how many different types of German are there?

Question

such as Swiss German, standard German, low German, high german, ect.

Answer 1

There are so many groups, and dialects - it wouldn't be a good idea to specify them, I would forget some. But take a look at the article I have found. A nice map is added, which can be zoomed two times. The cartographers did not forget anything.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_dialects

Answer 2

There's Hochdeutsch / High-German, which is THE standardized language which is taught in the schools of all German-speaking countries. Then there are MANY dialects throughout the different regions.

Since Hochdeutsch is standard education, you can learn that and be completely understood by any German speaker, and they in turn can all speak that back at you (although there may still be some dialectual accent mixed in). However, if you try to listen in on a converstation going on in a dialect, then you may have trouble understanding. (And sometimes movies use dialects for jokes--just like in America!)

Living in a specific region for a period of time will help you learn to understand the local dialect, but it's best to NOT try to learn to SPEAK the dialect; in Switzerland, people tend to take offense when foreigners try to speak "Schwitzedütsch" (Swiss-German).

Answer 3

The answer is two>>> Hochdeutsch (also called Standarddeutsch or plain Deutsch)
>>>>>> and Niederdeutsch ( all kinds of different dialects)

Answer 4

Lots of dialects. As much as Italian language has