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Untranslatable Words: Die Hiobsbotschaft Posted by Sten on Apr 17, 2020
If you get very bad news, how would you say that in English? Germans have a word for it, and it has quite the interesting origin story. It is the Hiobsbotschaft. Let’s have a look! What does Hiobsbotschaft mean? A Hiobsbotschaft, sometimes Hiobsnachricht and historically Hiobspost, is a Botschaft (message) with very bad news for the Empfänger (recipient). In other words, an Unglücksnachricht (message of…
Untranslatable Words: Die Konfirmandenblase Posted by Sten on Mar 12, 2020
Do you have to go to the bathroom a lot? Looks like you may have a Konfirmandenblase… A what? Let’s look at this untranslatable classic today! What does Konfirmandenblase mean? https://youtu.be/3ATLej-1WW0?t=1178 A Konfirmandenblase refers to a weak bladder, somebody that has to go to the toilet a lot. Other similar words referring to the same are “Sextanerblase” (“Sexta…
Untranslatable Words: Der Spießer Posted by Sten on Jan 20, 2019
Spießer. A very German word! Germans feel as if they are seen from the outside Germany as Spießer, as Germans generally like things to go orderly, not too chaotic, and are not the biggest fans of societal change. That is the stereotype. Let’s look at that word today! What does Spießer mean? Spießer is short for the official word Spießbürger…
Untranslatable German Words: Multikulti Posted by Sten on Aug 5, 2021
In Germany, you might hear the term Multikulti sometimes. It is often used positively, but sometimes there is a rather disgruntled undertone as well. It is widely used! But what does it mean? And is there a proper English translation for it? What does Multikulti mean? Multikulti is a shorthand of Multikulturalismus (m, multiculturalism). It’s the idea that a Gesellschaft (f, society)…
Untranslatable German Words: Mahlzeit Posted by Sten on Feb 25, 2021
Welcome to another dip in the toe of the deep pond of untranslatable German words. We’ve discussed plenty already, and you probably won’t hear many of them on a daily basis, unfortunately. The word that we look at today, however, is different. Here’s the story of how an innocent word became a word that many…
4 ‘Untranslatable’ German Summer Words! Posted by Constanze on Sep 4, 2019
Guten Tag! As the summer draws to a close I thought it would be fun to see what words and phrases are used in German to describe summer weather, as there are several that are ‘untranslatable’ – ie. unique to the German language! Of course, these words can really be used at any time of…
Untranslatable German Words: Der Augenschmaus Posted by Constanze on Aug 12, 2019
Guten Tag! Today I’m bringing you another quirky German word that has no single-word equivalent in the English language. We call these words ‘untranslatable’ (unübersetzbar), even if there are English phrases that convey the same meaning. These ‘untranslatable’ words are fantastic at displaying the efficiency of German compound nouns. Today’s word is der Augenschmaus. What…