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As an Italian living in Germany, and as a lover of the German language, I think this is not a good list. It reads like it was put together to fit the author's approach to coaching. Entwicklung, indeed, is the best example of this. It is exactly the same in English. What's really fun about German: as a non native you can get to a point where you create involuntary neologisms by putting together words you already know.…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah I speak 3 languages and all 3 have mutually exclusive constructs that can't be translated while carrying over the 'true meaning'. English is by far the least expressive of the 3. A common example is slavic мат. A repertoire of profanities that simply have no English translation, no equivalent, not even a meaningful loose translation/explanation. The best you can do is find the nearest approximate meaningful Engl…
This is an entirely subjective judgment on your part that you are advancing as though it were a matter of fact. Have you considered the possibility that you know English least well of your three languages, and that you are therefore better able to express yourself in the other two? Also, please provide a source for your "fact" that some languages are inherently more "expressive" than others (whatever that means).
And English being my strongest language, I'd say no, I don't think it's because I know it least well of the three.
Perhaps this is just something that doesn't make sense to people who only know one language, but it self-evident to multilinguals.
If you want a source, click TFA - a list of German expressions that don't exist in English. The discussion here on whether or not it's a great list, but no one disagrees there are phrases that don't exist in English.
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I mean, technically you can do this in English as well. English is a Germanic language and compound words are fully legitimate in the language. The following don't exist in the colloquialisms or formal records of the language, but are grammatically correct: Wehmot -> sorecourage Einsam -> onepeace Stimmung -> innervoice Lebensmut -> lifegrit Liebenswürdig -> loveworthy And, despite the author's claims, many do have d…
I am not convinced that Wehmut translates to sorecourage. The -mut ending appears in other emotions as well, Sanftmut, Schwermut for example. I think it relates to words like "Gemüt" and corresponds to "mood". So Soremood Softmood Heavymood
I'm also not a native speaker, so I could be completely off.
Doesn’t every language have such a thing? What makes German more exceptional than English? Or Chinese more exceptional than English? I’m certain there are expressions that don’t exist in every language, and even if you translated them, they might not translate well due to cultural or linguistic issues (try translating Monty Python to Chinese while keeping British wit and hoping your average Chinese viewer understands…
The rules for when you are allowed to use 文 and 語 are slightly irregular. Notably the term 漢語 (the Han language, a synonym for Chinese although even more all-encompassing, e.g. encompassing its many forms through several thousand years) exists, but 漢文 does not, at least not as a modern, common term. It sounds very old-fashioned. Likewise 粵語 (the Yue language) exists. 粵文 does not, at least in the same sense (again sounds very old-fashioned/archaic or sounds like it's referring specifically to the written language). However, for smaller "scopes" of languages, e.g. dialects, neither 語 nor 文 can be used. It is 廣東話 (Cantonese) not 廣東語 nor is it 廣東文.
There are many terms in Chinese that have no direct translation into English.
There's however a rather glaring pair of words in English that have no direct translation into Chinese. "Yes" and "no" have no direct corresponding words in Chinese. The closest Chinese equivalents of words expressing affirmation or negation such as "是" and "非" cannot be used universally. 你吃過飯嗎? "Have you eaten?" cannot be responded to with "是" or "非" (at least in modern Mandarin, 非 has a more universal sense in Classical Chinese). Responding affirmatively requires repeating the verb "吃了," literally "eaten." While responding negatively doesn't require the verb ("沒有") 沒 cannot be used universally either. 沒有 is not a valid response to 你要去嗎? ("Do you want to go?").
This is true of many languages, e.g. Latin.
In Dutch we use more or less the same words, but for me the top word is "wetenschap" (which is probably similar in German). Literally translated it's "knowledgeship", which would be a better word for science. You can believe things, and you can know things. Science is knowing things, and what better word to describe that than "knowledgeship"?
