Alsatian (Elsässisch)

Alsatian is a German Alemannic dialect spoken in Alsace, a region in eastern France which has passed between French and German control many times during its history. As a result, Alsatian has been influenced a great deal by the French language.

About 96,000 people speak Alsatian, which is 60% of the inhabitants of Alsace. The majority of speakers are adults and only about 36% of primary school pupils can speak the dialect. There is limited usage Alsatian in the media: one radio station, Radio France Alsace, broadcasts in Alsatian and other radio and TV stations broadcast some programs in the dialect.

Alsatian is not easily intelligible to speakers of standard German, but is closely related to other Alemannic dialects, such as Swiss German and Swabian. It is often confused with the Frankish language, a more distantly related German West Franconian dialect. Both languages are called alsacien in French.

Many speakers write in standard German, although street names, which were formerly only in French, may use local spellings.

Alsatian alphabet
A a	B b	C c	D d	E e	F f	G g	H h	I i	J j	K k
L l	M m	N n	O o	P p	Q q	R r	S s	T t	U u	V v
W w	X x	Y y	Z z	Ä ä	À à	É é	Ö ö	Ü ü	Ù ù

C, Q, X and Y only appear in loan words

Alsatian pronunciation (s'Redde)

Alsatian is pronounced more or less like German. The letter ù sounds like the French word "où"

Sample text in Alsatian

Zwelf vun dena elef
sin züe dena zehn gànge
un nien vu dena àrte
hàn züe dene siewene g'sàjt
so sechs wie m'r fenf gets keh vier meh
den m'r drej sin die zwei ansigschte.

Source: http://dialecte.alsacien.free.fr

Longer sample text (Tower of Babel)

Alsatian language courses, dictionaries and other materials (en français)