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As a German, I might not have thought of that but would absolutely use it to translate Verschlimmbesserung. Does it sound "normal" enough to native English spe
by eqvinox 1mo ago
As a German, I might not have thought of that but would absolutely use it to translate Verschlimmbesserung. Does it sound "normal" enough to native English speakers?
- arjan_sch 1mo agoI'm Dutch, sounds pretty good to me
- inanutshellus 1mo agoIt's definitely a normal-sounding, memorable word for us native English speakers. Meanwhile I won't be able to remember that German word longer than it takes me to close this tab. Vershumthingsomething.
- groestl 1mo agoThumbs up, let's settle on that translation
- clbrmbr 1mo agoIt's totally plausible portmanteau. I get the feeling thought that it sounds more marked in English than in German where these kind of mashups are formed more freely.
- ThrowawayR2 1mo agoThe sibling post's "disimprovement" sounds more natural and has parallel form with pre-existing broadly accepted English words like "disincentive" and "disinfect".
- eqvinox 1mo agoNot sure if that's just me, but "disimprovement" sounds like *removing* an improvement that was previously there…
- ThrowawayR2 1mo agoAn improvement isn't all or nothing, it can be incremental. The dis- prefix only indicates that the increment is negative in this case.
- pndy 1mo agoI'm darn sure that in time the original German pronounciation would be lost and you'd hear something comparable to reading Straße as "Strabe". Probably it would become "verskimbeserong".
- amiga386 1mo agoIt doesn't sound normal. "worse-" doesn't fit as a replacement for the "im-" prefix, because the "se" ending doesn't flow well into the plosive "prov". "disimprove" works much better. The similar word "unimproved" implies you did nothing to make it better, "disimproved" implies you actively made it worse. But this is still just effectively adding "not" to the word. If you must join two words that are the antonyms of each other (like verbessern and verschlimmern), the closest match I can think of is the vulgar pun "fuxed", a blend of "fixed" (repaired) and "fucked" (broke). https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Fuxed https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Fuxed