widely spoken Germanic language , after English, both as a first and as a second language . German is also widely taught as a foreign language , especially in continental Europe (where it is the third most taught foreign language after English and French), and in the United States. Overall, German is the fourth most commonly learned second language, and
2929-597: Is one of the three biggest newspapers in Namibia and the only German-language daily in Africa. An estimated 12,000 people speak German or a German variety as a first language in South Africa, mostly originating from different waves of immigration during the 19th and 20th centuries. One of the largest communities consists of the speakers of "Nataler Deutsch", a variety of Low German concentrated in and around Wartburg . The South African constitution identifies German as
3030-401: Is partly derived from Latin and Greek , along with fewer words borrowed from French and Modern English . English, however, is the main source of more recent loanwords . German is a pluricentric language ; the three standardized variants are German , Austrian , and Swiss Standard German . Standard German is sometimes called High German , which refers to its regional origin. German
3131-525: Is the Sachsenspiegel , the first book of laws written in Middle Low German ( c. 1220 ). The abundance and especially the secular character of the literature of the MHG period demonstrate the beginnings of a standardized written form of German, as well as the desire of poets and authors to be understood by individuals on supra-dialectal terms. The Middle High German period
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3232-578: Is the only language in this branch which survives in written texts. The West Germanic languages, however, have undergone extensive dialectal subdivision and are now represented in modern languages such as English, German, Dutch , Yiddish , Afrikaans , and others. Within the West Germanic language dialect continuum, the Benrath and Uerdingen lines (running through Düsseldorf - Benrath and Krefeld - Uerdingen , respectively) serve to distinguish
3333-485: Is understood in all areas where German is spoken. Approximate distribution of native German speakers (assuming a rounded total of 95 million) worldwide: As a result of the German diaspora , as well as the popularity of German taught as a foreign language , the geographical distribution of German speakers (or "Germanophones") spans all inhabited continents. However, an exact, global number of native German speakers
3434-689: The Ostsiedlung ). With the increasing wealth and geographic spread of the Germanic groups came greater use of German in the courts of nobles as the standard language of official proceedings and literature. A clear example of this is the mittelhochdeutsche Dichtersprache employed in the Hohenstaufen court in Swabia as a standardized supra-dialectal written language. While these efforts were still regionally bound, German began to be used in place of Latin for certain official purposes, leading to
3535-639: The Alamanni , Bavarian, and Thuringian groups, all belonging to the Elbe Germanic group ( Irminones ), which had settled in what is now southern-central Germany and Austria between the second and sixth centuries, during the great migration. In general, the surviving texts of Old High German (OHG) show a wide range of dialectal diversity with very little written uniformity. The early written tradition of OHG survived mostly through monasteries and scriptoria as local translations of Latin originals; as
3636-537: The Early Middle Ages . German is an inflected language , with four cases for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative); three genders (masculine, feminine, neuter) and two numbers (singular, plural). It has strong and weak verbs . The majority of its vocabulary derives from the ancient Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family, while a smaller share
3737-564: The European Commission . In 1998, then-Chancellor Helmut Kohl of the CDU had to pressure the CSU intensely not to veto the introduction of the euro as the new currency in Germany. On the other hand, the name euro was the idea of former CSU chairman Theo Waigel , who served as finance minister when the euro was introduced and held a very pro-European position in contrast to the Bavarian government of Edmund Stoiber . Since 2016,
3838-417: The European Union 's population, spoke German as their mother tongue, making it the second most widely spoken language on the continent after Russian and the second biggest language in terms of overall speakers (after English), as well as the most spoken native language. The area in central Europe where the majority of the population speaks German as a first language and has German as a (co-)official language
3939-484: The Federal Republic of Germany in 1949. According to German Federal Electoral Law, members of a parliamentary group which share the same basic political aims must not compete with one another in any federal state. The parties themselves officially remain completely independent with their own leadership and only few issue- or age-based joint organisations, which makes the alliance informal. However, in practice
