Germanism (was Verbing nouns)

Subject: Germanism (was Verbing nouns)
From: "Ridder, Fred" <ridderf -at- DIALOGIC -dot- COM>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 1997 18:58:42 -0500

Wayne Douglass wrote:

>Interesting that German is less "flexible" in some ways than English,
even
>though English derives from German. German and English do share the
ability
>to string together words to form a kind of compound noun. In English the
>words usually remain separated (for example, "tire tread depth gauge"),
but
>in German they are usually squashed together (for example,
>"arbeitslosefursorge" - not sure of that spelling).

Another thing I've always found interesting about German is that it
capitalizes all nouns. None of these "is this noun a proper name"
arguments that we have to put up with in English (cf the "web" vs.
"Web" thread of a couple months ago). Maybe all these engineers and
marketers who so liberally sprinkle capitalized common nouns in their
writing are unconsiously harking back to the German roots of English???

Fred Ridder (ridderf -at- dialogic -dot- com)
Senior Tech Writer
Dialogic Corporation
Parsippany, NJ
http://www.dialogic.com

TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a message
to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot- Send commands
to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/ or search and
browse the archives at http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html


Previous by Author: Job: Parsippany, NJ (USA)
Next by Author: Re: HTML code for Spanish question mark
Previous by Thread: Re: Augh!
Next by Thread: Stylish Microsoft


What this post helpful? Share it with friends and colleagues:


Sponsored Ads