Many Americans and other English-speaking expats end up living and working in Germany. They have to learn at least some German and adapt to a new culture. But few of them earn a living from Denglisch. American-born Gayle Tufts makes her living in Germany as a comedienne using her own brand of Denglish — for which she coined the word "Dinglish" to differentiate it from Denglish. In Germany since 1990, Tufts has become a well-known performer and book author who uses a blend of German and American English in her comedy act. However, she takes pride in the fact that although she is using two different languages, she does not mix the two grammars. Unlike Denglisch, Dinglish supposedly uses English with English grammar and German with German grammar, and avoids mixing them. A sample of her Dinglish: "I came here from New York in 1990 for two years, und 15 Jahre später bin ich immer noch hier."
Not that she has made complete peace with German. One of the numbers she sings is "Konrad Duden must die," a humorous musical attack on the German Noah Webster and a reflection of her frustration over trying to learn Deutsch. And her Dinglish isn't always as pure as she claims. Her own Dinglish utterance about Dinglish: "It’s basically what most Americans speak for the zehn, fünfzehn Jahren that we wohn here in Deutschland. Dinglish is not a neue Phänomen, it’s uralt and most New Yorkers have been speaking it zeit Jahren." As "Deutschlands 'Very-First-Dinglish-Allround-Entertainerin'" Tufts lives in Berlin. In addition to her performing and TV appearances, she has published two books: Absolutely Unterwegs: eine Amerikanerin in Berlin (Ullstein, 1998) and Miss Amerika (Gustav Kiepenhauer, 2006). She also has released several audio CDs.
"G.I. Deutsch" - Germlish
Much more rare than Denglisch is the reverse phenomenon sometimes called Germlish. This is the forming of hybrid "German" words by English-speakers. I have always called this "G.I. Deutsch," because of the many Americans stationed in Germany who sometimes invented new words from German and English (Germlish). My favorite example has long been a word that always makes Germans laugh. The Germlish word Scheisskopf (sh*t head) does not really exist in German, but Germans who hear it can understand it. In German the Scheiß- prefix is used in the sense of "lousy," as in Scheißwetter for "lousy weather." The German word itself is much tamer than the English s-word, often closer to English "damn" than its literal translation.
If any readers can give me some more examples of G.I. Deutsch, I'd love to have them.
Über-German
A variation of G.I. Deutsch is "über-German" in English. The tendency to use the German prefix über- (also spelled "uber" without the umlaut) is seen in U.S. advertising, in much the same way as English in German ads (but much more limited in scope). The use of "uber/über" is also used on English-language game sites. Like Nietzsche's Übermensch ("super man"), the über- prefix is used to mean "super-," "master-" or "best-" whatever, as in "übercool," the "überphone," or the "überdiva." Note: It's much cooler to use the umlauted form, as in German.
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