When German Words Travel, Our Zeitgeist Goes Oom-Pah-Pah
Why do Finnish buses take coffee breaks? And why are the French always
puzzled when they look at a skylight? It's because they use words of
German origin, sometimes without even realizing it.
Learning German is for many students an excercise in delayed gratification
Many students of the German language -- especially those who suffered
their way through cruel, Teutonic grammar drills, lost their sense of
orientation trying to order their German words correctly, or wounded
both their tongues and sense of self-esteem with sharp, unpronounceable
compound words -- get rather surprised when they come to Germany and
hear the language of Goethe in actual use.
People in Germany are often invited to attend "ein Meeting," asked to
bring along their "down-geloadete" information and told "sorry" (with a
rolling "r") when somebody bumps into them on the street.
But -- even in the age of digital communication, dominated by the
English language and US American pop culture -- it is not only English
words that cross national and linguistic borders.
The German Language Council recently organized an international
contest called "Word Migrations." People from 70 countries -- ranging
from Mexico to Singapore, Malaysia and South Korea to Nigeria --
participated in the linguistic hunt for German words that "migrated" to
other languages. Over 6,000 such words were submitted. A winner was
drawn from the entries and the award ceremony took place Thursday in
Munich.
Coffee break par excellence
"The response to our first advertisement was enormous," said Rudolf
Hoberg of the Association for the German Language, one of the
organizations participating in the German Language Council.
The winning entry also showed that Germany is not only a language of
profound philosophy and utmost, technical efficiency, but also a
language of leisure and procrastination.
Susanne Bätjer from Germany was wondering why a Finnish
public-transit bus, which she saw in 2005, had the word "Kaffepaussi"
displayed on its automated destination display. Do Finnish buses really
take coffee breaks? Bätjer learned in the end that the German word for
coffee break had acquired an additional, slightly different, meaning in
Finnish: "out of order."
Some German words -- such as kindergarten, zeitgeist, and sauerkraut
-- have long been known as German imports into the English language. But
the goal of the project was to go beyond the obvious examples and
explore the extent to which German words have infiltrated other
languages.
"We wanted to find out what German words are used on an everyday basis in other countries," Hoberg said.
A colorful collection
The results of this survey -- which one could best place in the
category of linguistic anthropology -- told a fascinating story of
German technical expertise, colonial history, cultural stereotypes and a
delightful sense of humor.
The Turkish rail system was started in 1913 with German assistance,
which is why Turkish train conductors always cry "fertik" ("fertig" --
ready or finished in German) when the train is about to leave the
station. In Cameroon, once a German colony, train stations are called
"banop" ("Bahnhof"). If one is anesthetized in Tanzania, they are -- all
joking aside -- "nusu kaput" (half-broken). In Afrikaans, the language
of Dutch settlers in South Africa, an impatient German is an
"Aberjetzte" ("aber jetzt" in German means "on the double" or "ASAP").
"The vocabulary of the German language is far better known abroad than we thought," Hoberg said.
And even though contributions came from all over the word -- the
Russians raise a glass of vodka to "Brudershaft," a gesture of
friendship and brotherhood (German "Brüderschaft"), while some American
presidential candidates can be best described as wishy-washy (from
German "wischi-waschi," lacking a clear-cut standpoint) -- most of the
words were submitted from Eastern Europe and Anglo-Saxon cultural areas.
What's that?
It may come as a surprise, however, that the most frequently
submitted entry was the French word for skylight -- "vasistas." In the
original German, "was ist das" means, literally, "what's that?" Yet most
French speakers probably don't pay attention to the fact that skylights
in French provoke, etymologically speaking, a sense of puzzled inquiry
about the state of the world.
It is also unlikely that Japanese students who have an odd student
job called "arubaito" realize that they are, from an etymological point
of view, part of Germany's labor-intensive work culture ("Arbeit" means
work in German).
"The project does not attempt a linguistic investigation," Hoberg
said. "Some words that were sent in might well be only passing fads."
Whether as temporary guest workers in foreign languages, or as
naturalized citizens, German words have long left the confines of the
German-speaking world. A large collection of colorful cross-linguistic
gems -- along with personal anecdotes and insights into the way cultures
collide and enrich each other -- has now been collected and published
as a book under the title "Ausgewanderte Wörter" (available in German
only).
