German-Russian pidgin

A mixed language or pidgin that appears to have arisen in the early 1990s. It is sometimes known Deutschrussisch in German or Nemrus in Russian. Some speakers of the mixed language refer to it as Quelia (not to be confused with the bird genus Quelea). It is spoken by some immigrants to Germany from Russia and other parts of the former Soviet Union.

Grammar

Russian acts as the linguistic substratum, supplying the syntactic structure into which German words are inserted. The German content varies from speaker to speaker, but can be as high as 50% of the vocabulary. The situation is somewhat akin to Spanglish in the United States.

Gender may be influenced by Russian genders, as in the case of most words ending in '-ung', which are always feminine in German, but usually masculine in the mixed language because Russian nouns ending in a hard consonant are always masculine. However, some words inherit their gender from the German noun, as in the feminine какая хорошая [kakaja xoroʂaja] from German feminine die Überraschung, meaning 'surprise'.

A mixed language makes greater use of the uncommon Russian auxiliary verbs иметь [imʲetʲ], meaning 'to have' and быть [bɨtʲ], meaning 'to be'. The corresponding verbs, (haben and sein respectively) are very common in German.

German verbs are often treated in a sentence as though they were Russian verbs, being russified by replacing the German infinitive verb ending. -(e)n with the Russian -tʲ. For example, German spüren becomes шпюрать [ʂpʲuratʲ], 'to feel'

The following features vary from speaker to speaker:

• Adopting the German terms for certain everyday items, particularly if the word has fewer syllables than the Russian equivalent.
• Adopting the German terms for the realities of immigrant life, such as Arbeitsamt ('labor office'), Sozial (a shortening of Sozialhilfe, meaning 'social assistance'), Termin (date), Vertrag (contract).
• Literal translation of Russian terms or phrases into German (calques).
• Using the German pronunciation of proper names rather than the 'russified' pronunciation based on transliteration into the Cyrillic alphabet. For example, in Russian 'Einstein' is written 'Эйнште́йн', and pronounced [ɛjnʂˈtɛjn]. But in this mixed language would be pronounced [ˈajnʂtajn], the German pronunciation of Einstein. Also [lʲajpt͡sɪk] (Ляйпциг) for 'Leipzig' instead of the russified lʲɛjpt͡sɪk' (Лейпциг), and [frojd] for 'Freud' instead of [frɛjd].
• There is at least one example of a neologism. Arbeits´слёзы, pronounced arbaytslyozy, could be a form of the German word Arbeitslosengeld (meaning 'unemployment pay'). The word has undergone an interesting phonetic and semantic shift. Casual or incomplete articulation of Arbeitslosengeld may be vocally realized as Arbeitslose, meaning 'an unemployed person', but the word takes on a new meaning because the Russian word слёзы (sljozy) means 'tears'. The resulting word in a mixed language, Arbeits´слёзы, means 'unemployment pay' but it might be better translated as 'unemployment pain'.

Examples of the mixed language

Phrases
Phrase in the mixed language	Transliteration	German Word	English Translation
Я сижу в шпильхалле.	Ja sižu v špilchalle.	Spielhalle	casino
Гельдшайны тут я векселяю.	Gel'dšajny tut ja vekseljaju.	Geldscheine, wechseln	bills, change
И мюнцы тут я засыпаю.	I mjuncy tut ja zasypaju	Münzen	coins
В блестящий Шпилёмат.	V blestjaščij Špilëmat.	Spielomat	video arcade
А не томи мою ты зелю.	A ne tomi moju ty zelju.	Seele	soul
Не сверли в ней лох.	Ne sverli v nej loch.	Loch	hole
А не души мою ты квелю.	A ne duši moju ty kvelju.	Quelle	source
Ох как я шпюраю подвох.	Och kak ja špjuraju podvoch.	spüren	to feel

Translator's Notes: 1) Many of these phrases were taken from an online casino by the original writer of the German version of this article. 2) Latin transliterations are nonstandard in that they use ch for x.

References

• "Mixed Languages and Cultural Identity" article from the Goethe-Institut (In German)
• Nemrus Dictionary (In Russian)
• В келлере термин . This recource calls the mixed language "Quelia". (In Quelia)
• Belentschikow, Renate und Ella Handke Об особенностях речевого поведения русскоязычного населения Германии Article on the linguistics of Russian immigrants in Germany (in Russian).
• Zemskaya, Е. А. Особенности русской речи эмигрантов четвертой волны Article on the speech of Russian immigrants (in Russian).
• Zemskaya E. A.: Язык русского зарубежья. Article from the Viennese-Slavic Almanac, 2001 (in Russian)
• Добровольский Д. О. Рец. на кн.: K. Meng. Russlanddeutsch Sprachbiografien. Untersuchungen zur sprachlichen Integration von Aussiedlerfamilien Unter Mitarbeit von Ekaterina Protassova (= Studien zur deutschen Sprache. Forschungen des Institutes für deutsche Sprache; Bd. 21). Tübingen, 2001 // ВЯ, 2002, № 4, с. 137-141. (English title: Investigations on linguistic integration among refugee families)