This is a fascinating thread - I had no idea there were such differences in High German versus Swiss German. Since I want to learn German to speak with as many German speakers as possible, I think it sounds like I'll need to learn the High German language instead of Swiss. Has anyone used the Rosetta Stone system to learn foreign languages? I'm planning on using it to learn German (assuming they only offer High).

On a side note, this is a topic I have always found fascinating - that is, the divergence of languages into dialects. Sadly, divergence like this seems to weaken the language. Being a student of the Celts, I learned that, for example, Irish is broken into at least three dialects, and the Irish government can't agree on a "standard" dialect to teach in schools. As a result, students are being taught wildly varying dialects that not all speakers can follow, and so Irish has limited utility, even in Ireland. Conversely, the Welsh kept their language fairly "pure", and made it a point to standardize certain words that had become slang. Thus, the Welsh language is much more strongly established in Wales than Irish is in Ireland.

Morgannon