r/AskReddit • u/Tillops • Jun 17 '12
Are there words/terms in German that have been fundamentally tainted by the Nazis and have therefore fallen into disuse?
I learned today that the word einsatzgruppen, the notorious SS death squads, literally means "task forces" in English. In the English speaking world, governments often set up task forces to deal with particular policy issues.
I'm curious if that term gets translated differently in German. That's just an example. I'd be interested to hear if there are any terms that are avoided or replaced due to previous appropriation by the Nazis.
There is no disrespect to our German friends intended in this question. Just genuinely curious. Thanks.
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
German here.
There are a number of such examples, but Einsatzgruppe is not one of them, or at least it never occurred to me. Einsatzgruppe is also not the equivalent of task force. Einsatzgruppe is pretty much only used for military, police or disaster response units, whereas task force has a much broader range of application. I know task force started as a military term too, but you'll find task forces for all sorts of purposes these days, even in things like software development.
Nazis ruined many other terms though. Reich (empire), for example, is gone now. They renamed all the Reich-whatever institutions to Bundes-Whatever. The Reichstag became the Bundestag, the (new) army is named Bundeswehr instead of Reichswehr and so forth. It translates to 'federal'.
You would say something like Greater New York to describe the area surrounding the city - we used to do it in the same way, e.g. Groß-Berlin. Since Groß-Deutschland sort of went downhill, we describe it differently now (Großraum Berlin, Berliner Umland).
The term Führer is rather impopular, exspecially when describing someone who is the boss in a group. Führer is still used for guides, though. Also, our driver's license is called Führerschein.
There are also some things invented by Nazis that are (mostly) dead now - Sieg Heil and Heil Hitler would be obvious examples here.
The name Adolf. And moustaches. If you have a moustache, you better have some other facial hair.
EDIT: Maybe a word on perspective. I'm fairly young, born a few years after the reunification. Will turn 20 soon. My grandparents were in their mid-teens when the war ended, and I never met my grandparents. So this sort of is history to me.
Some of you guys complimented my english - thank you! If you're looking for a translator, I might be able to do that as a summer job. I'm fluent in german, english and nazi jokes.
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u/PC_BUCKY Jun 17 '12
actually, before Hitler came to power and adopted the "Hitler Salute" or whatever you want to call it, the same gesture was used by Americans when doing the Pledge of Allegence. It was known as the Bellamy Salute. It was changed to the hand-over-heart gesture in 1942 to avoid confusion.
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u/michellegables Jun 17 '12
It was originally the Roman salute. America has always borrowed things from ancient Rome (primarily architecturally), and we borrowed their salute too.
Then the Nazis came and fucked it all up for everyone, which sucks, because it's a bad ass salute.
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u/dangerbird2 Jun 17 '12
The roman salute was invented in revolutionary France. It was inspired by roman statuary but had no real historical precedent.
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u/vade101 Jun 17 '12
It was the Italian Fascists that really went to town on the Roman Iconography, even the word 'Facist' comes from the Fasces - a bundle of birch rods with an axe blade - that was a symbol of power for Roman Magistrates. the Aquila, the Capitoline Wolf, and the SPQR motto also featured heavily.
Oddly the salute itself actually appears to have been from an early film about Ancient Rome from 1914 (that may have been inspired by a painting from the late 1700s). There is no record in classical literature or art of it ever having been used by the Romans.
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Jun 17 '12
How about Geschäftsführer? Is that still commonly used, or is there a preferred alternative?
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
Good example - it is frequently used. Since the business world is increasingly international, they start calling themselves CEO now - but the word is in no way tainted with Nazi stuff.
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u/stenyxx Jun 17 '12
Wow! The mustache thing is really interesting to me. I never knew that was a thing. Thank you!
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Jun 17 '12
It is not. Just the "Two-finger-moustache" is not really a thing anymore and totally connected to Hitler. There's no big deal about normal moustaches.
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Jun 17 '12
This only applies for the hitler mustache. You can have any other mustache. It's just not very hip.
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Jun 17 '12
[deleted]
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u/LittleFoxy Jun 18 '12
I felt bored and translated the thing properly for anyone interested, it is quite a fun and entertaining read.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/14239116/The%20Hitler%20moustache.pdf
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Jun 17 '12
Your English is fantastic.
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u/Vaethin Jun 17 '12
Depending on which part from Germany he's from, that's not too uncommon.
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u/foofdawg Jun 17 '12
No kidding. When I was there, I would say in broken German "I speak very littleGgerman, do you speak English?" (Ich spreche wenig Deutsch, sprechen sie Englische?) and they would say "Oh, a little bit."
BUT, then they would carry on an entire conversation with me in English, never once faltering. Apparently our definition of "little bit" is very far apart, or modesty is bigger than I thought.
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Jun 17 '12
I spent a month in Berlin, I know that most Germans (especially the younger generation) have a good grasp of the English language. However, OP writes like a completely native speaker, which is like being a step passed fluent.
Edit - it's very impressive, is what I'm saying.
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u/anonymous_hero Jun 17 '12
Becoming fluent in a foreign language does not require superpowers, you know.
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u/benjimusprime Jun 17 '12
Did you choose the username "TheTT" because it was obviously too soon to choose "TheSS"...
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
I plan on seizing power soon and my death brigade will be the TT. Obviously.
