Even Greener Pastures

The number of American/English words in German today is appalling.

Oh, that's nothing, Herr Steve. You ought to count up the number of German words that have insinuated themselves into English. It's appalling, I tell you! Kindergarten, for example. What's wrong with simply saying classes for little kids? Pass the smelling salts. The pure English had been corrupted and polluted for too long! Hey, I'm sounding like a Frenchman.

I am curious why it bothers you so much. It's not your native tongue. If they don't care, why should you?

And, although it’s just my personal observation, Germans sort of like English, or at least English words, for some odd reason. I never understood that. So, I think that means they readily adopt English words like “sorry” when there really is no reason for it.

But, English is not like that. While there are a few German words English has adopted, they pale in comparison to the number of English words German has taken on.

So, if the French are still wishing to keep their language “pure”, and they may have given up on it, the Germans seem to never have had that sentiment.

This would merit a thread of its own, I think. Feel free to split, Nikola.

Steven, in case you're not aware of this: what Germans used to say instead of "Sorry" was neither Entschuldigung nor Verzeihung, but, er, Pardon. Pronounced with a French nasal at the end. As my mother still does. 

Actually, German's had perhaps more than its fair share of purges. Without checking, I can think of at least two or three. The first one came quite early on, in the 16th or 17th century, when they tried to get rid of Latin loanwords. Until then, if I remember correctly, the German word for "surface" was "Superficies", which was replaced by "Oberfläche". A couple of hundred years later, it was about eliminating the arch-enemy, French.
And I'm sure everybody will be able to guess when last act of "purification" took place, non-specific, but actually also mostly about French. That's when we got Bahnsteig instead of "Perron" (platform) and Gehweg instead of "Trottoir" (sidewalk). People did accept these newly minted German words (mainly because everybody employed in any sort of official capacity was obliged to use them, I suspect), but I don't think any normal person felt they were a real improvement.

Mixed into those purges were almost continuous efforts to at least "Germanize" orthography, wherever particularly obstinate loanwords simply refused to leave the language. Thus, we write Perücke instead of perruque and Zentrum instead of "Centrum". As it's only been about 20 years since the last concerted effort of this kind was made (Friseur -> Frisör; Delphin -> Delfin), I'm confidently looking forward to seeing delightful little monsters like "gugeln" and "Softwär" appear - all in good time.

What about Serbian, Czech, Japanese, Swiss German, or Georgian, for example?

Quote from: SHL on June 15, 2019, 10:28:57 pm

And, although it’s just my personal observation, Germans sort of like English, or at least English words, for some odd reason. I never understood that. So, I think that means they readily adopt English words like “sorry” when there really is no reason for it.

But, English is not like that. While there are a few German words English has adopted, they pale in comparison to the number of English words German has taken on.

So, if the French are still wishing to keep their language “pure”, and they may have given up on it, the Germans seem to never have had that sentiment.

This would merit a thread of its own, I think. Feel free to split, Nikola.

Steven, in case you're not aware of this: what Germans used to say instead of "Sorry" was neither Entschuldigung nor Verzeihung, but, er, Pardon. Pronounced with a French nasal at the end. As my mother still does. 

Actually, German's had perhaps more than its fair share of purges. Without checking, I can think of at least two or three. The first one came quite early on, in the 16th or 17th century, when they tried to get rid of Latin loanwords. Until then, if I remember correctly, the German word for "surface" was "Superficies", which was replaced by "Oberfläche". A couple of hundred years later, it was about eliminating the arch-enemy, French.
And I'm sure everybody will be able to guess when last act of "purification" took place, non-specific, but actually also mostly about French. That's when we got Bahnsteig instead of "Perron" (platform) and Gehweg instead of "Trottoir" (sidewalk). People did accept these newly minted German words (mainly because everybody employed in any sort of official capacity was obliged to use them, I suspect), but I don't think any normal person felt they were a real improvement.

Mixed into those purges were almost continuous efforts to at least "Germanize" orthography, wherever particularly obstinate loanwords simply refused to leave the language. Thus, we write Perücke instead of perruque and Zentrum instead of "Centrum". As it's only been about 20 years since the last concerted effort of this kind was made (Friseur -> Frisör; Delphin -> Delfin), I'm confidently looking forward to seeing delightful little monsters like "gugeln" and "Softwär" appear - all in good time.

What about Serbian, Czech, Japanese, Swiss German, or Georgian, for example?

Nikola split the thread right before I posted, so her timing was a bit off (I’ve not gotten out of bed yet, it's only 8:45...

But, anyway I wrote:


Thank you Alharacas for your informative post. I always love hearing you inform us about German etymology, and the German language in general. Some here might have noticed my fondness for the German language (I’m not sure Neal and Jerry have quite noticed this yet....... but, it is a distinct possibility however  )

Pardon ist flagged as veraltend by Duden and LEO as well, with LEO’s Worthäufigkeit (word frequency for anyone else reading this except Nikola and Sofia) at 3 out of 7, and the Wortverlaufskurve (sort of the curve showing its use) only at 2.2 in 1960 and a 1.1 in 2019. (To compare a really common word like das Beispiel, Beispiel comes in on LEO’s Worthäufigkeit 5 out of 7, and a Wortverlaufskurve of 300 (Frequenz) in 1960 and Frequenz of 280 today.)

