{"id":11861,"date":"2020-06-25T11:13:51","date_gmt":"2020-06-25T11:13:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?p=11861"},"modified":"2020-06-25T11:13:51","modified_gmt":"2020-06-25T11:13:51","slug":"the-curiosity-of-the-german-word-shitstorm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-curiosity-of-the-german-word-shitstorm\/","title":{"rendered":"The Curiosity of the German Word &#8220;Shitstorm&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Today we&#8217;re looking at a a really fun German word: <em>Der Shitstorm<\/em>. I already hear you say &#8220;but that&#8217;s not a German word!&#8221; And you&#8217;d be right, of course. But hear me out, it gets funkier! But let me first tell you about the curious German word\u00a0<em>Shitstorm<\/em>.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Merkel said this?!<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Raw Politics: Angela Merkel&#039;s &quot;sh**storm&quot; moment\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/j2xJdGGlrHo?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Angela Merkel, the German\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/whos-who-in-german-politics\/\"><em>Bundeskanzlerin<\/em><\/a>, known for being reasonable, well-mannered and calm in any situation made the headlines when she used some &#8220;raw&#8221; language. In 2018, she used the word <em>Shitstorm\u00a0<\/em>in an official capacity at a technology conference. She talked about how the internet is quite a new phenomenon for many, and that in the past, she even called it <em>Neuland\u00a0<\/em>(uncharted territory). She then said:\u00a0 &#8220;<em>Das hat mir einen gro\u00dfen Shitstorm eingebracht, deshalb will ich das nicht einfach wiederholen<\/em>.&#8221; (It generated quite a shitstorm, so I don&#8217;t want to repeat it now.&#8221; Exceptional? No. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spiegel.de\/politik\/deutschland\/shitstorm-politiker-fuerchten-hass-im-internet-a-829312.html\">It wasn&#8217;t the first time she used it.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In the captions, the New York Times translated that sentence as &#8220;it generated a shitstorm&#8221;. But I don&#8217;t think you&#8217;d use the word in English in an official capacity, would you?<\/p>\n<p>You can hear a chuckle from the German audience in the clip above when she says\u00a0<em>Shitstorm<\/em>. It is a relatively new word, mostly used casually (but not considered vulgar) and to hear somebody in such an official capacity use it is perhaps unexpected and causes that reaction. That&#8217;s not because it is a word she should not be using.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>It&#8217;s even in the <em>Duden<\/em>?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/der-duden-the-cornerstone-of-german-spelling\/\"><em>Duden<\/em><\/a> actually has the term\u00a0<em>der Shitstorm\u00a0<\/em>as well. The German dictionary added it in 2013, and defines it as follows: &#8220;<em>Sturm der Entr\u00fcstung in einem Kommunikationsmedium des Internets, der zum Teil mit beleidigenden \u00c4u\u00dferungen einhergeht<\/em>&#8221; (Storm of outrage in internet communication media, which sometimes involves insulting remarks). The\u00a0<em>Duden\u00a0<\/em>notes that its origin is in English, as a combination of the words\u00a0<em>shit\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0<em>storm<\/em>. Merriam-Webster has an entry for\u00a0<em>shitstorm<\/em>, which is denoted as\u00a0<strong>vulgar slang<\/strong>: <span class=\"dt \"><span class=\"dtText\"><em>a wildly chaotic and unmanageable situation, controversy, or sequence of events<\/em>. To be fair, though, Germans would find a direct translation of\u00a0<em>Schei\u00dfesturm\u00a0<\/em>just as vulgar. So don&#8217;t do that!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>So you can see that the English term is a bit broader in that it is not necessarily online. But these days, where do wildly chaotic and unmanageable situations happen mostly? Right. Online. And I am sure that Germans would not steer away from using the word in an offline situation.<\/p>\n<p>The word originally comes from the 1948 World War II novel <em>The Naked and the Dead\u00a0<\/em>by Norman Mailer. In it, American soldiers have the following exchange:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;Red spat. \u201cI knew we been havin\u2019 it soft too long. Two to one they send us out <strong>to catch a shit-storm<\/strong> tonight.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote><p>Wilson nodded, shaking his head angrily. \u201cWhen you have it good it don\u2019 pay to bitch. All those replacements wantin\u2019 to see combat, they\u2019re gonna change they mind.\u201d&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Interesting, also how we now lost the\u00a0<em>Bindestrich\u00a0<\/em>(hyphen). But how did the <i>Shitstorm <\/i>find its way into the vocabulary of the German <em>Bundeskanzlerin<\/em>?<\/p>\n<p>It is assumed that the term got traction in German with the <em>Vortrag\u00a0<\/em>(lecture) by Sascha Lobo at the Berlin blogger conference re:publica in 2010, titled\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=I2sn3AzH0Dw\"><em>How to survive a shit storm<\/em><\/a>. The whole thing is in German, and the word stuck.