4040-557: The Fraktion members per state. The CSU-Landesgruppenchef is considered one of the most prolific members of the Bundestag parliamentary group. Historically, most of these politicians have become members of the federal government. CDU and CSU always take part in coalition negotiations together, although they behave like two different parties. Both parties join a federal government coalition together; there has never been only one of them in government. At least one major government department
4141-682: The German Party during the early years of the Federal Republic. The BVP became the sister party of the DZP and they did not compete against each other except for the May 1924 German federal election , the 1924 Bavarian state election and the 1925 German presidential election . The DZP and BVP were mostly jointly represented at the Imperial governments. Similarly to the modern CDU/CSU split,
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4242-522: The German states . While these states were still part of the Holy Roman Empire , and far from any form of unification, the desire for a cohesive written language that would be understandable across the many German-speaking principalities and kingdoms was stronger than ever. As a spoken language German remained highly fractured throughout this period, with a vast number of often mutually incomprehensible regional dialects being spoken throughout
4343-746: The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I , and the other being Meißner Deutsch , used in the Electorate of Saxony in the Duchy of Saxe-Wittenberg . Alongside these courtly written standards, the invention of the printing press led to the development of a number of printers' languages ( Druckersprachen ) aimed at making printed material readable and understandable across as many diverse dialects of German as possible. The greater ease of production and increased availability of written texts brought about increased standardisation in
4444-666: The Old High German language in several Elder Futhark inscriptions from as early as the sixth century AD (such as the Pforzen buckle ), the Old High German period is generally seen as beginning with the Abrogans (written c. 765–775 ), a Latin-German glossary supplying over 3,000 Old High German words with their Latin equivalents. After the Abrogans , the first coherent works written in Old High German appear in
4545-676: The Sprachraum in Europe. German is used in a wide variety of spheres throughout the country, especially in business, tourism, and public signage, as well as in education, churches (most notably the German-speaking Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia (GELK) ), other cultural spheres such as music, and media (such as German language radio programs by the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation ). The Allgemeine Zeitung
4646-550: The Standard German language in its written form, and the Duden Handbook was declared its standard definition. Punctuation and compound spelling (joined or isolated compounds) were not standardized in the process. The Deutsche Bühnensprache ( lit. ' German stage language ' ) by Theodor Siebs had established conventions for German pronunciation in theatres , three years earlier; however, this
4747-513: The Upper German dialects spoken in the southern German-speaking countries , such as Swiss German ( Alemannic dialects ) and the various Germanic dialects spoken in the French region of Grand Est , such as Alsatian (mainly Alemannic, but also Central–and Upper Franconian dialects) and Lorraine Franconian (Central Franconian). After these High German dialects, standard German
4848-469: The pagan Germanic tradition. Of particular interest to scholars, however, has been the Hildebrandslied , a secular epic poem telling the tale of an estranged father and son unknowingly meeting each other in battle. Linguistically, this text is highly interesting due to the mixed use of Old Saxon and Old High German dialects in its composition. The written works of this period stem mainly from
4949-494: The 16 German states, the CSU has members and affiliations only in Bavaria. (CSU online members live outside of Bavaria but have no vote within the party.) Also, the CDU runs only in regional and local elections outside of Bavaria. Both parties do have party lists for the general (federal) elections to the Bundestag: the CDU has 15 lists in each of the 15 non-Bavarian states, the CSU only in Bavaria. Since 1972, both parties agreed
5050-470: The 1976 general elections – without consulting the CSU. Kohl did well in the elections on October 3, 1976, although Social Democrats and FDP had still enough seats to continue their coalition. Kohl decided to leave his post as prime minister of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate for the chairmanship of the CDU/CSU Bundestag faction. In November that year, the 49 CSU Bundestag members gathered in
5151-593: The Bavarian People's Party was generally seen as the party further to the political right, as evidenced by the 1925 second round of the presidential election when the Center Party backed Rhenish Catholic and Weimar Coalition candidate Wilhelm Marx while the BVP made common cause with the monarchist and nationalist parties in backing Prussian junker and former general Paul von Hindenburg despite him being
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#17327649719605252-457: The CDU joint chancellor candidate, and the popular candidates of the CDU may decide not to show up in the Bavarian campaign. Both parties together form a parliamentary group ( Fraktion ) in the Bundestag. Such a Fraktionsgemeinschaft is legal because both parties are no competition of each other during the elections (the voters can nowhere decide between a CDU and a CSU candidate). The Fraktionsgemeinschaft (parliamentary group alliance) works on