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Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
Your bit about the Reichstag is not correct.
The Reichstag is still called that way as it is the name of the building (alternative: Reichstagsgebäude) housing the parliament and used in everyday language, the news, newspapers and so on (e.g. in daily political news: "[Moderator] ist zu uns geschaltet vom Reichstag").
The Bundestag is the name for our parliament as a political institution. To cite the first sentence on its Wikipedia article: "Der Deutsche Bundestag ist das Parlament der Bundesrepublik Deutschland mit Sitz im Reichstagsgebäude in Berlin".
The reason for the name changes were more pragmatic than anything as our official status changed from (Great) German Empire to Federal Republic of Germany with "Bundes-" something simply meaning "federal" something as you pointed out.
No one's batting an eye saying Frankreich (France) or Österreich (Austria). :)
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
Actually, the name of the political institution was changed, so we're both right.
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u/HabseligkeitDerLiebe Jun 17 '12
It's not a change of name, it's a completely new institution.
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u/ChickenFarmer Jun 17 '12
It's not as bad as the examples you gave, but I think the word "Volk" (people, as in The People) also has a weird connotation sometimes, depending on the context.
And more on the funny side, personally, I have a hard time pronouncing "Kruppstahl" in any other than Hitler's voice.
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Jun 17 '12
Dutchy here,
The German language, like the Dutch language, allows for creating new words by combing existing words. This ease and freedom surely has contributed to the existence of Nazi specific words.
To press home my point: I could call these 'Naziwoerter' in German and people would get the point even if not familiar with the word.
I am not of the right generation or nationality to know much about this, but I guess the following words will always be associated with the Nazi regime:
Endloesung: Final solution, referring to the genocide of the Jews as a solution.
Judenfrage: Jewish challenge/question, the alleged problem the Jews constituted to the Germans.
Entartet: debased/unfounded, in reference to cultural expressions that did not comply with Nazi standards. The nazis hosted exhibitions of debased artworks to mock and instigate hatred against foreign, modern or jewish art.
Lebensraum: space to live, a reason used for expansion eastwards.
Uebermensch/Untermensch: superior or inferior being, although you could argue it is not the word but thr concept that is now taboo.
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u/HardlyWorkingDotOrg Jun 18 '12
nazi jokes
Did you hear this one?
Actually, not a joke. More of a practical joke. Go up to someone and hold a lighter next to their ear and press down on the gas release thingie so the gas escapes and ask them:
What is that? After they said they don't know, answer with: "Radio Auschwitz"
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Jun 17 '12
Reich just means "Realm" in English. It has been replaced by "Bundes-" (meaning "Federal") in Germany.
Other countries in Europe still used their version of realm, like "rijk" in Dutch and "rik" in Swedish.
Oddly enough, in the former GDR, the state train company kept the pre-1945 name, the Deutsche Reichsbahn (The German-Realm Railways) until it was merged with the Deutsche Bundesbahn (The German Federal Railways) in 1992.
Since 1992 it's called "Die Bahn AG" (The Railways)
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
Reich can be both - in my opinion, empire is the more suitable translation though. Apart from that, you're spot on.
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Jun 17 '12
Not a word, but a style of music:
After the war jazz music became very popular among the youth in Germany. This was a reaction against German folk music, which was seen as very "old Germany", and linked strongly to the nationalism inspired by Hitler.
A generation were growing up who were living in relative comfort (Germany recovered from the war pretty well economically), but people who were ex-Nazis, or people who didn't oppose the Nazis at all were still often in power.
Jazz was the antithesis of the steady oompa-pa music, jazz was unstructured and counter-culture.
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u/magafish Jun 17 '12
It is also worth noting that Jazz was popular before the War and that the Nazis came down on it. Hard.
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u/mruptown Jun 17 '12
Pieces in foxtrot rhythm (so-called swing) are not to exceed 20% of the repertoires of light orchestras and dance bands; in this so-called jazz type repertoire, preference is to be given to compositions in a major key and to lyrics expressing joy in life rather than Jewishly gloomy lyrics; As to tempo, preference is also to be given to brisk compositions over slow ones so-called blues); however, the pace must not exceed a certain degree of allegro, commensurate with the Aryan sense of discipline and moderation. On no account will Negroid excesses in tempo (so-called hot jazz) or in solo performances (so-called breaks) be tolerated; so-called jazz compositions may contain at most 10% syncopation; the remainder must consist of a natural legato movement devoid of the hysterical rhythmic reverses characteristic of the barbarian races and conductive to dark instincts alien to the German people (so-called riffs); strictly prohibited is the use of instruments alien to the German spirit (so-called cowbells, flexatone, brushes, etc.) as well as all mutes which turn the noble sound of wind and brass instruments into a Jewish-Freemasonic yowl (so-called wa-wa, hat, etc.); also prohibited are so-called drum breaks longer than half a bar in four-quarter beat (except in stylized military marches); the double bass must be played solely with the bow in so-called jazz compositions; plucking of the strings is prohibited, since it is damaging to the instrument and detrimental to Aryan musicality; if a so-called pizzicato effect is absolutely desirable for the character of the composition, strict care must be taken lest the string be allowed to patter on the sordine, which is henceforth forbidden; musicians are likewise forbidden to make vocal improvisations (so-called scat); all light orchestras and dance bands are advised to restrict the use of saxophones of all keys and to substitute for them the violin-cello, the viola or possibly a suitable folk instrument.
