what are the cultural differences between southern and northern Germany?

Answer 1

Hi,

Baden-Wurttemberg

Baden-Wurttemberg has some of the country's most charming countryside. It embraces not only the Black Forest, a very popular recreational area in the Central Uplands, or Lake Constance, known locally as the 'Swabian Sea', but also the green valleys of the Rhine and the Danube, the Neckar and the Tauber, the rugged Schwabische Alb and the gentle Markgraflerland, all major holiday resorts. The different soil conditions are ideal for fruit, wine, sparagus and tobacco.

Not only blessed by nature, it is also an ideal crossroads for transport and communications which heightens its attractiveness to tourists and industry. The inventiveness and business sense of the people are proverbial, and their intellectual and artistic achievements fill many a chapter of German cultural and literary history, as testified by such names as the writers Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805) and Friedrich Holderlin (1770-1843), or the philosophers Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) and Martin Heidegger (1889-1976). The central Neckar region with the state capital Stuttgart (population 584,000) is Baden-Wurttemberg's industrial and cultural centre. Mannheim's Kunsthalle and Reiss-Museum are outstanding landmarks. The minsters of Ulm and Freiburg are monuments to southern Germany's architectural pre-eminence. Heidelberg's castele and the old city centre attract visitors from all over the world. And the Black Forest's traditional cuckoo-clocks are not confined to the Clock Museum in Furtwangen but taken to all corners of the globe by tourists.

Ref : http://www.europe-today.com/germany/gersouth.html

Carnival

In Germany the season of Carnival is referred to as Karneval or Fastnacht or Fasching depending on the region. It's very different from e.g. Brazilian or Venecian (Venice/Italy) Carnival. In general, Carnival is a Catholic festival. In predominantly protestant areas you'll find little Carnival activities. It is the period before Ash Wednesday, before the Lent, the fasting-days, begin. People take it as the last opportunity to drink, eat and frolic to their hearts content. Until Easter things will be going to some extremes.

A common trait throughout Germany is people's liking for costumes and disguises, may they be traditional (e.g. in Baden or in Venice/Italy) or leaning towards the bizarre side as in the Rheinische Karneval, (i.e. between Mainz and the Dutch border along the river Rhine) Naturally, children like to dress up but adults do so, as well.

The Alemannische Fasnet, celebrated mainly in Southwestern Germany and northern Switzerland, has its roots in pagan beliefs and is preoccupied with chasing ghosts and demons by intimidating them with very elaborate scary wooden masks, fire and the terrible noise of pipes and drums. One of the most impressive displays of the alemannische Fasnet can be watched in Basel, Switzerland at the Narrensprung (run of the fools). For the Narrensprung, which starts early in the morning between 4am and 5am, all the lights in the city of Basel are turned off and men disguised in traditional costumes parade through the streets, accompanied by marching bands playing traditional songs.

Ref : http://www.watzmann.net/scg/faq-2.html