5353-556: The CDU operates in the other 15 states of Germany . The CSU also reflects the particular concerns of the largely rural, Catholic south . While the two Christian Democratic parties are commonly described as sister parties, they have shared a common parliamentary group, the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group, in the German Bundestag (German: CDU/CSU-Fraktion im Deutschen Bundestag ) since the foundation of
5454-407: The CDU since Bavaria is predominantly Catholic while Christians in Germany as a whole are approximately equally balanced between Catholics and Protestants. There are nevertheless strong regional differences within Bavaria and Germany as a whole with large predominantly Protestant areas in northern Bavaria and large predominantly Catholic areas in North Rhine-Westphalia and South Western Germany having
5555-404: The CSU has strongly been advocating the idea of a maximum number (Obergrenze) of 200,000 people per year to limit the number of asylum seekers. This is opposed by the CDU because they claim that it is impossible to limit the number through border control. While both parties officially identify themselves as non-denominational Christian , the Catholic influence on the CSU is stronger than that on
5656-406: The CSU usually only differ slightly in their political stances. The CSU is usually considered more socially conservative (especially on family issues, e.g. the CSU favors providing infants' parents with compensation (Betreuungsgeld) if they intend not to use the public day nursery system to work while the CDU favors public funding of day nurseries). The CSU government in Bavaria has implemented one of
5757-408: The DNVP's entry but without success. With no prospect of a stable government, the Reichstag was dissolved in October for fresh elections. The Reichstag was elected via party list proportional representation . For this purpose, the country was divided into 35 multi-member electoral districts . A party was entitled to a seat for every 60,000 votes won. This was calculated via a three-step process on
5858-549: The DVP. However the CDU's foundation was the result of a major re-organisation of the centre-right political camp compared to the Weimar Republic. Although the CDU was largely built as the de facto successor of the Centre Party, it successfully opened out to non-Catholic Christians (many of them affiliated with the German People's Party until 1933) and successfully asserted itself as the only major conservative party (outside of Bavaria) against initial competition from other Catholic, Protestant or national conservative parties such as
5959-614: The Empire. Its use indicated that the speaker was a merchant or someone from an urban area, regardless of nationality. Prague (German: Prag ) and Budapest ( Buda , German: Ofen ), to name two examples, were gradually Germanized in the years after their incorporation into the Habsburg domain; others, like Pressburg ( Pozsony , now Bratislava), were originally settled during the Habsburg period and were primarily German at that time. Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, and cities like Zagreb (German: Agram ) or Ljubljana (German: Laibach ), contained significant German minorities. In
6060-414: The Frisian languages— North Frisian (spoken in Nordfriesland ), Saterland Frisian (spoken in Saterland ), and West Frisian (spoken in Friesland )—as well as the Anglic languages of English and Scots. These Anglo-Frisian dialects did not take part in the High German consonant shift, and the Anglic languages also adopted much vocabulary from both Old Norse and the Norman language . The history of
6161-417: The German language begins with the High German consonant shift during the Migration Period , which separated Old High German dialects from Old Saxon . This sound shift involved a drastic change in the pronunciation of both voiced and voiceless stop consonants ( b , d , g , and p , t , k , respectively). The primary effects of the shift were the following below. While there is written evidence of
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#17327649719606262-399: The German states; the invention of the printing press c. 1440 and the publication of Luther's vernacular translation of the Bible in 1534, however, had an immense effect on standardizing German as a supra-dialectal written language. The ENHG period saw the rise of several important cross-regional forms of chancery German, one being gemeine tiutsch , used in the court of
6363-623: The Germanic dialects that were affected by the High German consonant shift (south of Benrath) from those that were not (north of Uerdingen). The various regional dialects spoken south of these lines are grouped as High German dialects, while those spoken to the north comprise the Low German and Low Franconian dialects. As members of the West Germanic language family, High German, Low German, and Low Franconian have been proposed to be further distinguished historically as Irminonic , Ingvaeonic , and Istvaeonic , respectively. This classification indicates their historical descent from dialects spoken by