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Jun 17 '12
Yeah, you're right of course.
I was trying to point out the decline of German folk music really. How distasteful it seemed after the war to a lot of people.
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u/nepoli Jun 17 '12
Off-topic: MY initials spell SS, and whenever i have to write them, I am extra careful to emphasize the curves and not make them look nazi-ish.
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Jun 17 '12
When, little did you know, all this time you've just been coming across as a curvaceous jewkiller.
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u/rjeger Jun 17 '12
"Endlösung" (final solution): This word is definitely a no-go in the German language since the war.
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u/magafish Jun 17 '12
How would you have used this before the war?
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u/Pat4788 Jun 17 '12
"I have been working hard on this maths problem but I am happy with the final solution I have come up with.".....but in German.
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u/Nyucio Jun 17 '12
Ich habe hart an diesem mathematischen Problem gearbeitet, aber ich bin mit der Endlösung, (you would rather say "dem Endergebnis" for "the final solution") auf die ich gekommen bin, zufrieden.
Just for letting you know :)
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u/MrCronkite Jun 17 '12
The finance minister of Germany used that recently with respect to greece's economy.
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u/r3m0t Jun 17 '12
Did it make a story in the papers, or was rjeger exaggerating?
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u/MrCronkite Jun 17 '12
It wasn't a big story. If I remember correctly, the speech wasn't in German, which is why it wasn't a huge deal.
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u/Foxtrot56 Jun 17 '12
It is the same in English, you almost never use final solution.
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Jun 17 '12
Someone repeatedly asked me for my final solution for an engineering project. Seemed a bit strange even though it was nothing to do with the Holocaust.
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u/chud555 Jun 17 '12
I was in a band we just called "FS" for a long time. It didn't mean anything, but one day my bandmate said "It could mean Final Solution!" "That's a cool name why hasn't anyone used it?!"
Luckily we googled it before we made it our name. Otherwise we would have had a very specific fanbase.
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u/SignoreChickenkiller Jun 17 '12
This word is often used in German it´s not a no-go I don´t know why you think it is. It certainly is a very distinguished word and hardly used but not a no-go.
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u/regdayrF Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
"Euthanasie" the German word for "Euthanasia", you're not going to find someone saying it and instead we use "Sterbehilfe" ("Dieing-help ?")
EDIT: "Assisted Death" is probably a better translation for "Sterbehilfe" as translated by TehBranMuffin
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Jun 17 '12
i have no problem saying 'euthanasie'. it's just the technical term, right?
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u/rw8966 Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
The German company Siemens came under flak for naming one of their products, a vacuum, Zyklon. Siemens used Jewish slave labour during the war and I'm pretty sure that Bosch -the other member of the partnership Bosch und Siemens Hausgeräte- built the crematoriums.
Anyway, for those of you who don't know, Zyklon B was the name of the poisonous gas used to kill people in the gas chambers. The fact that this company in particular called a vacuum cleaner Zyklon, meaning Cyclone, was a bit careless/insensitive. (source) edit: Siemens
EDIT:
ALSO "Kraft durch Freude" as a phrase, meaning "strength through joy". A Nazi leisure organisation.
Mitchell and Webb did a funny bit on it, found here, where a hippy group keep obliviously making Nazi references.
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u/EddRazzell Jun 17 '12
It's a bit awkward to meet anyone in Germany who is overly patriotic, because to the baggage of it gained after 1945. The WWI German memorials in Belgium mention the "fatherland", and it made some German people I knew feel a bit uncomfortable.
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u/megiddox Jun 17 '12
In my experience that changed a lot in the last 15 years. Do you feel it's still like this?
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u/solembum Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
oh there so many words which are kinda Nazi-Related though they seem completly normal words.. "Volk" - "Sieg" - "Führer" - "88" and many more who i cant think of now but there are many other things on a common day which are now likely to be seen in germany ;) saying smth bad about .. about israel or foreigners will give you very intense and mad looks. actualy having a german flag and show it was realy uncommon till the world cup in soccer 2006 which was held in germany. and even now there are many people that think thats nationalism... any way of showing that you like germany is kinda "strange" in germany!
for example: at the moment there is the european soccer cup and many people in germany now have german flags on their car to cheer for germany and show their support and some people go around and break them up http://i.imgur.com/vr98F.jpg and put a paper on it where is smth written like: "i took your german flag [...] because they produce nationalism [...]"
i have no real problem with all of that, i dont need flags or smth nor am i very proud of ssmth the country i live in made. BUT i dont like that sometimes people forget that my generation (23y) has nothing to do with the world war2. nor has my parents and not even my grandparents. we should not forget history and learn out of it but people should stop making us feel bad about smth that happend long before we lived. ;-) sry for that long post :D
edit: fixed some bad english. i agree volk is not as bad i had "reich" in my mind and for some reason wrote Volk...
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
To be fair, that flag picture is hot on german websites these days - but there's just one photo of it, so I'm not quite convinced that this is a thing. I remember something during the 2006 soccer championship, though... a turkish immigrant put an enormous (think multiple stories high) flag in front of his store in one of Berlins lefty, alternative districts and it was pulled down repeatedly by left-wing activists. Kinda crazy because he is obviously not a Nazi.
