German Listening Comprehension
Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN
Study Guide
Study Guide: Vocabulary - Grammar - Notes/Comments
The following glossary and notes should help you better understand the AFN audio file.
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.1 | |
| der Militärsender, - | military radio station |
| beliebt | popular |
| die Bedeutungslosigkeit | insignificance |
| auf|erstehen (ist) | to rise from the ashes (lit.: from the dead), be resurrected |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.2 | |
| die Kaserne, -n | barracks (pl.); military installation/base |
| gegründet | founded |
| um|ziehen, zog um, ist umgezogen (nach) |
to move (to) |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.3 | |
| ehemalig | former |
| der Gauleiter, - | gauleiter; a district governor under the German National Socialist regime |
| beschlagnahmen | to seize, confiscate |
| der Außenminister, - | foreign minister |
| sich ein|nisten (in + dat.) | to settle (in); lit.: to build one's nest (in) |
| das Kommando übernehmen (übernimmt), übernahm, übernommen |
to take command |
| behalten (behält), behielt, behalten |
to keep |
| sich offiziell nennen, nannte, genannt (Umg.) |
here: to use one's official military title |
| jdm. gefällt etw. nicht | sb. doesn't like sth. |
| ausschlaggebend | decisive |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.4 | |
| das Schloss, ¨-er | castle |
| beschallen | here: to feed radio programming, cover |
| bauen auf (+ acc.) | to count on; to make one's basis |
| das Erfolgsgeheimnis, -se | secret behind one's success, secret key to success |
| besessen von | obsessed with, possessed by |
| das Ereignis, -se | event |
| die Gesellschaft | society |
| komisch | strange |
| das Bier, -e | beer |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.5 | |
| der Befehl, -e | order |
| den Betrieb auf|nehmen (nimmt auf), nahm auf, aufgenommen |
to go into operation; here: to start broadcasting |
| treten (tritt), trat, ist getreten (in + acc.) |
to step (into) (cf. ins Fettnäpfchen ~ [Rdw.] = to put one's foot in it) |
| begrüßen | to welcome, greet |
| die Stimme, -n | voice |
| sich rasieren | to shave |
| leicht erregbar | very sensitive, touchy (cf. er ist ~ = he gets upset/angry easily) |
| die (Selbst-)Beherrschung | (self-)control (cf. die ~ verlieren = to lose control, lose one's self-control) |
| blutend | bleeding |
| das Kriegsgericht, -e | court martial |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.6 | |
| prägen | to mark, form; to determine (cf. das Verhältnis war nachhaltig geprägt [von] ... = the tone of the relationship was strongly influenced [by]) |
| die Unterhose, -n | shorts; Brit.: underpants |
| die Dienstanweisung, -en | official instruction |
| der alltägliche Ablauf, ¨-e | daily routine |
| aus|strahlen | here: to radiate, show |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.7 | |
| verboten | forbidden, permitted, not allowed |
| bemerken | to realize, notice |
| todlangweilig | deadly boring |
| die Mittelwelle | medium wave, (AM radio) |
| empfangen (empfängt), empfing, empfangen |
to receive |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.8 | |
| aktuell | here: at the moment |
| der Hörerbrief, -e | letter from a listener |
| der Grund, ¨-e | reason, cause |
| die Befreiung | liberation, setting free (cf. die ~ssache [Umg.] = a matter of liberation) |
| die Sprachweise | manner of speech, way of talking |
| Amerikanischer Soldatensender AFN Vocabulary 11.9 | |
| der Impuls, -e | impulse, inspiration |
| der Ansporn | incentive |
| der Botschafter, - | messenger, ambassador |
| jdm. neu vor|kommen, kam vor, ist vorgekommen |
to be new to sb. |
| wahr | true (cf. im ~sten Sinne des Wortes = in the truest sense of the word; literally) |
| die Leidenschaft | passion |
| fremd | strange, foreign; exotic |
| das Lebensgefühl | experience/enjoyment of life; attitude towards life |
| German Grammar - Click the link for detailed lessons | |
| German Verbs with Prepositions | bauen auf (+ acc.), sich einnisten (in + dat.) |
| Separable/Inseparable Verb Prefixes | aus|richten, verlassen |
The following background information should help you better understand the AFN audio file.
