Genuine question. Our german teacher has given us an article on that Jugendwort thing (attachment). How accurate is this? Do you actually use these words? Thank You!
by Aviation365_
Genuine question. Our german teacher has given us an article on that Jugendwort thing (attachment). How accurate is this? Do you actually use these words? Thank You!
by Aviation365_
31 comments
it’s so accurate that 99% of germans hear these words the first time when the Jugendwort gets announced and Susanne Daubner is reading it in the tagesschau.
I’m old af and I’ver heard of these, so they are relatively common I would say. Probably out of style if I know of them by now though.
“Checkst du” and “das crazy” are phrases many people use. I would say most others are just English words like lowkey and literally..
“Hartzen”, “I bims”, “Aura” and “goonen” I actually heard before they were by Daubner
Gammelfleischparty, Smombie, – Never
hartzen, I bims – Some for a short period of time, but not anymore.
Goofy, Smash, Aura etc. – Yes, I think these words are relevant to internet culture, but please note that there is not one “youth internet culture” in Germany. For example, some TikTok users probably use these words quite often, while some Reddit users claim they’ve never heard of them.
Checken is used all the time
Edit: which is a bit unfortunate as it sounds like it should mean “to check”, but it doesn’t, meaning this introduced yet another false-friend pseudo-anglicism into German
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Some are actually quite ok, some are a bit weird, some are pretty absurd, some are just rehashed phrases from 10+ years ago, making a comeback. A lot of the times, it’s basically just internet slang.
The whole Jugendwort thing is a bit of a meme in itself because in the past some of these were way out of touch and basically boiled down to what old people think young people sound like. It feels like the selections have gotten better in recent years though.
The words starting from 22 are ones that got actually used before they got chosen as contender (or winner) of jugendwort.
“I bims” was part of a meme language thing at some point but Im not sure if it wasnt already dead when it got selected.
Smombie and Gammelfleischparty are words made up by the jugendwort jury or media.
This entire jugendwort thing got much more accurate over the last few years but before that nobody really cared anymore because it was just a bunch of old people inventing words they thought young people might use
i routinely hear „i bims“ und „hartzen“.
i would also like to add my favorite: „darf er so?“
Goonen is 100% a 2025 word. Idk how many times ive seen it used by youth this year, especially on the internet
Sometimes… sadly
I’ve definitely used “I bims” and the whole lingo around it for far longer than it was actually cool.
I bims, 1 teenager vong 2017 her!
Yes, every single one at least once a day
Hi. I’m sorry, the goofy from the last rotten meat party. Hard smombies have a bad aura, goon on their smash chats all day, you check? Totally crazy.
And I thought that the youngsters became retarded 🤔. Seems I just became old…
Goonen originally came from subcultures in Reddit, online games and Discord and made its way into TikTok and schools but not sure if it’s a 2025 thing. Heard of this from American teens some time ago. Same way some other words are viral in tiktok if they make it into German tiktok and become mainstream they get adapted until it turns into cacophony and people stop saying it
Youth language is in constant flux, hence the constantly changing “Jugendwörter des Jahres”. Few things kill the usage of a “youth word” than officially being crowned one.
The teenager who use “Gammelfleischparty” before 2008 is about to celebrate their 30. birthday and has likely long forgotten and/or is too embarrassed to admit having ever used the word.
It’s really weird, some of these are spot on current colloquial language use, some are more like “meme words” that are not used all that much, and some seem entirely made up and cringey.
I work a lot with teens and 20somethings, and there is definitely a whole spectrum of words and phrases and expressions. Some are very specific to socio-cultural groups, some drift from one group to the other, for example many slang words have an Arabic or Turkish origin and are only used by migrant / bilingual kids at first but then they disperse into the wider demographic. Also, even a small age difference of 3-4 years can make a huge difference in language use. Many of these words are very short-lived, too, after a while they are either completely forgotten or they become fossilized as memes or something you only use sarcastically.
yeah but when they become old we say they’re cringe and use other ones. it has like a Rotation which words we use every year
not really. Sure, a few words are regularly used, but the thing is that its a contest hosted by Langenscheid (German Language Encyclopedia), where the „Jugendwort“ is voted by anyone on the Internet.
If you had heard from the „4Chan Botvotes the new Mascot for Kinder situation“, than its kinda like that, exept WAY more tamer.
The reason the year is given for each term is that these aren’t necessarily current any more. Particularly on the internet, slang tends to change very quickly, and by the time such terms have become widespread enough to find their way into lists like this, many of them are already on the way out. And of course, often these terms might be used in some communities, but not all of them.
It’s good to be able to recognize some of the more common terms, but maybe don’t use them yourself until you’re *really* confident you can use them correctly.
they should add *digga* to the list
The way i always perceived the Jugendword is that whoever tf vote on/chooses them, it’s nothing I ever heard before, people start using it ironically 💀
Not young anymore but can confirm that Gammelfleischparty was a thing in 2008 and hartzen was around even longer.
Not sure if “I bims” really was trend among young people in 2017, it was everywhere in advertising, so Millenials and GenX used it for ad campaigns…
I am 26 now and the only thing we use (and used) very often is „hartzen“.
For the other words, the only ones sometimes used are the two on the end of the site: „checkst du“ and „das crazy“ but it is most likely because of the hype
not really the age group who’s voting for these as mid-20, but i often use “I bims”, “goonen” and “das crazy” (but they won’t come up in normal conversation, but in already funny contexts)
I bims were a horrific time
Gammelfleischparty is quite common even by the older people, at least if they have some self irony. I (51) know this word for years. Most likely the youth learned from us 😛
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