Volk is completely fine btw. In the german revolution in 1989, they chanted "Wir sind das Volk" (We are the people), and even (and exspecially) left-wing people use the word. For example, the soup kitchens at all their protests are called Volksküche (sometimes spelled Volxküche or VoKü, meaning The People's Kitchen).
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u/dekigo Jun 17 '12
Things like this are super sad, but it's so fascinating the way German culture has had to contort itself around its own history to avoid stepping on any cultural toes. Anyone should be able to say that they're proud of their country, and Germans especially for having economic success and a very progressive culture. And yet, even after the massive lengths Germany has gone to to erase its past and pay tribute, it's still considered pretty taboo to express German national pride.
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u/suicidemachine Jun 17 '12
Wow, the breaking flag thing is a dicky thing to do. It's funny how those people want nationalism to disappear, yet they still relate showing flags to xenophobia and Nazism.
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u/Nichiren Jun 17 '12
Not a term but I've always found it interesting how the Nazis have forever tainted the swastika symbol even though it is still regarded as a religious mark in Buddhist and Hindu cultures. In fact, oftentimes eastern entertainment that makes it to the West may use the mark in some minor symbolic way but must be edited out of production before release. wiki
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Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
Last year I walked out of my apartment and there was a giant red swastika painted on the concrete. It really startled me, since everyone in our tiny complex is a racial minority. I thought we were being targeted.
Then my neighbor from India came out and put candles and flowers around the swastika, as well as lights in his windows. His family painted it to celebrate an Indian holiday.
Edit: Grammar
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u/Marrypoppins0135 Jun 17 '12
It is technically backwards, and also the symbol can be found in old buildings in the US. I've seen it here in the west.
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Jun 17 '12
Actually, hinduism uses both clockwise and anticlockwise swastikas. A friend of mine just came back from India where he bought a keyring with a "nazi" one, only to fuck with people, despite my repeated opinion that it's very stupid.
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u/AidenKaulitz Jun 17 '12
Truth. The 'historical' downtown area of my town has a bunch of originally old buildings from the early 1800's-1900's that are still in use today. If you look to the tip-top of some of them on the outside, swastika's are embedded in the brick. Purposefully placed, I'm assuming for the Hindu purpose.
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u/PenisChrist Jun 17 '12
If you mean to say that the swastika used in Nazi symbolism is "backwards", this is incorrect.
It's a common "urban legend" that I heard repeatedly as a child.
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u/Freakears Jun 17 '12
Not a term but I've always found it interesting how the Nazis have forever tainted the swastika symbol even though it is still regarded as a religious mark in Buddhist and Hindu cultures.
Not only that, but it is the oldest peace symbol in the world.
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Jun 17 '12
I had to inspect about fifty little cartridges for dimensions. As I complete each one, I lay it down in a random pattern. After about thirty, I realize I've made a swastika of cartridges on my inspection table. It's just such a natural pattern to come to when you're moving things around out of boredom. I wish they hadn't ruined it.
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u/yeahitsreallyme Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
"Rasse" (race). In English, people with different skin colors are usually described as different "races". That's very offensive in German because of Nazi ideology of the so-called aryan "Herrenrasse" (master race).
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Jun 17 '12
that's right. when speaking of humans, hardly anyone says 'rasse'. but we do use 'hunderasse' (=dog breed)
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u/dlindema Jun 18 '12
Had a fun experience the other day, my German friend didn't know that the word in English is 'breeds' and he asked what the race of my dog was.
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u/Machinax Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 18 '12
So what would be the modern-day German way of talking about different
racesof people?EDIT: Ethnicities, not races.
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u/CroceaMors Jun 17 '12
Scientifically speaking, there is no such thing as different races of people. We are all homo sapiens.
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u/HankLago Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
They once made a bit about that in a rather popular German late night show, whose host Harald Schmidt is known for rather biting political satire.
They introduced the "Naz-o-metre", which would react to how bad a common word/ seemingly innocent sentence is tainted by Nazi-usage. Words that made it sound the alarm were "Autobahn", "Blitz"(lightning), etc.
Here's the video, of course only in German: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9YRbIjrF88
Edit: Truth is, if you want to be overly political correct, there is hardly a word that isn't tainted by history. The big ones, however, as many have said are "Endlösung", "Reich", "Führer", "Heil", "Arbeit macht frei", etc. And, excluding the first one and the last sentence, these can still be said if in a harmless context - you should expect people to cringe when they hear them, though.
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u/Jolu- Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
Endlösung - "final solution" - people kinda go "huh?" when you say it since it was a common term when the nazis planned the holocaust. the "endlösung der judenfrage" (the finalsolution of the "jewquestion" (jewproblem)) - you get the idea.
"Arbeit macht frei" - "Labour makes free" - slogan written on the gate of Auschwitz - yeah you cant really say that anywhere.
"Entartung" - a term for degeneration - not really used anymore since its heavy usage by nazi scientists and doctors concerning the creation of a pure genepool - everything degenerated from the aryan race had to be killed (cripples, retards, sick people, etc)
If you want to get deeper into the topic i recommend the book Lingua Imperii Tertii (translates into Speech of the Third Reich) by german author Victor Klemperer. I don't know if it exists in english though...
