4 ms·

>Early ‘90s, after “Die Wende” It was a peaceful revolution. Wende is a term coined by the SED and misleading. https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/sprachkritik-wer

>Early ‘90s, after “Die Wende” It was a peaceful revolution. Wende is a term coined by the SED and misleading. https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/sprachkritik-wer-wende-sagt-sagt-eben-nicht-revolution-100.html https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/sprachkritik-wer-wende-sagt-s... (in german tho)

fpetm 2y ago
That's interesting. In Hungary the end of communism is called "rendszerváltás" (lit. change of system) or "rendszerváltozás" (lit. change in system). There is a small debate about which term is more appropriate, although they are mostly used interchangeably but nobody calls it a revolution. The process was completely peaceful and legal, unlike other places where the change was more chaotic and violent.
- nier 2y ago
  Yes, please don’t assume that most people who speak German call it a revolution either. Wende means turnaround and that’s good enough for the rest of us. But today I learned that Hungarian is a Uralic not a Slavic language and so of course I had no chance discerning which word in «rendszerváltás» stood for system or change, which made me mad enough to want to look it up: rendszer (“system”) +‎ váltás (“change”)
  - fpetm 2y ago
    The names given to these important events are always controversial and are often politically motivated. For example in Hungary the 1956 revolution was called a counterrevolution under socialism, or for a more recent example the election of Orban in 2010 (who has been prime minister since) is often called another "rendszerváltás" in opposition circles. Also, Hungarian being an agglutanative language the word "rendszerváltás" breaks down into simpler roots: "rendszer" = "rend" (order) + "-szer" (unique suffix) and "vált" (to change) + "ás" (suffix which turns verbs into nouns). I find this language really cool because of the fact that most words decompose into very simple morphemes.
    - nier 2y ago
      Interesting. This -szer suffix seems to be used a lot. Attached to hajtó, it turns driver to fuel. Attached to autó, it turns car to car service. Attached to pàra, it tuns vapor to vaporizer. Attached to fékező, it turns braking into brake fluid. Seems like adding -szer turns the meaning of the word into its enabler.
  - schoen 2y ago
    I know Hungarian doesn't normally have any Indo-European roots, but it can of course borrow words from neighboring languages, so I would have wondered whether váltás could have be borrowed from a Romance language, from the same root as volte/volta (from Latin volvo), meaning 'turn' (particularly given the possible cultural influence of German Wende, which we were just discussing). I checked on Wiktionary and this nice theory is not right; váltás has been traced back to Proto-Finno-Ugric roots and has known cognates in other distant Uralic languages. Oh well! At least we live in a miraculous time where one can easily check etymologies in various language families in five seconds. :-) But amusingly, "revolution" itself also literally etymologically means ... turn!
  - MonkeyClub 2y ago
    > Wende means turnaround "Revolution" also means "turnaround".
nier 2y ago
Wende is the term that most Germans use without thinking twice. It’s been a common word, which existed long before 1989, and while it is since then strongly linked to the events around the time when the Berlin wall fell, you’ll have a hard time finding a German who knows of how this word was used by the East-German political party (SED). Spoiler: It was used to mean the opposite of what actually happened (i.e. more power to the party). The parent comment’s link brings you to the transcript of an interview with a former German law professor who, knowing the SED’s usage of the word, made sure to always describe what happened in 1989 as a revolution. This is actually one person begging other German speakers to start using what he thinks is the correct word. Ain’t gonna happen. If East-Germans stood up for themselves in the required numbers to overthrow their leaders, I guess Germans would use the word revolution. But that’s not what transpired. In 1989 a system collapsed. Communism. While that may also always qualify as a revolution in academic circles, German people chose Wende, which simply means turnaround.
- guenthert 2y ago
  > Wende is the term that most Germans use without thinking twice. Sure, but for something not directly related: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wende_(Bundesrepublik_Deutschland) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wende_(Bundesrepublik_Deutschl... (might be dating myself there ;-}

fpetm 2y ago

That's interesting. In Hungary the end of communism is called "rendszerváltás" (lit. change of system) or "rendszerváltozás" (lit. change in system). There is a small debate about which term is more appropriate, although they are mostly used interchangeably but nobody calls it a revolution. The process was completely peaceful and legal, unlike other places where the change was more chaotic and violent.

nier 2y ago
Yes, please don’t assume that most people who speak German call it a revolution either. Wende means turnaround and that’s good enough for the rest of us. But today I learned that Hungarian is a Uralic not a Slavic language and so of course I had no chance discerning which word in «rendszerváltás» stood for system or change, which made me mad enough to want to look it up: rendszer (“system”) +‎ váltás (“change”)
- fpetm 2y ago
  The names given to these important events are always controversial and are often politically motivated. For example in Hungary the 1956 revolution was called a counterrevolution under socialism, or for a more recent example the election of Orban in 2010 (who has been prime minister since) is often called another "rendszerváltás" in opposition circles. Also, Hungarian being an agglutanative language the word "rendszerváltás" breaks down into simpler roots: "rendszer" = "rend" (order) + "-szer" (unique suffix) and "vált" (to change) + "ás" (suffix which turns verbs into nouns). I find this language really cool because of the fact that most words decompose into very simple morphemes.
  - nier 2y ago
    Interesting. This -szer suffix seems to be used a lot. Attached to hajtó, it turns driver to fuel. Attached to autó, it turns car to car service. Attached to pàra, it tuns vapor to vaporizer. Attached to fékező, it turns braking into brake fluid. Seems like adding -szer turns the meaning of the word into its enabler.
- schoen 2y ago
  I know Hungarian doesn't normally have any Indo-European roots, but it can of course borrow words from neighboring languages, so I would have wondered whether váltás could have be borrowed from a Romance language, from the same root as volte/volta (from Latin volvo), meaning 'turn' (particularly given the possible cultural influence of German Wende, which we were just discussing). I checked on Wiktionary and this nice theory is not right; váltás has been traced back to Proto-Finno-Ugric roots and has known cognates in other distant Uralic languages. Oh well! At least we live in a miraculous time where one can easily check etymologies in various language families in five seconds. :-) But amusingly, "revolution" itself also literally etymologically means ... turn!
- MonkeyClub 2y ago
  > Wende means turnaround "Revolution" also means "turnaround".

nier 2y ago

Wende is the term that most Germans use without thinking twice. It’s been a common word, which existed long before 1989, and while it is since then strongly linked to the events around the time when the Berlin wall fell, you’ll have a hard time finding a German who knows of how this word was used by the East-German political party (SED). Spoiler: It was used to mean the opposite of what actually happened (i.e. more power to the party). The parent comment’s link brings you to the transcript of an interview with a former German law professor who, knowing the SED’s usage of the word, made sure to always describe what happened in 1989 as a revolution. This is actually one person begging other German speakers to start using what he thinks is the correct word. Ain’t gonna happen. If East-Germans stood up for themselves in the required numbers to overthrow their leaders, I guess Germans would use the word revolution. But that’s not what transpired. In 1989 a system collapsed. Communism. While that may also always qualify as a revolution in academic circles, German people chose Wende, which simply means turnaround.

guenthert 2y ago
> Wende is the term that most Germans use without thinking twice. Sure, but for something not directly related: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wende_(Bundesrepublik_Deutschland) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wende_(Bundesrepublik_Deutschl... (might be dating myself there ;-}