6464-547: The Irminones (also known as the Elbe group), Ingvaeones (or North Sea Germanic group), and Istvaeones (or Weser–Rhine group). Standard German is based on a combination of Thuringian - Upper Saxon and Upper Franconian dialects, which are Central German and Upper German dialects belonging to the High German dialect group. German is therefore closely related to the other languages based on High German dialects, such as Luxembourgish (based on Central Franconian dialects ) and Yiddish . Also closely related to Standard German are
6565-644: The Italian autonomous region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia , as well as a recognized national language in Namibia . There are also notable German-speaking communities in France ( Alsace ), the Czech Republic ( North Bohemia ), Poland ( Upper Silesia ), Slovakia ( Košice Region , Spiš , and Hauerland ), Denmark ( North Schleswig ), Romania and Hungary ( Sopron ). Overseas, sizeable communities of German-speakers are found in Brazil ( Blumenau and Pomerode ), South Africa ( Kroondal ), Namibia , among others, some communities have decidedly Austrian German or Swiss German characters (e.g. Pozuzo , Peru). German
6666-408: The MHG period. Significantly, these texts include a number of impressive secular works, such as the Nibelungenlied , an epic poem telling the story of the dragon -slayer Siegfried ( c. thirteenth century ), and the Iwein , an Arthurian verse poem by Hartmann von Aue ( c. 1203 ), lyric poems , and courtly romances such as Parzival and Tristan . Also noteworthy
6767-425: The SPD, while the Communist Party won 13%, and the National Socialist Freedom Movement (NSFP), an alliance of völkisch nationalists and the Nazi Party , won 6.5%. No clear majority could be formed in the new Reichstag. Wilhelm Marx remained Chancellor in a minority cabinet with the hope of bringing the DNVP into government. The following months were dominated by debate over the Dawes Plan , which would set out
6868-449: The basis of a Fraktionsvertrag (parliamentary group agreement) with some special provisions for the CSU, e.g. with regard to speaking time in the Bundestag. The parliamentary group has one chair and one or more vice chairs (12 in the 2021 Bundestag). The chair has always been a CDU member. The First Deputy chair is ex officio the leader of the CSU-Landesgruppe . The Fraktion is divided into 16 Landesgruppen (state groups), comprising
6969-444: The committees of the parties harmonise their decisions with each other and the two parties run behind a common candidate for Chancellor , and the leader of one party is usually invited to party conventions of the other party. Both the CDU and CSU are members of the European People's Party and the International Democracy Union . Both parties sit in the European People's Party Group in the European Parliament . The CDU and CSU share
7070-447: The constituency level, an intermediary level which combined multiple constituencies, and finally nationwide, where all parties' excess votes were combined. In the third nationwide step, parties could not be awarded more seats than they had already won on the two lower constituency levels. Due to the fixed number of votes per seat, the size of the Reichstag fluctuated between elections based on the number of voters and turnout. The voting age
7171-459: The contrary, former CSU leader Theo Waigel warned against a separate election campaign. In such a campaign, CDU and CSU would fight much more each other than the rest of the parties. In 2018, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer , a former Minister-President of Bavaria and the leader of the CSU, opposed CDU Chancellor Angela Merkel 's policy on Syrian refugees in Germany. Seehofer hoped to place restrictions on incoming refugees, many of whom enter
7272-486: The country through Bavaria. His stance was seen as being in part motivated by the 2018 Bavarian state election in which it was feared that the far-right Alternative for Germany would make gains. The dispute threatened to bring down the Merkel government which relied on the CSU for its parliamentary majority as Seehofer had indicated his resignation on 2 July, but he already rescinded it a day later after an agreement over
7373-903: The creation of a CDU party organization in Bavaria. In March 1977, the CDU Bayern was supposed to be founded in Nuremberg. During the conflict, the Aktionsgemeinschaft Vierte Partei , the Bund Freies Deutschland (West-Berlin), the Christlich Soziale Wähler Union (Saarland), the Deutsche Union (North Rhine-Westphalia) and the Partei Freier Bürger (Bremen) were founded. On 12 December 1976,
7474-403: The current CDU leader Kohl, a more moderate Christian Democrat. Strauß believed that CDU and CSU should be separate national parties to address different audience: the CDU the moderate, social and liberal voters, the CSU the conservative voters. After the elections they should still form a government together. In 1975, the federal CDU declared Kohl to be the next CDU/CSU chancellor candidate for
7575-535: The development of non-local forms of language and exposed all speakers to forms of German from outside their own area. With Luther's rendering of the Bible in the vernacular, German asserted itself against the dominance of Latin as a legitimate language for courtly, literary, and now ecclesiastical subject-matter. His Bible was ubiquitous in the German states: nearly every household possessed a copy. Nevertheless, even with