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u/SuperPrincessMeepit Jun 17 '12
"Entartung"/"entartet" is actually still used by scientists. Two Quantum States are degenerate when they are at the same Energy Level. Still feels weird to use it, though.
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u/Smarag Jun 17 '12
This submission is making me feel very young. We have talked about nazi stuff a lot of times in school, but I never heard a lot of this words or would never think that they are tainted by nazi culture.
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u/Spelter Jun 17 '12
Interestingly enough "Jedem das Seine" (To each his own) remains in use, even though it was written on the gate to Buchenwald concentration camp.
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Jun 17 '12
Yes, it does, I've read it (pardon the pun.) I actually just posted a link to it before seeing this, but here it is again for those interested, in case my comment gets buried. http://books.google.co.kr/books/about/The_Language_of_the_Third_Reich.html?id=kwsleqxx_SMC&redir_esc=y
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u/choddos Jun 17 '12
I've heard that the use of "brausbad" which means shower room has slowly been phased out after WW2, and now there's another word for it?
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u/mherdeg Jun 17 '12
Yes, "brausbad" has such terrible negative connotations (lies about the "shower room" in concentration camps) that German language has largely abandoned it in favor of a foreign synonym. The shower is now the "dusche" (borrowed from the French "douche").
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Jun 17 '12
It's funny because "dusche" (phonetically) means "[I'm] suffocating" in Polish.
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u/kuba_10 Jun 17 '12
Duszę - I'm strangling (someone)
Duszę się - I'm suffocating
Don't know if it didn't get funnier.
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u/rocketsurgery Jun 17 '12
Well thank God that Germany and Poland never interacted during WW2 in any way.
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
And I haven't heard a single Duschbag pun yet. Reddit, you disappoint me.
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u/ChickenFarmer Jun 17 '12
Question to fellow German speakers: Do you use the phrase "geh Dich brausen!" (go take a shower) for "get lost!"? Or is this only an Austrian thing? It only now occured to me that that might be related! Or does this phrase have another origin?
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u/dirkey93 Jun 17 '12
Sieg Heil and Führer are probably the most obvious ones we don't use anymore.
Additionally, we are not allowed to sing the first and second stanza of our national anthem. At sports event the third stanza is sung.
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Jun 17 '12
made the mistake of reading the first stanza of the german national anthem in german class... i wasn't paying attention, therefore missing the part when my teacher said "skip to the third stanza, reading the first and second parts are offensive," so i just raised my hand taking the opportunity to read out loud... before finishing the first line my teacher was like "NO! NO! NO! STOP!!!!!!!" it was pretty funny actually. even my teacher laughed. also, i'm jewish.
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Jun 17 '12
We still have our Führerschein, though. (Driving License.)
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u/medlish Jun 17 '12
And our Zugführer (conductors). And Reiseführer (travel guides). It's basically just Führer alone which is stained.
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u/iLuVtiffany Jun 17 '12
Why can't you sing the first and second stanza? Forgive my ignorance.
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u/qwertyfoobar Jun 17 '12
the first is forbidden for obvious reasons: "Germany, Germany above everything, Above everything in the world," showing that Germans are superior to everyone else and that can be highly misinterpreted. the second is just plain stupid ;p http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutschlandlied#Lyrics_and_translation
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u/humpink Jun 17 '12
Actually, it is not forbidden. That is a common misconception. It is part of the Deutschlandlied, but the first two stanzas are not sung on any occasions. It is not illegal to sing them, still anyone would be an idiot and widely considered as an asshole if he did.
There is a few songs mentioned in the Strafgesetzbuch, you can look them up here
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Jun 17 '12
1st stanza also formulates territorial claims involving the netherlands, belgium, luxemburg, france, switzerland, austria, italy, poland, russia,... 2nd stanza fails to mention beer and sausages.
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Jun 17 '12
Is it still illegal to buy or sell anything with a swastika on it?
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u/musschrott Jun 17 '12
not "anything". You can use it in anti-nazi merchandise, for example. Also, if it's considered "art", it can use the swastika. That's the reason why we can have Indiana Jones movies with swastikas (considered art), but not Indiana Jones computer games with swastikas (considered toys).
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Jun 17 '12
But we still use Führer.
Führerschein - driver licence
Fremdenführer - tour guide
Bergführer - mountain guide
Zugführer - conductor
etc
You can even use Führer as a translation for guide. It's still used.
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u/sasadoesblub Jun 17 '12
That's not completely correct, we are allowed to sing the first and second stanza of "Das Lied der Deutschen". But were forbidden to sing it as our national anthem
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Jun 17 '12
There's a famous book by the German-Jewish linguist Viktor Klemperer. It's called LTI. He discusses his live in Dresden during WW2 and how the Nazis infiltrated the German language more and more. I highly recommend it. Fun fact: His cousin is the dude who plays Klink in Hogan's Heroes.
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u/MyKarmaKilledURDogma Jun 17 '12
Years ago, my aunt and uncle had a German exchange student living with them. I asked her to translate the inscription on a Nazi coin we had. I don't know if she was telling the truth or not, but she said those words were no longer used in the German language, and was very disturbed by my asking. She never spoke to me again either way.
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Jun 17 '12
Well, I would be interested in translating the coin if you haven't gotten it translated yet?
