The word of the year 2023 was: crisis mode. On the one hand, this was due to the fact that there have been a lot of crises recently: the corona pandemic, the Russian attack on Ukraine. And not to forget: the energy crisis. On the other hand, these days it is quickly becoming a crisis, which doesn’t actually deserve the name. “The state of emergency has become a permanent state,” explained the Society for the German Language, which chooses the word of the year.
This development in so-called crisis communication creates interesting excesses. There is a constant stream of explanations, relativizations, clarifications and positions taken. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Last year, Deputy Bavarian Prime Minister Hubert Aiwanger showed how not to do it with remarkable amateurishness. When looking at how he responded to the allegations about an anti-Semitic leaflet in his school bag (that’s what you do in modern German: become something behave), you could get the crisis yourself.
The Sparkasse Nuremberg, which was recently publicly criticized, presented a positive example. The reason: A customer had… Nuremberg News scolded the digital telephone assistant Anna because she didn’t understand his Franconian dialect. Anna is actually supposed to help Franconian customers when all telephone lines are at full capacity in the service hotline, but so far this has only been partially successful because she “has difficulties when things get too Franconian,” as a spokeswoman admitted.
Several media outlets reported critically on the franc paradox and you can imagine what immediately prevailed at the Sparkasse: a mood of crisis. At least the bank reacted quickly and adequately and sent Anna to language school, as you can see on Facebook. In a “Gräschkurs” a savings bank employee – and apparently a hobby Fränggisch teacher – teaches the computer everyday sentences like these: “I’m going to get rid of Glaageld at Haafen. Where’s the point of this?” Translation: I want to get rid of a bunch of change. Where can I deposit this?
And lo and behold: the feedback on the video is consistently positive. The Franconian would say: Yes, yes. Grisengommunification successful.