Derivations of German Words
Germanisms in foreign languages may have gone through a change of meaning, appearing as false friend to the learner's eye. For instance, in Russian language, a галстук galstuk is not a scarf (German literally: "Halstuch"), but a tie; nor would a парикмахер parikmacher (German literally: "Perückenmacher") be a "wig-maker", but actually denote a hairdresser.
Likewise, in Japanese, a messer is not a knife, but a scalpel. Two more examples would be Japanese アルバイト (transliterated to "arubaito", derived from German: Arbeit and abbreviated to "baito") and リュックサック (transliterated to "ryukkusakku"; derived from German "Rucksack"; abbreviated to リュック ).
Read more about this topic: Germanism (linguistics)
Famous quotes containing the words german and/or words:
“I dont want to shoot any Englishmen. I never saw one til I came up here. But I suppose most of them never saw a German til they came up here.”
—Maxwell Anderson (18881959)
“Certainly, words can be as abusive as any blow. . . . When a three-year-old yells, Youre so stupid! What a dummy! it doesnt carry the same weight as when a mother yells those words to a child. . . . Even if you dont physically abuse young children, you can still drive them nuts with your words.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)