APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110024-7
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FIGURE 1. Distribution of dialects
years, the regime will have no choice but to expand its import of foreign labor and perhaps encourage their permanent settlement.
Standard High German is spoken by virtually all East Germans, but Low and Middle German dialects are extensively used for informal daily communication. Figure 1 illustrates the distribution of German dialects. The Low German dialects are characterized by a lifting intonation, derided by other Germans as "singing Saxon," and provide a common cabaret device for evoking laughter. (Walter Ulbricht, former First Secretary of the SED, spoke with a Saxon intonation.) One contemporary phenomenon which has resulted from increased physical mobility and the universality of radio and television is the gradual replacement of Low German dialects in informal speech by standard High German. Another development is the appearance of new, peculiarly Communist, meanings for common words, and the introduction of Russian or Russian-derived political, economic, and ideological terms. New dictionaries have been compiled by Western linguists in an effort to clarify these new meanings, sometimes called "party Chinese" by the man in the street.
2. Class structure
Since assuming power in 1945, the Communist have brought about a social revolution in East Germany. Prior to 1945 the area retained many feudal vestiges. About 30% of its agricultural land, for example, was included in large estates (more than 250 acres each) belonging to the landed gentry, or Junkers. This class, the backbone of the Prussian state, dominated the army and the bureaucracy and, after 1871, continued to furnish Germany most of its military and civil leaders. The middle class was far less influential than in western Germany. A large working class had grown up in the southern industrial cities and in Berlin. Before 1945 this society was highly stratified. Social mobility was limited as a result of the concentration of wealth in a small upper class and by severely restricted educational opportunities.
One of the first objectives of Soviet policy after the occupation began in 1945 was the elimination of the former ruling class and of influential elements of the middle class by abolishing independent income. The Soviet Military Administration froze all bank accounts, abolished civil service pensions, transferred many factories and other business activities from private to public ownership, and dissolved privately owned large estates, redistributing the land to politically reliable elements.
At the same time, Soviet and East German authorities purged the middle class of known Nazis and other elements they considered inimical to their philosophy. Although the socialization programs, under the guise of democratization, were initially directed at large enterprises, they were soon extended step by step to other elements of the economy, effectively eliminating the economically independent middle class. Members of the middle class and their children were subjected to widespread and severe discrimination to eliminate them from positions of power and to break their will to resist the Communists. Many died in concentration camps, and a large number fled to the West.
Socialization of East German life, however, progressed fitfully as harshness usually led to mass flights (prior to 1961) of those affected by the measures. The authorities, moreover, sought to create the image of a diverse society in which classes or
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110024-7
