Denglisch

Denglisch

The Academie Francaise exists to protect and preserve the French language. Americans find the institution peculiar, and describe it with the typical and unconscious slight derision arising from the mutual loving animosity which has marked historical Amero-French relations: “That’s a French thing,” or “well, the French do that sort of thing”. English now has “to google” as a verb, has adopted and bastardized most other languages in adaptation of words like ‘savoir faire’, ‘hinterland’, ‘doppelgänger’, ‘hors d’œuvre’ and others whose original context or usage has been lost or forgotten. And we’re happy about it. We like our mutt-language, just as we like our mutt-culture, just as long as it doesn’t become too inconvenient or too specific.

As I was learning German, I resolutely determined to speak no English, to learn the German expressions and use them. The more I learned, the more I realized that if I wanted to sound like a German, I would have to incorporate English expressions. ‘Feiern’ means to party, but many say ‘Party machen’. ‘Coffee to go’ may be found everywhere, even though ‘Kaffee zum Mitnehmen’ is a perfectly good expression. If I’ve noticed something, it is something I have ‘gecheckt’.

The field of politics, particularly of development, is particularly full of these Denglisch words; in some cases because no German expression exists, in others because the English is more fitting, more widely used or shorter. Consider the following example, from an article on Yemen’s educational policy from InWent, a government-affiliated organisation: (Denglisch in bold)

Top-down-Bildungspolitik gescheitert

Diese Einsicht war auch Ausgangspunkt eines Prozesses in der Republik Jemen, der in die Entwicklung einer Grundbildungsstrategie durch die jemenitischen Stakeholders im Erziehungswesen mündete. Angestoßen wurde der Prozess durch die Erkenntnis der „Modernisierungsfraktion“ im Erziehungsministerium, dass die überkommene top-down-Bildungspolitik im Jemen trotz erkennbaren Engagements der Bildungsplaner nichts mehr war als ein fallweises und kurzatmiges Krisenmanagement. Weit entfernt von der Lebenswelt der Schüler, Lehrer und Eltern, schien das ministerielle muddling-through unbeabsichtigt mehr Probleme zu schaffen als zu lösen

Source: http://www.inwent.org/E+Z/content/archiv-ger/05-2003/schwer_art1.html

Seriously, what is this?