By Jeroen Bos
“Germans don’t have humor. They are serious and driven by achievement. They are competitive and want to be seen as a hard working nation that makes their economy thrive. A boss pays you to get your job done and not to have fun with your colleagues.”
The humor is in the language
That’s the general feeling about Germans, and nothing could be further from the truth. However it is so that Germans have a completely other different sense of humour than Dutch people. They don’t tell jokes for example. Ever. Nor will they ever joke about their supervisor or manager. Liking them or not, respect for your boss is important. So how can you have humour without even making jokes? German humour is concealed in remarks, sentences and language. Their languages enables them to make sentences that can be very ambiguous. A very popular example is:”Dieser Bereich wird zur Verhütung von Straftaten durch die Polizei videoüberwacht”. This can either mean that the parking ground is watched by the police against criminality (what is also meant), but it can also mean that the parking ground is being watched against crimes committed by the police. Germans love this way of humour. It is a way of humour that is only possible because of their very specific way of structuring sentences. Some of them are possible to translate into Dutch. These jokes however can never be translated into English. The languages are simply too different. The other way around is also true. It is very hard to translate English jokes into German.
That is why the countries often don’t like each other’s humour, or think the opposite country doesn’t have humour.Ambiguity is an essential part of German humour. At everything you say that also could have a sexual meaning, they start laughing. Examples are saying yours is bigger, or saying it’s warm and humid today. Most Dutch would probably see it as a very juvenile way of humour. Of course, as an adolescent I love this little awkward way of German humour.
To understand German humor, listen carefully
If you want to understand the German humour, you have to listen very close. Especially at the beginning of my traineeship, I often tried to follow a conversation among my colleagues. Nothing special happened, I thought, until they all started laughing. I totally missed to joke. After a while you start to understand better what they are saying, but even then it is still hard to follow a joke, notwithstanding making one yourself. It was not until I was in Germany for over two months I could make colleagues laugh. And the first time it wasn’t even on purpose. I was making an ambiguous remark without even realizing it myself. This was also the moment I started understanding why something could be so funny. After this moment I learned to make more jokes. As a matter of fact Germans are very funny, you just have to know what you have to listen for. Furthermore quick-wittedness also works, Germans can appreciate this as well. It takes some time to get used to, but believe me, it’s worth the effort! Once you understand them, you’ll have the funniest working days with them. Never say Germans don’t have humor, you just don’t understand them! But isn’t that what culture’s all about?