The article mentions the "Association for the German Language", which seems to refer to the prescriptivist "Gesellschaft für deutsche Sprache".<p>It's important to understand that few Germans are even aware it exists and its conservative views are extremely unpopular and non-standard. Even the Council for German Orthography which regulates German orthography as taught in schools only has two Association representatives in its total of 18 German council members.<p>In practice Germans generally regard the Duden (the equivalent of the Oxford English Dictionary) as the ultimate authority on German orthography and vocabulary. And the Duden generally takes a descriptivist approach, adapting to language change rather than trying to halt it.<p>Additionally, there seems to be a strong correlation between Germans with strong opinions about loan words and Germans with strong opinions about immigrants (or more recently the loss of "occidental identity" via "Überfremdung").<p>There are of course people who feel strongly about language who aren't also nazis in the more literal sense but the kind of complaints people have about language use often gives you a relatively safe indicator of their political views:<p>Complaining about wrong apostrophe use: moderate grammar nazi<p>Complaining about excessive use of English loan words in office culture: red-blooded grammar nazi<p>Complaining about "Elektronik" not meaning "electronics": moderate actual nazi<p>Complaining about "Handy" or "Portemonnaie": red-blooded actual nazi
Hopefully someone interested will read this comment, since it might be buried at the bottom: there is a fun project called Anglish that works to make the English language free from any non-Germanic loan words, using old(er) English and even made up words inspired by German, Dutch etc when no others exist. It's not, as far as I can see, a militant effort, but more fun and an inspiring linguistic challenge.<p>Check it out: <a href="http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/Main_leaf" rel="nofollow">http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/Main_leaf</a>
Reminds me of "handy", the German word for "cell phone". My German friend said "we just use the English word for that." I have yet to find an English speaker who calls a mobile phone a "handy".
Oh I <i>love</i> these. My favourite french one is "footing." No, "je vais faire du footing" doesn't mean, "I'm footing the bill," it means, "I'm going for a jog."<p>There's a ton of examples in France for some reason. Brushing as in the article, but also "pressing" for the dry cleaner.<p>In Chile they say all the time, "catchai'?", meaning "did you catch what I said?" Equivalent of "y'know?" It took me a while to realize that they conjugate it too.. To say, "I didn't understand," they'll say, "No catcho." Beautiful ;)
These are called wasabi eigo in Japanese, and there are enough to fill a dictionary, they change all the time.<p>My favorite are ones like "left over"... a baseball term for a hit that goes over the left-fielder's head, rather than uneaten food saved for later.<p>English admits a ton of these as well. I'd be horrified if someone recommended a board to keep English pure from foreign influences though. It seems both futile and xenophobic.<p>Languages are like old shoes. They are going to get beat up with use, but are wasted if you just lock them away to prevent it. And maybe as you wear them around, they'll get more character and more comfortable.
See also: "<i>al fresco</i>", which in England means "dining outdoors" and in Italy "being in prison". I wonder if it's because eating English food under the English weather can be considered punishment on the level of incarceration...?
> risqué meaning ‘risked’ (a verb, not an adjective)<p>No. "risqué" is also an adjective denoting that something involves risks (like "risky" in English) or that a statement is licentious, shocking (like "risqué" in English).
I don't think Russian "face control" is borrowed from English entirely. "Control" (контроль) is a proper Russian word, borrowed from French/German and in this context means "checking","verification".
Russians like taking plurals of English words, add a Russian ending that denotes plural and attach a specific meaning to the newly minted word. For example, бутсы. It's pronounced "boots-y" where 'y' denotes plural. The word referes to these things <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=%D0%B1%D1%83%D1%82%D1%81%D1%8B&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwipiITPot7PAhVBez4KHaEUDt0Q_AUICCgB&biw=1202&bih=644" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/search?q=%D0%B1%D1%83%D1%82%D1%81%D1%...</a>.<p>Also, "le week-end" comes to mind although it's not different from its English original. "Naan bread" is also interesting.
They forgot parking in french which is the word for car park.<p>And japanese has so many of such words that are imported from English with a totally different meaning you d need a book to cover them.
Japanese word for "blue" is apparently "boo-roo"<p>“The Japanese language has no exact word for the color blue. The term the Japanese use, ao, is ambiguous – best translated as blue-green. Ao has the connotations of immaturity and inexperience that the English word green has. When the Japanese wish to be exact – when describing the color of Siamese cats' eyes, for example – they will sometimes resort to the English word blue, which they pronounce "boo-roo."”<p><a href="https://www.wired.com/1995/03/blue-laser/" rel="nofollow">https://www.wired.com/1995/03/blue-laser/</a>
In Spanish we have plenty of these false anglicisms, and we seem to be obsessed with the "-ing" English ending:<p>un smoking (lately adapted the ortography to "esmoquin") -> a tuxedo<p>un parking -> a garage, car park<p>hacer footing -> to do jogging<p>hacer zapping -> to channel hop (when viewing TV)<p>tuning -> customizing/accesorizing cars<p>un lifting -> a facelift<p>Also some hybrid anglicisms:<p>hacer puenting -> to bungee jump (from Spanish "puente", bridge)<p>hacer balconing -> to jump from a balcony, typically to a swimming pool (from Spanish "balcón", balcony).<p>And of course, some "true" anglicisms like catering, casting, camping, etc.
Spruce is a Polish word, and it means "From Prussia" which would be written as "z Prus".<p>Ref: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spruce#Etymology" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spruce#Etymology</a>
There are no double entredre's in France because they never say anything that could mean two things or because, "double entendre" (double hear), literally doesn't make sense?
