Entrepreneur and executive Kenneth Brailsford founded nutritional company Zija International, which he continues to serve as president, CEO, chairman, and major shareholder. Outside of work, Kenneth Brailsford has remained actively involved with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints for more than four decades, and he has dedicated several years of service to the LDS church as a missionary and volunteer.

1. By Kenneth Brailsford

2. Introduction
 A highly experienced executive in the nutritional
supplement industry, Kenneth Brailsford heads Zija
International, a company that he founded in 2004.
Also a dedicated member, missionary, and volunteer
within the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints,
Kenneth Brailsford traveled to West Germany in the
1960s to undertake missionary work and there
obtained conversational proficiency in German.

3. About German
 In addition to being the official language in Austria and
Germany, German is widely spoken in Switzerland and
parts of Italy, France, Luxembourg, and Brussels. Around
121 million people worldwide speak German, and there are
many German-speaking communities found in Canada and
the United States, South Africa, South America, and
Australia due to emigration.
The language itself belongs to the branch of Germanic
Indo-European languages, of which Dutch, English, and
Afrikaans are also members. The first examples of German
in its written form were found in an eighth century epic
poem and in Latin manuscripts.

4. Conclusion
 The widely accepted standard written and spoken form
of German that is used today is known as
Hochdeutsch; its pronunciation evolved from
southern regions, crystallizing in the sixth century.
Hochdeutsch emerged as a standard form of literary
German when Martin Luther translated the Bible in
the 16th century.