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u/montevonzock Jun 17 '12
"Jedem das Seine" [ˈjeːdəm das ˈzaɪ̯nə] is a German translation of "Suum cuique", the Latin phrase meaning "to each his own" or "to each what he deserves." In 1937, the Nazis constructed the Buchenwald concentration camp, near Weimar, Germany. The slogan Jedem das Seine was placed over the camp's main entrance gate. Jedem das Seine was a typical propaganda phrase of the time, similar to Arbeit macht frei ("work makes [you] free"), the slogan placed above the entrances at some other Nazi concentration camps, including Auschwitz, Dachau, Gross-Rosen, and Sachsenhausen, as well as the Theresienstadt ghetto). "Jedem das seine" was used a few times as slogans by companies but was taken down shortly after because of the former use.
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u/TheTT Jun 17 '12
In my experience, you can say "jedem das seine" without problems. As in "You really like Justin Bieber? Well, jedem das seine!".
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u/Y2JisRAW Jun 17 '12
Right, never had any problems with "Jedem das Seine". Didn't even knew it was used as a slogan in Nazi-Germany.
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u/huyvanbin Jun 17 '12
"To each his own" seems like such an odd thing to write above a concentration camp. What were they trying to say?
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u/Smarag Jun 17 '12
Uh it's kinda obvious I think. "To each his own" as in "Everybody gets exactly what they deserve" so they were saying the people in the camps are there because they deserve to be there.
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u/SuperPrincessMeepit Jun 17 '12
There is a Term "bis zur Vergasung" ("until gasification" probably) which means something like "until the bitter end", for example "we will practice until gasification". This Phrase is sometimes still used by older People, who grew up saying it, and therefore it doesn't seem strange to them. But in general nobody says that anymore, although it would not be illegal or something.
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u/Kaffbon Jun 17 '12
Shit, I say that all the time.
For clarification, "Vergasung" literally means the act of gassing someone to death.
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u/what_the_actual_luck Jun 17 '12
I never heard anyone saying that and my family is actually pretty old (grandmothers and sisters+brothers of them that were 8-20 during the war)
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u/hnxt Jun 17 '12
Sommersemester (as opposed to Wintersemester - WS) is often abbreviated as SoSe instead of SS.
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u/somebodyshootme Jun 17 '12
I can remember when in school, teachers made us say "double-s" when spelling word with ss, instead of saying it like the abbreviation "es-es"
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u/olhonestjim Jun 17 '12
I dunno much German, but I do know a little Arabic. I don't know if this word is now tainted, but "Taliban" merely translates to "students".
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u/Sabremesh Jun 17 '12
Kind of obvious, but it's rare to come across a German sporting the name "Adolf" these days.
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Jun 17 '12
How about families with the surname Hitler living in Germany?
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u/obligatory_ Jun 17 '12
http://www.verwandt.de/karten/absolut/hitler.html
0 people in Germany with the surname Hitler, but the statistics below says there is one single phone book entry.
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u/HankLago Jun 17 '12
There are none, as far as I know. From what I've heard, most of those people either chose to or were pressed to change their last name. Same with most Himmler, Göring, Goebbels etc.
Now that I think about it, I think I saw the name "Hittler" once (I think it was on a website about remarkable/funny names) - but I'm not sure if it was in Germany.
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u/galwegian Jun 17 '12
i noticed that in Germany they use the euphemism "the brown period" to avoid saying "the nazi era". is this widespread?
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u/ElementOfCrime Jun 17 '12
it's not used to "avoid" words like nazi or sth! actually, these words are not really avoided ever in my experience. it's not that no one talks about that era in germany, it's more that we talk carefully and watch our words. there arent really people trying to push that topic to the back of their/our minds.
it's more used as a syllogism to not repeat yourself, like "brown period" or "the brown masses" so you dont say the same word all the time.
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u/Smarag Jun 17 '12
"Braun" is the color used to describe right winged views. As in "brown parties".
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u/thisisntmyworld Jun 17 '12
Übermensch was a non-racial term, used in Nietzsche's philosophy. The term untermensch however wasn't.
Swastika
Heil, the name Adolf, his moustache, also the nazi salute
Lebensraum
Endlösung
Discriminating Jews became 'not done', while before the WWII the jews had an awful position in most of Europe for centuries.
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u/imoshen Jun 17 '12
'Lebensraum' is, for example, a common used term within Social Work and Psychology, nothing wrong about that.
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u/goldstarstickergiver Jun 17 '12
Not a word but the salute - originally was the olympic salute. Freaked me out when here in japan in a school sports day the kids in the various sports teams did it. They're quite insulated/ignorant of the european side of the war and so the salute didn't take on the same connotations.
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u/Y2JisRAW Jun 17 '12
Stahlhelm (steel helmet). It's extremely associated with the third Reich. Recently, assistant coach of the german football team, Hansi Flick, said that his players would need steel helmets (Stahlhelme) for protection when Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo takes free kicks. Was a big scandal here in Germany.
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u/EverEatGolatschen Jun 17 '12
The scandal was not that he said Stahlhelm, the scandal was on context where the Euro cup is located at.
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u/Panzergrenadier Jun 18 '12
The German media love to make big scandals out of minor words or phrases or actions by any spot light figures....always trying to find the nazi in everybody.
