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Untranslatable German Words: Teil 1 Posted by Constanze on Jun 9, 2014
I am fascinated by words which exist in other languages, but which we do not have in English. I think my fascination stems from the question I ask myself when confronted with one of these words: Why does it exist in one language, but not in another? Sometimes, this is obviously for cultural reasons, but…
How to translate the untranslatable German word Gemeinheit Posted by Sten on Aug 30, 2021
Thanks to our reader Rob Prichard for pointing out that die Gemeinheit is a word that is rather untranslatable in our post on the word Multikulti. Never thought about that one as untranslatable! But let’s find out why, and what you might want to translate it as! What does Gemeinheit mean? A Gemeinheit is a mean thing somebody does to you…
German ‘Mother’ Words Posted by Constanze on Oct 14, 2020
Guten Tag! In a recent post, I looked at the word Muttermal in detail. Whilst researching that post, it occurred to me how many German words start with the word mother – die Mutter. Some have obvious translations, while others are a little more intriguing. Today I thought I’d give you a handful of these…
German Kofferwörter (Portmanteau Words) Posted by Constanze on May 9, 2018
Today the topic is all about German Kofferwörter. These are words that mix two or more existing words together to create a new word with a blended meaning. These are what the English call portmanteau words. Examples in English include Brexit (Britain + Exit, to describe Britain exiting the EU), smog (smoke + fog), and…
German Loanwords in English Pt. 1 Posted by Sten on Mar 23, 2018
We have some untranslatable words in German, which we have covered extensively. But there are also words in English that were not translated at all – kept their meaning, spelling but not their pronunciation! Let’s look at and listen to a few of these Lehnwörter (loanwords). I first give a recording of the word in both…
3 Lazy German Words Posted by Constanze on Aug 30, 2017
Guten Tag! Today I’d like to bring you not one, not two, but three ‘untranslatable German words’ for your amusement. These are words that do not have a direct translation in English, and are often rather interesting and/or quirky. It’s rainy and dull here today, and I’m sure many people just want to be at…
5000 New German Words Added To Dictionary Posted by Constanze on Aug 9, 2017
You may have seen articles floating around the past couple of days about how 5,000 new German words have been added to Duden. But what is Duden? And what are the words? Duden is a dictionary of the German language. It was first published by Konrad Duden (hence the name) in 1880, and has just released its…