7676-456: The dialect so as to make the work as natural and accessible to German speakers as possible. Copies of Luther's Bible featured a long list of glosses for each region, translating words which were unknown in the region into the regional dialect. Luther said the following concerning his translation method: One who would talk German does not ask the Latin how he shall do it; he must ask the mother in
7777-470: The dominant centre-right position in the German political spectrum. The CSU is usually considered the de facto successor of the Weimar Republic –era Bavarian People's Party (BVP), which itself broke away from the all-German Catholic Centre Party (DZP) after World War I , but the CSU included also parts of the agrarian and liberal Bavarian Peasants' League and parts of the bavarian wing of
7878-519: The eastern provinces of Banat , Bukovina , and Transylvania (German: Banat, Buchenland, Siebenbürgen ), German was the predominant language not only in the larger towns—like Temeschburg ( Timișoara ), Hermannstadt ( Sibiu ), and Kronstadt ( Brașov )—but also in many smaller localities in the surrounding areas. In 1901, the Second Orthographic Conference ended with a (nearly) complete standardization of
7979-435: The home, the children on the streets, the common man in the market-place and note carefully how they talk, then translate accordingly. They will then understand what is said to them because it is German. When Christ says ' ex abundantia cordis os loquitur ,' I would translate, if I followed the papists, aus dem Überflusz des Herzens redet der Mund . But tell me is this talking German? What German understands such stuff? No,
8080-481: The influence of Luther's Bible as an unofficial written standard, a widely accepted standard for written German did not appear until the middle of the eighteenth century. German was the language of commerce and government in the Habsburg Empire , which encompassed a large area of Central and Eastern Europe . Until the mid-nineteenth century, it was essentially the language of townspeople throughout most of
8181-693: The institution of a new currency in November 1923, and the government was able to bring the Western Allies to the table on the issue of the Ruhr and reparations. When the state of emergency lapsed in March 1924 and, faced with parliamentary opposition to several government decrees, Chancellor Wilhelm Marx requested the dissolution of the Reichstag for new elections. The elections resulted in losses for
8282-448: The issue between the coalition parties (the CDU, the CSU and the SPD) had been reached. In June 2018, CDU and CSU Bundestag members held separate meetings on the topic of refugees, which was highly unusual. A fake Twitter account announced that CSU leader Seehofer had abolished the CDU/CSU alliance and that CDU vice chair Bouffier had called for a CDU in Bavaria. Many journalists published
8383-447: The largest concentrations of German speakers are in the states of Rio Grande do Sul (where Riograndenser Hunsrückisch developed), Santa Catarina , and Espírito Santo . May 1924 German federal election First Marx cabinet Z – DVP – BVP – DDP Second Marx cabinet Z – DVP – DDP Federal elections were held in Germany 4 May 1924 to elect the second Reichstag of the Weimar Republic . The elections took place in
8484-402: The mother in the home and the plain man would say, Wesz das Herz voll ist, des gehet der Mund über . Luther's translation of the Bible into High German was also decisive for the German language and its evolution from Early New High German to modern Standard German. The publication of Luther's Bible was a decisive moment in the spread of literacy in early modern Germany , and promoted
8585-512: The news, which was interpreted by the Merkur as a sign that such events are considered no longer absurd or unlikely. Political scientist Heinrich Oberreuter did not believe in Seehofer's threat to expand the CSU to the rest of Germany. Both parties aim essentially for the same voters. As separate parties in the general elections both would lose voters. The CSU would lose its unique selling point as
8686-653: The ninth century, chief among them being the Muspilli , Merseburg charms , and Hildebrandslied , and other religious texts (the Georgslied , Ludwigslied , Evangelienbuch , and translated hymns and prayers). The Muspilli is a Christian poem written in a Bavarian dialect offering an account of the soul after the Last Judgment , and the Merseburg charms are transcriptions of spells and charms from
8787-484: The parties of the moderate centre who had been part of government in the previous year: the Catholic Centre Party , German People's Party (DVP), and German Democratic Party (DDP). The Social Democratic Party (SPD) suffered particularly severe losses. Parties of the far right and far left made the most advances: the radical nationalist German National People's Party (DNVP) very nearly surpassed
8888-463: The party's educational centre in Wildbad Kreuth , Southern Bavaria. 30 of them voted for a proposal to form a CSU Bundestag parliamentary group of its own. CDU leader Kohl was informed only later via the media. This 'Kreuth separation decision' (Kreuther Trennungsbeschluss) was a major political earthquake and caused the CDU to react swiftly and resolutely. Kohl threatened the CSU by preparing
8989-462: The pronunciation of the ending -ig as [ɪk] instead of [ɪç]. In Northern Germany, High German was a foreign language to most inhabitants, whose native dialects were subsets of Low German. It was usually encountered only in writing or formal speech; in fact, most of High German was a written language, not identical to any spoken dialect, throughout the German-speaking area until well into the 19th century. However, wider standardization of pronunciation
