Meanings
- humorousironicusuallyInvokes a perception of the specified country as superior to others, or having a supreme status when compared to others.
Pax Americana and all that bullshit? Grissom said. 'America über alles. You want to make the rest of the world our slaves.'
2008, Mike Hockney, Prohibition A, page 451 more example
Similarly, British Finance Capitalism forced back to its last line of defence will cry: "Britain über alles" though for the moment, Socialism having neglected Scottish Nationalism [..]
1967, Hugh MacDiarmid, The Company I've Kept, page 132
Origin
From the verse Deutschland, Deutschland über alles, über alles in der Welt (“Germany, Germany above all, above all in the world”), from the German national anthem Lied der Deutschen, composed by Joseph Haydn in 1797. The verse originally meant that the Germans and their rulers have to overcome existing divisions and keep in mind the goal of a unified Germany.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
über alles. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/%C3%BCber%20alles
“über alles.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/%C3%BCber%20alles. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “über alles,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/%C3%BCber%20alles.
Source: über alles on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.