<\/p>\n<p>The word won\u00a0<em>Anglizismus\u00a0<\/em><em>des Jahres\u00a0<\/em>(anglicism of the year) in 2011 in Germany, in Switzerland it even made\u00a0<em>Wort des Jahres\u00a0<\/em>(Word of the Year) in 2012.<\/p>\n<p>There was an attempt to create a German word to mean the same thing:\u00a0<em>Netzhetze\u00a0<\/em>(net hunt), but it did not really catch on.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Shitstorm? I&#8217;d get a lot of flak for that!<\/strong><\/h2>\n<div id=\"attachment_11862\" style=\"width: 560px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone post-item__attachment\"><a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Bundesarchiv_Bild_101I-635-3999-24,_Deutschland,_Flak-Batterie_in_Feuerstellung.jpg\" aria-label=\"Flak\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11862\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11862\"  alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"796\" \/ src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/06\/Flak.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/06\/Flak.jpg 550w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/06\/Flak-242x350.jpg 242w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-11862\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A German <em>Flak-Batterie<\/em> in 1943 (Image by Bundesarchiv, Walther at Commons.wikimedia.org under license CC-BY-SA 3.0)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>In a way,\u00a0<em>Shitstorm\u00a0<\/em>is untranslatable. It simply isn&#8217;t a common term. Imagine a New York Times article, in which the word\u00a0<em>shitstorm\u00a0<\/em>was used. Just like that, unapologetically. He&#8217;d get a lot of flak for that! Wait a second&#8230; Catching flak seems to be a good translation of <em>einen Shitstorm bekommen<\/em>! You&#8217;re getting\u00a0<em>flak<\/em>, meaning you get criticism. Cool. But guess WHERE <i>flak <\/i>comes from?<\/p>\n<p>Actually, it originates in German vocabulary in the <strong><em>Erste Weltkrieg <\/em>(First World War)<\/strong>, believe it or not! <em>Flak\u00a0<\/em>really is an\u00a0<em>Abk\u00fcrzung\u00a0<\/em>for\u00a0<em><strong>Fl<\/strong>ug(zeug)<strong>a<\/strong>bwehr<strong>k<\/strong>anone\u00a0<\/em>(&#8220;flyer\/aircraft defense canon&#8221;, or anti-aircraft gun). The word <em>Flak\u00a0<\/em>was used in German to refer to these weapons and things associated with it. German might be known for having <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/two-of-the-longest-words-in-german\/\">extremely long words<\/a>, but that doesn&#8217;t mean we always like saying them. Instead of\u00a0<em>Flugzeugabwehrkanonenoffizier\u00a0<\/em>(anti-aircraft gun officer), it&#8217;s quicker, shorter, and understandable to call this person a <em>Flakoffizier <\/em>(flak officer). In German,\u00a0<em>Flak\u00a0<\/em>still just means that: an anti-aircraft, or AA gun.<\/p>\n<p>The word only gained traction in the English language in World War II. Being the target of German AA guns, the English pilots would begin using the word\u00a0<em>Flak <\/em>in applications like\u00a0<em>flak jackets<\/em>, which meant to protect from pieces of the exploding grenades shot at your plane. At some point, <em>flak <\/em>turned up in a sort of wisdom for pilots:\u00a0 <strong><em>If you\u2019re not catching flak, you\u2019re not over the target<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>So from borrowing words to adopting words, sometimes these things go full circle, like with this wonderful example.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Have you used the term\u00a0<em>Shitstorm\u00a0<\/em>before in your language? Do you have an equivalent for it in your language? Let me know in the comments below!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<img width=\"242\" height=\"350\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/06\/Flak-242x350.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/06\/Flak-242x350.jpg 242w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/06\/Flak.jpg 550w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 242px) 100vw, 242px\" \/><p>Today we&#8217;re looking at a a really fun German word: Der Shitstorm. I already hear you say &#8220;but that&#8217;s not a German word!&#8221; And you&#8217;d be right, of course. But hear me out, it gets funkier! But let me first tell you about the curious German word\u00a0Shitstorm. Merkel said this?! Angela Merkel, the German\u00a0Bundeskanzlerin, known&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-curiosity-of-the-german-word-shitstorm\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":110,"featured_media":11862,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3,8],"tags":[224302,165051,421737,337679,504039],"class_list":["post-11861","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-language","tag-angela-merkel","tag-curiosity","tag-second-world-war","tag-untranslatable-german","tag-world-war"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/110"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11861"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11861\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11864,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11861\/revisions\/11864"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}