Capturing the Zeitgeist Native German Loanwords in ... - Skemman

3 English Vocabulary
4 Þorsteinn Hjaltason
3.1 The Term Loanword
Before I begin my research on German loanwords, we must define what a loanword
is. When a word is taken from one language into another, it is usually called a
loanword 7 or a borrowing. Crystal observes that neither term "is really appropriate, as
the receiving language does not give them back" (126). Loanword is the more
respectable term, but the following threefold distinction, used by German linguists, is
often applied by English speaking scholars:
1) Gastwort ‘guest word’: “retains its original pronunciation, spelling and meaning”.
Example passé (French) and diva (Italian).
2) Fremdwort ‘foreign word’: “has undergone partial assimilation”. Example French
garage. Different pronunciation (‘garrij’) and exists also as verb in English.
3) Lehnwort ‘loan word’ has assimilated and is not distinguished as such by many
speakers. Good examples are the numerous early loans, like bishop (< Greek episcopos)
and cheese (< Latin caseus) (Hughes 55).
It should be noted that the term Gastwort is barely used anymore by German
linguists (see for example Bußmann 203, 396). The distinction is therefore mostly
twofold: Fremdwort noting the not yet fully integrated word versus Lehnwort which
should have assimilated phonologically and be known by most speakers. The fact is that
many borrowings have been assimilated to the spelling and pronunciation of English,
and they are no longer perceived as "foreign" by native speakers (Jackson and Zé
Amvela 54). The distinction between a Fremdwort and Lehnwort (loanword) remains
often unclear, and this division must be used with care (Bußmann 203). In this paper, I
will only refer to the term loanword.
No less important is the distinction between a loanword and a loan translation. The
latter – also known as calque (from French) – is simply a translation of the parts of a
word (the morphemes) from one language into another in order to borrow some
concept, idea etc. A good example is superman from German Übermensch (über
‘over/super’ + mensch ‘man’ 8 ) (Hughes 55). During the Anglo-Saxon period, calques
7 The spelling differs between dictionaries and handbooks; some write it in two words (loan word) and
others in one word (loanword) and I will follow that convention.
8 Interestingly, just the second part translates into native English (man), but the first part translates into
Latin (super), which demonstrates the fusion character of English and English word formation.