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From the article: "the unique wisdom of some of these words, that don't have an exact counterpart in the English language". So the claim is precisely that because English doesn't have single-word translations of these German terms, that the German words somehow encode "unique wisdom", which is obviously BS. In most cases, close examination reveals that it's unfounded BS. "Aufrichtigkeit" (Sincerity/Honesty) has the s…
> From the article: "the unique wisdom of some of these words, that don't have an exact counterpart in the English language". So the claim is precisely that because English doesn't have single-word translations of these German terms, that the German words somehow encode "unique wisdom", which is obviously BS. As for the general claim, not so obviously. For one, "wisdom" here is not meant as some expert understanding…
The author of the article is obviously not aware of any of this, and doesn't care. He is writing without concern for the truth status of what he is saying, his aim is only for attention. This is the very definition of bullshit according to the philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt in his essay "On Bullshit": "It is just this lack of connection to a concern with the truth - this indifference to how things really are - that I regard as of the essence of bullshit".
Me: Moved to Hamburg this year, has 320 days on Duolingo and finished an actual beginner's German course so far. I can only partially agree to the statements made in this thread about the quality of this list but I've been fascinated with German words that have no English counterparts, at least not completely. My favorite one so far is "Waldeinsamkeit"--literally "forest soltitude" but the translation does not captur…
As the night owl that i am, i should know.
How do you percieve the traffic lights/Ampeln? (There! Another thing, Ampel!) For me they are way too bright during darkness. Its like a cone of colored light painting the houses up to a few hundred meters away, even irritating when i'm bicyling a little faster (because empty streets!), and don't have them in direct line of sight, only overlapping hazes of red and green, with maybe flashes of orange around some corner, curve, ridge.
Btw. Stargazing. I miss that. The 'seeing' here is pathetic most times. Can't be helped really, except by going into the outskirts. Though i have no telescope nor binoc anymore, i sometimes cycle to the
[1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elbekreuzung_2
and depending on the weather and tide enjoy an 'unearthly' atmosphere ...err Stimmung. Because when you go down from the dike you stand in wafting fog up to your hips, while small waves splash in the reeds, and all that sometimes tinted red from the 'Flugwarnbefeuerung' high above on the masts.
Added bonus: some large ship floating by with deep rumbling engine, illuminated only by navigation lights and the ghostly sheen of screens on the bridge.
And some birds.
Anyways, i'm sure there are other interesting places, but this one i know, and thought i should share ;-)
Me: Moved to Hamburg this year, has 320 days on Duolingo and finished an actual beginner's German course so far. I can only partially agree to the statements made in this thread about the quality of this list but I've been fascinated with German words that have no English counterparts, at least not completely. My favorite one so far is "Waldeinsamkeit"--literally "forest soltitude" but the translation does not captur…
Fellow Hamburg immigrant here. I admire your optimism and the will to perceive an intention behind the darkness (which was also one of my first impressions of Hamburg). Unfortunately, I don't see it that way, but more as general unfriendliness of the city towards a random individual. Other things in the same vain that I noticed (coming from the Balkans, if important) are: very few overhangs that the buildings offer a…
That water thing is not entirely true:
[1] https://www.hamburgwasser.de/privatkunden/themen/trinkwasser...
[2] https://www.trinkwasser-unterwegs.de/startseite/
[3] https://refill-deutschland.de/
There a few, as you can see, and locations marked with a sticker where you can ask for a free refill of your bottle as described in [3].
Personally i wouldn't trust public water springs for hygienic reasons. Maybe a cultural thing, i'm not used to them. I can't really remember of having seen them anywhere in Germany since my childhood. They are a 'new thing' to us.
As an Italian living in Germany, and as a lover of the German language, I think this is not a good list. It reads like it was put together to fit the author's approach to coaching. Entwicklung, indeed, is the best example of this. It is exactly the same in English. What's really fun about German: as a non native you can get to a point where you create involuntary neologisms by putting together words you already know.…
Oh my, Sonnenschuld!!!! I feel you, I have felt this so often and talked about it too, but me and my colleagues didn't come up with this neologism :D Can we use it, can we, can we, bitte?!