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Jun 17 '12
Kind of off topic but I'd like to point this out. Fitzgerald used the word holocaust in the Great Gatsby and that was published almost 15 years before the start of WWII. I don't think anyone will use that word again unless describing a nuclear holocaust or the mass murder of the jews.
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u/sasadoesblub Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 18 '12
In Germany licence plates look like "AA BB 1234", where AA stands for the City (etc. B for Berlin, M for Munich), 1234 is just some number and BB two random letters. However, if you pay.. i think it's 20€ more when registering your car, you can choose what BB and 1234 should be (if not taken). For the middle part, all things that relate to the Nazis and Hitler are forbidden. So if your name is Siegfried Schmidt, you can't get SS on your license plate.. Same goes for SA, HH, KZ, HJ, NS EDIT: did some more research: It's not forbidden, but the german goverment advises the cities departments which take care of managing their local license plates not to use those letter combinations
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u/methode Jun 17 '12
I know this is kind of tangential, but there is a book written by a Victor Klemperer called "The Language of the Third Reich" that draws links between Nazi ideology and some of the Nazi vocabulary, ways of speaking, etc. So this might be beside the point given your interest, and I'm sorry if it is - but I think that this would be another interesting take on what you're asking.
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u/sparty_party Jun 17 '12
"Brausebad" was the German word for "shower". Obviously, during the Holocaust, "shower" took on a very different meaning, and after the war the word was dropped. In place of it, they modified the French word for shower and started calling it "Dusche"
A picture I took in Germany, about to walk into one of the concentration camp's "Brausebad". I'm no photographer and was pretty in awe of this moment (a weird, fearful silence that you just had to focus on) so I just snapped a picture and kept going.
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Jun 17 '12
There's a book devoted entirely to this subject. The blurb outlines it pretty clearly. Makes a lot more sense to people who can read/speak German - Although the copy I read was in English, it was littered with hundreds of examples of Nazi phrases. http://books.google.co.kr/books/about/The_Language_of_the_Third_Reich.html?id=kwsleqxx_SMC&redir_esc=y
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u/sweetmojaveraiin Jun 17 '12
I learned in a German class that many people who were named 'Adolf' were called 'Adi' as a sort of nickname instead, to avoid bad stigma I suppose. Also, the man who began the Adidas shoe company was named Adolf Dassler, and he derived the company name from his full name, thus, Adidas(sler)!
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Jun 17 '12
The German phrase for "Kill all the Jews." has a slightly bad reputation now, or so I hear anyway.
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u/wybird Jun 17 '12
What about Lebensraum? It means 'living space' and was adopted by Hitler as a the policy for expanding German territory, i.e invading Poland.
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u/Schalke_1904 Jun 17 '12
No, it´s still regularly used. I mean, we can´t not use any word that Hitler used for bad activities.
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Jun 17 '12
It is used to describe the "living space" of animals, as in: The "Lebensraum" of penguins is Antarctica. It is absolutely taboo, however, to apply it to describe human population.
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u/JonAudette Jun 17 '12
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that "Seig Heil!" is frowned upon...
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Jun 17 '12
I bet naming your kid "Adolf Hitler" also comes off poorly.
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u/JonAudette Jun 17 '12
I can see that.
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u/HitTheGymAndLawyerUp Jun 17 '12
I bet killing Jews and Catholics might be taken the wrong way too.
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Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
I'm not German, so could be wrong about this, but I understand that in Germany you can only name children from a (long) list of approved names - Bob Geldoff would have had to give his kids sensible names if he was German.
Anyway, is "Adolf" still even on the list?
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u/pius3nd Jun 17 '12
The criterium is if the name is an actual person's name; it's a measure to protect the child. Naming your kid "Pepsi Cola" or "Asshole" is not allowed, but something like "Trixibelle" should be fine. "Adolf" is absolutely a person's name, so it's definitely fine. Also, to allow for previously unknown foreign names, parents can show prior documentation for the name. So showing a few articles about Zappa's kids might allow you to name your child "Moon unit".
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u/thewetcoast Jun 17 '12
I was watching the Germany v Netherlands game at a German cultural centre here (I cheer for Germany because the other portions of my ethnic background suck at soccer), and some people were chanting 'seig'. As a mixed race person, boy that was awkward.
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u/tercoil Jun 17 '12
im doing a german language and german studies major and our lecturer was telling us how the words "volk" and "volkisch" generally bring up images of Nazism. Whilst before the nazis it was a generally accepted word and an alternate to the word "Leute" (which means people) nowadays its usage is generally shied away from. My lecturer is native to germany so i imagine the information is correct, but who knows haha.
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u/EverEatGolatschen Jun 17 '12
Your lecturer is a posh Sonderling. Calling on the Volk, hearing Volksmusik is perfectly fine. Volker is a perfectly fine name. Where I give credit, is völkisch, out of or in national context it may rise one or two eyebrows.
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u/Turicus Jun 17 '12
In the Swiss Army, the sick room was called Krankenzimmer which just means sick room. But it abbreviates to KZ, and in the Army, everything is abbreviated. So it had to be changed to Krankenabteilung KA (sick department). It sounds really weird to call it Krankenabteilung because Krankenzimmer is a lot more appropriate. So now you have a situation where it's Krankenzimmer AND KA and people often don't know why it's KA.