Let's not forget that <i>entrée</i>, in French, means "appetizer".<p>ETA: I see this is mentioned in the article. Posted too hastily :-)
The Dominican Republic (and I think other Spanish-speaking Caribbean islands) has a lot of words they use that come from English but have been modified over the years, or were brand names that are now used to describe something Generic.<p>SUV is "Jipeta" or "Yipeta" sounding like "Jeep-eta",
Diaper is "Pampa" sounding a bit like "Pampers",
Trash-can is "Zafacón" coming from the English "Safety-can",
and my personal favorite is the word "boche" which is a bit like a scolding or reprimand but comes from "Bull shit."
Note that the academie francaise is way flexible to accept english words in the official vocabulary. In Quebec they literally have a french word to replace all common english expressions and prevent borrowing.
Wikipedia has a nice list [0]. In German pseudo-anglicisms are an often used method of word formation, e.g: Beamer (projector), No-Go (faux pas), Handy (mobile phone), Oldtimer (classic car), Streetworker, Barkeeper and (brand new) Shitstorm, etc. There are also pseudo-gallicisms in use (like "Blamage" for disgrace, or "Friseur" for coiffeur). Fun stuff.<p>[0] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pseudo-anglicism" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pseudo-anglicism</a>
My favourite German one is <i>body bag</i> for <i>rucksack</i>.
I mean we have this wonderful German word <i>rucksack</i>, it is so nice it even has been imported into English, then instead of just using it we import the wrong word from English.<p>Unsurprisingly the phenomenon also exits in English, for example <i>Zeitgeist</i> means something slightly different in German than in English and I wouldn't use in German in the same way I see it used in English.
ln Spain, everyone refers to Facebook as <i>el face</i>, (with the English pronunciation of the word "face") which sounded pretty funny until I got used to it.
> And those Berliners who just can’t let the party end can carry on at _eine Afterhour_ until well after the sun comes up.<p>In Toronto’s nightlife, there were definitely establishments referred to in English as “After Hours’.”<p>In the days when liquor could not be served after 1am in Ontario, such places purported to serve only espresso and soft drinks, but there was nearly always some kind of nudge-nudge-wink-wink way to order some kind of alcoholic drink.<p>The entire 80s decade is a hazy blur to me for some reason or other, but I seem to recall places like “Le Tube” opening at around 11pm, but not getting going until 1:30am when everyone left the ordinary clubs.<p>(The building that housed Le Tube is now the home to a leather shop that has a large kink clientele. I believe that the things people wore to LeTube in its heyday were at least as risqué as the fetish items they buy in that location today.)<p>---<p>Anyhow, absolutely these are loanwords from English into other languages like German, but I dispute that “After Hours” is not used in English.
I love these confused loan words (sometimes they are English-English as well, as Australian and American English can collide in my household).<p>My wife got an advertising postcard (for hair gel) from her sister with a picture of a woman whose hair was whipped into a swirl. The card said "Sei kein Blender" (don't be a "blender"). I was sure this was Dinglish for "don't look like you got your hair caught in a blender -- use our hair gel". But my wife informed me that it was the opposite: "Don't look like everyone else (i.e. blend in): use our hair gel to give yourself an absurd hairstyle"<p>There are also fun formations from ex pats, like the Franglais "callinsicker" I've heard French friends use in SF when we're speaking French; it literally means "to call in sick" (i.e. skyve off work).
Do you know that "bridge game" word in English is of Slavic origin, where it came from Tartars. <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Russian_origin" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Rus...</a>
In Estonian Bluetooth is called
Sinihammas [1] which literally means "blue tooth", being non indoeuropean language is difficult when you want to loan words, it's often much easier to invent your own word that would follow the existing grammar than wreck your head around all the grammatical problems encountered when you use English words in Estonian sentences.<p><a href="http://www.arvutikaitse.ee/arvutikaitse-algtoed/sinihammas/" rel="nofollow">http://www.arvutikaitse.ee/arvutikaitse-algtoed/sinihammas/</a>
And then there's the whole business of Wasei-Eigo, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasei-eigo" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasei-eigo</a>.
In Swedish, a portable cassette play is (or was, who uses these anymore?) called a "freestyle". I have no idea what the etymology of that one is.<p>Then there is the old word for baguette (the French type of bread) that was called "pain riche". This is from the first restaurant in Sweden to serve it which was called "Riche". I think everybody have heard stories about Swedes in the 80's trying to order that in France and the confused look from the French. These days people use the proper French word to describe it.
Korean has some doozies:<p><a href="https://youtu.be/hQuJwjAnWHA" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/hQuJwjAnWHA</a><p>"Skinship" - try and guess what that means.
Well, "face control" in Russian has nothing to do with beauty of the people entering a club. The aim of "face control" is to make sure that no people that might possibly cause some trouble, or unable to pay, get into a nightclub or the like.<p>Not sure if explanations of the words from other languages are similarly misleading.
Norwegian has e.g. "light" instead of "diet" for diet products ("Diet Cokie" is "Coke Light" in Norway).<p>We also have e.g."vorspiel" and "nachspiel" for "pre party" (private party before going out, where you can get drunk cheaply...) and "after party" respectively.
If you use LaTeX for typesetting, the document class for slideshow presentations is called Beemer. My understanding is that this is a German psuedo-anglicism related to projectors.
I have a large dictionary of word origins on my bookshelf. It seems every basic 'English' word was borrowed somewhere some time ago. Its natural.