| Notes | |
| 85 | American Forces Network (AFN) Europe, initially aimed at U.S. troops stationed in Britain during World War II, began broadcasting from London in 1943. The first song it played was "The Star Spangled Banner." In the station's early days, Nazi bombing raids over England kept knocking it off the air. AFN later moved to Paris, then to Frankfurt. |
| 86 | heute noch existieren - The approximately 20 major U.S. military installations remaining in Germany are concentrated in the southern and southwestern states of Bavaria, Baden-Württemburg, Hesse, and Rhineland-Palatinate. The Washington Post newspaper reported this past spring that the U.S. military planned to cut its force of 71,000 Army and Air Force personnel there by half. See note 47 in the 17-4 issue of Schau ins Land. |
| 87 | Wagner (1890-1944) headed the Gau, or region, of Upper Bavaria and Munich. Gaue were originally organizational divisions of the Nazi Party but became quasi-state administrative entities after the Nazis took power in 1933. The German Reich had 42 of them in 1945. Gauleiter were appointed and dismissed by Hitler himself. |
| 88 | Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893-1946) was Nazi Germany's ambassador to Britain from 1936 to 1938, and foreign minister from 1938 to 1945. He was instrumental in forming the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo axis, and in planning the 1939 attack on Poland that ignited World War II. Ribbentrop is perhaps best known for his role in negotiating, with Soviet foreign minister Vyachaslav Molotov, the notorious German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact (1939), whose secret provisions divided Poland between them (the Soviets also invaded Poland in 1939) and gave the Soviet Union control of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia (independent after World War I, the three were annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940), and Finland (invaded by the Soviets in 1939). Germany attacked the Soviet Union in 1941. Ribbentrop's influence declined over the course of World War II. He was found guilty of war crimes at the Nürnberg trials and hanged. |
| 89 | Höchst am Main is a suburb of Frankfurt. The castle is about 400 years old. See also note 22 in the 17-10 issue of Schau ins Land. |
| 90 | Ö3 is the abbreviation of Österreich 3, one of the radio stations run by Austria's public broadcasting company ORF (Österreichischer Rundfunk). |
| 91 | George S. Patton (1885-1945), called "Old Blood-and-Guts" by his men, was one of the most outstanding American generals in World War II. A graduate of West Point, he commanded a tank brigade in France during World War I. He was later promoted to major general. In World War II, Patton commanded a corps in North Africa and the Seventh Army in Sicily. He was given command of the Third Army in early 1944 and led a spectacular advance from Normandy across northern France into Germany. The quick arrival of his forces decided the Battle of the Bulge (1944-45), Germany's last offensive of the war, which was fought in the Ardennes Forest of Luxembourg and southern Belgium. Patton was particularly brilliant in highly mobile tank warfare. He died in Heidelberg, the result of a car crash, and is buried in the American cemetery in Luxembourg, at the head of his troops, as he had requested. |
| 92 | Eifel - The Eifel, forming the northwestern part of the Rhenish Slate Mountains, is a plateau region north of the Mosel River (French: Moselle) and west of the Rhine in the German states of Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia, and in eastern Belgium. Popular with tourists, it has extinct volcanoes and crater lakes (called Maare). |
AFN GERMANY: “The US defense drawdown began in earnest after the Gulf War, and impacted AFN stations and the organization of AFRTS in Europe. Even though the Europeans are not our primary audience, many of their feelings are summed up in a German newspaper article in the early 1990s that stated 'the U.S. military can leave Europe, but AFN must stay'.” - From AFN Europe - History (RadioDX.com)
NEXT > 'AFN' Transcript
WEB > AFN Europe (Bavaria, Hessen, etc.)
WEB > AFN Kaiserslautern and Frankfurt with historical sounds and photos from the early 1970s!
WEB > AFN Europe - History (RadioDX.com)
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NOTE: This sound file, transcript, and notes were originally published in Schau ins Land audiomagazine (read my review) and are used with the permission of Champs-Élysées, Inc.