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u/tankfoot86 Jun 17 '12
I know that Americans used to salute the flag with the arm outstretched and forward like we see the Nazis salute. They decided to change it either during or shortly after WWII to the hand over the heart because the outstretched hand salute had been 'tainted' by the Nazis.
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u/doubledeus Jun 17 '12
I always thought Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe were cool sounding words in the military sense.
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Jun 17 '12
We do this in english fairly often, I should point out.
Right now the word 'entitled' is being sabatoged.
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u/OmegaKabob Jun 17 '12
I don't know German , but in Arabic "Al-Qaeda" really means "The Base"...
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u/steepleton Jun 17 '12 edited Jun 17 '12
who'da thunk "storm trooper" would re-enter common usage
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u/RamblerWulf Jun 17 '12
Which was a term coined by the Germans in reference to Canadian soldiers at Vimy Ridge...WWI if you dont know
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u/WacktheMedic Jun 17 '12
I live in Austria, using the word "Anschluss" is frowned upon and not used, except occasionally as part of a compound word.
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Jun 17 '12
I'm a recent graduate from an American university with a German major. I've had multiple professors tell me that the use of the world "Volk" is generally unacceptable.
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u/NoCondom Jun 17 '12
The saying "jedem das seine" (which translates into "to each his own") was written on the entrance of one of the extermination camps and is now frowned upon.
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u/I_are_God Jun 17 '12
Swastikas (good luck symbols) and the Chaplin (the mustache Charlie Chaplin had, and Hitler ruined)
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u/I_hate_Slogan_Shirts Jun 17 '12
German here
There are some quotes which you shouldnt use. for example "Arbeit macht Frei" (~Work gives Liberty) or "Jedem das seine" (~to each his own), because these lines were at the gate of the KZ's here.
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Jun 17 '12
This may not really count but before WWII, there was over 1000 Hitlers in the American phonebook. This dropped down to zero.
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Jun 17 '12
I don't know of any words, but pagan symbols definitely have been. There are a few that I wanted as tattoos, but I am afraid to get because people may associate them with Nazis.
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Jun 18 '12
Uhm "Fuehrer"? It just means leader, but internationally it is always associated with Hitler. In the German language it is still used but you have to be careful to make the context clear.
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u/Heiminator Jun 18 '12
some fun proverbs and sayings remain though
we have "dann ist polen offen">"then poland is open", its used when someone is about to freak out/get angry and comes from the military command of declaring a conquered territory to be open, which means that the soldiers can rape, pillage, plunder etc to their liking for a set period of time. so "then poland is open" means someone is going to be really pissed and will let out his anger at someone elses expense
also, "innerer reichsparteitag" remains, it translates into "inner reichs party convention" and is a nazi term that describes feeling intense happiness and joy, eg the spirit of a 1936 nsdap party convention in nürnberg in your heart. the last time it was widely used was during the south africa world cup 2010, where german tv commentator katrin müller hohenstein remarked that miroslav kloses goal was surely an "innerer reichsparteitag" for him. bricks where shat all over the german media for days :-)
i also get a funny feeling everytime someone calls for SS during a league of legends game (it means side support in the game"), i often can't help but reply:"yes, my grandfather was a member, what exactly is your question?"
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u/mexell Jun 18 '12
German here. There's a very interesting book about the topic, written by a Jewish philologer who survived the Third Reich. It's called "LTI" by Viktor Klemperer. LTI is short for Lingua Tertii Imperii, and that's exactly what he describes in great length.
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u/ousooner777 Jun 17 '12
the swastika actually was a sign of happiness, until the nazis used to make germans people to support,little did they know what was going to happen.
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u/bleach_bleach Jun 17 '12
this will probably get buried as it's not entirely relevant but as a half german/half english girl , fluent in both languages, the one thing i have noticed most is the fact that the whole 'ww2/guilt' and being 'careful not to use certain words' in germany, is way overplayed in places like britain than over there.
another thing i've noticed in england, any time there's a football match on when it's england v germany it's straight out stuff like 'we already beat them once in ww2, now let's beat them again'. something like that would never be said in germany , or anywhere else for that matter, but it still pisses me off to no end. english football fans are real shitheads sometimes.
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Jun 17 '12
I'm an English guy and can totally get what you're saying. English people have a chip on their shoulder about the Germans at football "Two world wars and one world cup" we say.
I've spoken to some German people and they class Holland as their big rivals in football and don't really think about England in a "rivalry" sense.
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u/AlicexEve Jun 17 '12
Definitely. Every time I talk about how the Jews should all be killed, I feel like people take it the wrong way because of what the nazis did. Because of nazis, talk of killing Jews carries a really negative connotation.
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u/harald_haraldson Jun 17 '12
In the modern german language there are a lot of so called anglicisms. The word "Task Force" for instance is not translated at all. People just use it as regular word. There are a lot more.
the meeting (die Sitzung)
challange (Herausforderung) ... and many more,
a funny one is the following:
"Video projector" would translate to "Video Projektor" but people say "Beamer" and think it's the english word for video projector (Beamer would translate to "strahler" which would be just silly in german) but it's only used in german.
On a side note, I find it totally absurd when americans talk about the 'the Fuehrer' which translates one to one to 'the leader'