9090-546: The states of North Dakota and South Dakota , German is the most common language spoken at home after English. As a legacy of significant German immigration to the country , German geographical names can be found throughout the Midwest region , such as New Ulm and Bismarck (North Dakota's state capital), plus many other regions. A number of German varieties have developed in the country and are still spoken today, such as Pennsylvania Dutch and Texas German . In Brazil,
9191-504: The strictest regulations for shopping hours in Germany in order to protect employees. The CSU also strongly opposed ideas of an income unrelated system of contributions to public health insurances, a proposal which met a lot of approval in the CDU in 2010. CSU politicians often make their mark as self-declared defenders of Bavaria's state rights and cultural independence from federal or European Union bureaucrats, even in times of conservative federal governments or conservative presidents of
9292-500: The third most commonly learned second language in the United States in K-12 education. The language has been influential in the fields of philosophy, theology, science, and technology. It is the second most commonly used language in science and the third most widely used language on websites . The German-speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of annual publication of new books, with one-tenth of all books (including e-books) in
9393-468: The vote was rescinded after the CDU had threatened in turn to form local associations within Bavaria and to run in Bavarian elections against the CSU. Strauß himself polemicised against Kohl in a closed CSU meeting on November 24 (this Wienerwald speech was leaked, and published on November 29 in Der Spiegel ): That Helmut Kohl will never become chancellor. Being 90 he will write his memoirs: 'I
9494-564: The wake of several national crises the previous year: hyperinflation , the occupation of the Ruhr , conflict between the federal and state governments, as well as the Beer Hall Putsch and German October . A national state of emergency had been declared in response to these events, which the Stresemann cabinets and first Marx cabinet had used to bring them under control to a great extent. Hyperinflation had been controlled with
9595-555: The world being published in German. German is most closely related to other West Germanic languages, namely Afrikaans , Dutch , English , the Frisian languages , and Scots . It also contains close similarities in vocabulary to some languages in the North Germanic group , such as Danish , Norwegian , and Swedish . Modern German gradually developed from Old High German , which in turn developed from Proto-Germanic during
9696-600: The written form of German. One of the central events in the development of ENHG was the publication of Luther's translation of the Bible into High German (the New Testament was published in 1522; the Old Testament was published in parts and completed in 1534). Luther based his translation primarily on the Meißner Deutsch of Saxony , spending much time among the population of Saxony researching
9797-429: Was a "neutral" language as there were virtually no English native speakers in Namibia at that time. German, Afrikaans, and several indigenous languages thus became "national languages" by law, identifying them as elements of the cultural heritage of the nation and ensuring that the state acknowledged and supported their presence in the country. Today, Namibia is considered to be the only German-speaking country outside of
9898-547: Was an artificial standard that did not correspond to any traditional spoken dialect. Rather, it was based on the pronunciation of German in Northern Germany, although it was subsequently regarded often as a general prescriptive norm, despite differing pronunciation traditions especially in the Upper-German-speaking regions that still characterise the dialect of the area today – especially
9999-465: Was chancellor candidate for 40 years; lessons and experiences from bitter times.' The last chapter written maybe in Siberia or elsewhere. It turned out that most local CSU leaders and also conservative CDU state leaders did not approve a separation between CSU and CDU. The CSU Bundestag members revoked their decision. On December 7, the CDU/CSU Bundestag group elected Kohl as its chairman. In 1980, Strauß
10100-492: Was established on the basis of public speaking in theatres and the media during the 20th century and documented in pronouncing dictionaries. Official revisions of some of the rules from 1901 were not issued until the controversial German orthography reform of 1996 was made the official standard by governments of all German-speaking countries. Media and written works are now almost all produced in Standard German which
10201-403: Was the joint CDU/CSU chancellor candidate and lost more than 4 percent of the votes. This ended his ambitions for a federal CSU. Under the chairmanship of Angela Merkel (2000–2018), the CDU left some right wing positions behind and shifted more to the political centre. Especially the 2015 refugee crisis divided the German population and caused conflict between the CDU and the CSU. Therefore,
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