A bit of background: I moved to Zurich last year and (after a short covid delay) began weekly german lessons, having never studied german before but speaking a little French.
My current job will last another 2-3 years, after which I will need to decide whether or not I want to stay in Switzerland. I love living here, but frankly my lack of language knowledge is very frustrating. My workplace is international and English-speaking, but outside of work I feel fairly isolated. I can currently manage the standard tourist things like ordering in a restaurant but not conversation. To be honest, whether or not I decide to stay in Switzerland will depend pretty heavily on how well I speak german in 2 years' time.
I would really appreciate hearing the experience of other expats in Switzerland who started learning german after or shortly before they moved here. How fluent can you become in a couple of years? Were you able to speak dialect in that time, or only standard German?
If you put make a very big commitment to learning high German over the next three years then you should have a fairly good command of the language in the end.
But without a lot of interaction with the Swiss, I don't see how you will make much of an advance there. It's something you pick up rather than learn. In my case my wife and kids are Swiss and I live in the country side, so I just picked it up.
I thought my German was coming along nicely and that I was getting a bit of Swissness into it. Every time I speak German in Germany or Austria they say it sounds Swiss, laughably so considering the Irish accent behind it, but my Swiss friends have informed me of my "Schriftdeutsch with a Swiss accent".
I agree about the commitment. Practice, practice, both in print and make yourself go out and speak an listen to German every day, on your way to work, at lunchtime, and on your way home.
The feeling of isolation starts to fade the better your command of High German, first of all, and Swiss German comes later. Good, confident High German will already open a lot of doors and hearts. In other words, you needn't set your aim as full command of Swiss German, right away.
The first thing to aim for is no longer having to ask anyone to repeat something to you in English.
Gradually, if you work on listening (e.g. each time you are in the tram), you will start to understand the Swiss German, too. The better your command of High German, the more likely you are to be able to hear and make the mental shift to Swiss German, and then you no longer need to ask for High German. Don't give up, because that's freedom.
And that is OK. If you moved to Germany (and accents vary massively in Germany anyhow)- you would soon adapt. You have become a communicator, and that is what matters.
Do you live in a household where everyone speaks English? You will have to be strict- join Clubs, local activities, classes (not necessarily languages - anything that interests you- hopefully by Spring)- watch German TV, etc- and when people switch to English, be firm and ask them to help you and stick to german as you really want to learn. People will respect that.
If you put in the work, you can be fluent in a couple of years, maybe less. Nowadays it's easier to learn a language with the multitude of available resources.
I wouldn't bother learning dialect, I find it of no use. German is fine. And stick to your English working environment, it's definitely better compared to the German or the Swiss German one.
No use for what? All depends surely- if integration and feeling part of a community is important- then speaking super posh perfect German may not achieve that. Same as if you'd move to Cornwall or Lancashire, etc- you would have to adjust your Eton speak.
One. Try to watch everything in German. Buy a dvd of a tv show that you know well. Watch it in German with German subtitles. Concentrate on listenig and reading. Repeat and repeat. You will understand more everytime you watch it.
Also watch the news on tv. There are in German not Swissgerman.
Read 20 minutes whenever you find one. It is easy to understand and after a while you will spot mistakes
Two. Take a two week holiday in Germany every year. Spend two weeks in Hamburg or Berlin and attend language classes. Full time. You will meet orhers learning German and are surrounded by German. It is a lot cheaper than Switzerland.
Third. Join a Verein. Look for something that you like. Hiking, cooking, bee keeping. Whatever. Just don't join an expat club.
I worked in both German/Swiss and English companies. There is less politics and better pay in an English speaking company. English environment wins hands down.
I'd like to piggy back and ask what virtual learning courses you all could recommend. I'm coming up on my 3 year visa renewal and since I'm not working I'm required to show that I'm learning the language and/or in a language learning class and can pass an A1 language test. Does anyone have one they recommend over others?
I think putting effort into learning the standard language is still the right thing to do. Anyone living in Switzerland will automatically get the Swiss accent and vocabulary when trying to practice German in every day life. Swiss German is far from being one dialect but a group of significantly different dialects... I think studying that is a bit silly but if you really want to only do so with at least B1 in German... or you won’t get the difference anyways.
I don’t think that Swiss people will exclude any foreigners who put a serious effort into learning German.