One of my favorite expressions was zum Exempel, but unfortunately it’s also considered veraltend like Pardon. My former German professor from Hamburg used to say it all the time, but she was born in 1921 and died this January at 97. Now that’s a perfectly nice expression and could be a nice little alternative to zum Beispiel so why does it have to go and we get Airport and hi instead, like we need Airport? We really need hi?  What?  Who adopts these kooky English words and why use them?

Zum Exempel appears in Franz Carl Weiskopf’s Abschied von Frieden, published in 1950 and is flagged as veraltend in LEO, and quoted “es kommt nicht leicht was Besseres nach. Zum Exempel.....wenn der Erzherzog-Thronfolger Franz Ferdinand Kaiser wird” (Weiskopf, Abschied v. Frieden, 1,383)

Exempel appears to have a Latin origin, but it still faded. Exempel still can be used in other constructions so it’s doing a bit better than Pardon with a Worthäufigkeit of 4 on a scale of 1-7 and a declining Wortverlaufskurve of a high in around 1965 of 4 and now a 2 in 2019 (that word is also flagged as Bildungssprachlich as many of my former professor’s German words were she used.)

My other German professor told us to never use the word “Charterflug” in the 70s, that it wasn’t a German word and no one would understand it (we didn’t believe him- he was a German language purist, and only wanted us to read Goethe and listen to Wagner and not read “degenerate” modern German writers like Thomas Mann or Günter Grass) , and Charterflug was just an example of German “word-aping” as he called it and to say “Pachtflug” instead (I think he made that word up, but it wasn’t a bad attempt since a Pacht as you know is a lease of something). And it Software ever gets spelled “Softwär” or googeln “gugeln” I will definitely have to reach for the nitroglycerin pills to prevent a heart attack. The beautiful German language being ruined.

As to the French words being purged, they never purged das Pissoir, although it’s flagged as veraltend too and has a use frequency now in LEO as a 0.3 and a 0.0 prior to 1950. But, I’ve seen it on roadside stops in Northern Germany. I always thought it was kind of cute. Reminds me in English of calling a urinal a “pisser”

French has got some crazy false cognates too. Like  I’ avertissement.  Sounds like an advertisement, instead of a warning. Sort of like saying, “a bit of an advertisement here folks, but if you touch this high voltage wire you could die.

A bit of trivia, Steve. Do you know that here in the US we used the French aerodrome and aeroplane until the early 1950s, or so?

I used to fly small planes and got a pilot’s license at 19, which is why I have an interest in aircraft, but I haven’t flown a plane in 41 years, but yes, I knew of the word aerodrome. That used to appear on our old maps. I have seen airplane spelled aeroplane, but that’s more of a minor spelling and pronunciation change, wouldn’t you say? Not a complete dropping of the word. Aerodrome also hasn’t really disappeared, it’s just become part of pilot jargon, as far as I can tell, and I think some pilots may still use it today.

But, English has no main language authority, so it’s hard to track language trends in English except in the broad sense, like looking at a 1611 King James Bible, or something. We all know people don’t talk like that anymore.

But, you are right. There are a few old words, like 1950s and earlier words that have long disappeared. Nothing comes to mind off the top of my head, except for a few words from the 60s like groovy, but those were more teenager slang words.

That’s interesting, but when I went through a flight training course from 1976-1977, I we used to see the word aerodrome on the maps, and I even used to hear the word occasionally spoken in ground school. I wouldn’t say it was extensively used, but it was used now and again.

It could have been the instructors were trying to impress everyone by using aerodrome, a word they might have considered technical aeronautical jargon. But, yes I learned that in flight school. As far as aeroplane, that’s to me just a different spelling of airplane, sort of like colour vs. color. Except, of course, the pronunciation is slightly different I suppose.

You must know what it's like in the US, of course, TAFKNATO. 
To me, "aeroplane" doesn't sound that strange, so I checked wiktionary (the usual suspects, Oxford, McMillan's, etc. don't tell you anything about usage):



And this is what it says:

aeroplane (plural aeroplanes)
(Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland, India, Britain) A powered heavier-than-air aircraft with fixed wings.

Usage notes
This word was also formerly used in Canada and the US, but those regions now use airplane. Some speakers in those places may still idiolectally use aeroplane, however.

Which has taught me a new word: idiolectally. Wonderful. Thank you for this, Jerry. 

Idiolectally.  Does that mean only idiots use it?

SHL: Reminds me in English of calling a urinal a “pisser”  

I would rather think that a pisser is the user of pissoir.
...still having doubts what would be the pissee then