Potato (slang)

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Potato is an ethnophaulistic slang term for Germans (similar to Alman ) in an intercultural context. It can be used insulting, but also humorous or as a self-label.

Use and history of terms

The derogatory use of the word potato for people is not a phenomenon of the 21st century; Since the 1960s, "potato eater" was used in the Federal Republic of Germany, particularly by Italian guest workers, as a counterpart to nutritional terms such as " spaghetti eater". For the 19th century, the German dictionary of the Brothers Grimm from 1873 names "many jokes" that were driven with the name potatoes, for example with the "potato saxons" in the duchies or the inhabitants of the Ore Mountains who were called "potato wains", " because the potatoes are often your only food ”.

Today the term potato is used in various interpretations as a designation of the German itself. As a stereotype for Germans in multicultural contexts, it is often classified as a swear word with which Germans are to be belittled or insulted. The name can be traced back to the prejudice that Germans consume potatoes a lot and often . This clichéd assumption proves to be only partially correct, as the EU-wide comparison of the per capita consumption of potatoes shows. According to the study, Germany is in the lower midfield.

The expression can therefore also be understood as a reaction to swear words such as “ caraway turkey ” or “spaghetti eater” and follows the pattern of using eating habits as part of one's own identity and as a field of demarcation from other groups. In multi-ethnic contexts, the term also serves to distinguish between “Germans” and “foreigners”. On the other hand, potato is also used as a humorous mutual designation in youth and everyday language or in the media. For example, the term is used in the first episode, Turkish for Beginners (2006), in which the character Cem greets the German-born protagonists Lena and Nils with the words: “Well you potatoes”.

Finally, potato can also be used as a self-designation with a positive or ironic meaning, for example within the hip-hop scene and as a positive appropriation by the group that was originally insulted ( Geusenwort ).

Do not confuse the term "potato" with the expression potato German , who for those in South and Central Jutland can be used immigrated ethnic German families.

Controversy

The term “potato” played a role in debates about a controversial hostility towards Germans . In 2010, for example, the then Family Minister Kristina Schröder described a problem as such in an interview with ARD, which is also expressed when children and young people in particular are referred to as “German potatoes” or “German sluts”. Such insults are also a form of racism . The Berlin interior senator Ehrhart Körting and the head of the Greens, Cem Özdemir , called for a consequent action against such behavior, while the Green politician Sven-Christian Kindler described Schröder's statements as "pseudo-scientific, dangerous nonsense".

Julian Reichelt was nominated in 2018 by the association of “ New German Media Makers ” for the “Golden Potato” award in recognition of the “underground reporting” of the Bild newspaper about the immigration society. He then rejected the award and justified this with the statement, among other things, that potatoes had meanwhile "become an insult in schoolyards that actually relates to race and origin and that is in no way meant lovingly".

The term also appeared in the discussion about the problems of the German national soccer team after the early retirement from the 2018 World Cup . According to a Spiegel article, there should be a dividing line in the German team between self-proclaimed " Kanaks ", to which players with a migration background, such as u. a. Jérôme Boateng and Mesut Özil also heard Julian Draxler and gave “typical Germans” like Thomas Müller or Mats Hummels . The difference between these groups was mainly in the lifestyle of the players, so the extravagant "Kanaks" sometimes made fun of the lifestyle of the "potatoes". The national player İlkay Gündoğan and Lukas Podolski, who was active in the DFB team until 2017, replied in response to this reporting that sayings between each other were always to be understood as fun.

In the April 2019 edition of his television program Neo Magazin Royale, the satirist Jan Böhmermann addressed the composition of Wikipedia authors as predominantly male and German without a migration background. He then initiated the creation of this article to check whether such an article, the term of which offends this very group of people, would survive in Wikipedia.

Use in music

The term "potato" is also used in German rap and in German-speaking punk as a term for Germans in song lyrics. Here are a few examples:

  • 187 Strassenbande - "A Code" (album Der Sampler II ) - song line: "And also potatoes that protect Kanacken"
  • Acne Kid Joe - Potato ( Karate Kid Joe album ) - song line: "Today a German, tomorrow a racist, in the spirit a potato, you are what you eat"
  • Ali As feat. Pretty Mo - "German / Foreigner" (Album Amnesia ) - song line: "Ey, you potato, what's going on?"
  • Audio88 & Yassin - "Schellen" (album Halleluja ) - song line: "You can still say that as a proud sack of potatoes"
  • Egotronic feat. Emilie Krawall - "An die Wand" (Album No Arguments ) - song line: "We're putting all of Germany on the wall, now it's time for the potatoes"
  • Eko Fresh - " Die Abrechnung " (Album German Dream Allstars ) - song line: "And now this Fler, you fat potato come a little closer"
  • Fler - "cry for love" - ​​song line: "You are talking about potatoes, you can tell that you are a farmer"
  • Jan Delay - "Potatoes" (album Mercedes-Dance ) - song line: "I'm a potato and I'm cool with it"
  • JAW - "Fremdkörper" (album The unbearable audacity of being ) - song line: "Because for German potatoes this swag is not free"
  • KC Rebell feat. Kool Savas - “Spiegel” (album distance ) - song line: “where they said: 'Make up your mind! Potato or Kanake? '"
  • KIZ - “What do you want to do ?!” (Album Böhse Enkelz ) - song line: “You victim, who do you want to box? There are potatoes everywhere ... "
  • KIZ - "Ellenbogengesellschaft (Pogen)" (album Hahnenkampf ) - song line: "Upside down world, dropped by a hot potato"
  • Kummer - "Schiff" (album KIOX ) - song line: "Between angry potatoes and a pile of crystal meth"
  • Liquit Walker - "Deutschrapkanakke" (album Unter Wölfen ) - song line: "Stamped as a potato, if you walk differently"
  • Love A - "Weed" (album nothing is new ) - song line: "Fear 1, pity 0, world champion, potato country"
  • NMZS - "Freaks 'n' Geeks" - song line: "This is rap for failure, music for vegetables, potato rap, underground plus a lot of starch"
  • Yassin - "Hair Gray" (album Ypsilon ) - song line: "I'm the first Kanacke, the Kanacken not celebrate, and soon the first potato on a gallows in Bavaria"
  • Drawn in masculine - "Plattenbau OST" (album Alles brennt ) - song line: "That is no longer German, what I talk about is potato"

variants

The actress and cabaret artist Idil Baydar lets her fictional character Jilet Ayşe use the term sweet potato in recognition of “potatoes” with desirable behavior. On the stage of a Berlin action on Press Freedom Day 2017 , she commented on the participation of numerous artists, journalists and viewers, referring to the journalist Deniz Yücel, who was imprisoned in Turkey at the time :

“'Deniz stands for what we all need: freedom of expression. If I don't have freedom of expression, then I can't say: you shitty potatoes, stop the dominant culture! ' But here are all Ayses sweet potatoes: 'You walk with us in solidarity, and I swear you will get that back a thousand times over.' "

- Jilet Ayşe : Quoted in Die Tageszeitung , May 5, 2017

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Maria Paola Tenchini: On the semantics of ethnic bad names . In: Lingue e Linguaggi . tape 10 , 2013, ISSN  2239-0367 , p. 125-136, especially p. 127 f . ( core.ac.uk [PDF]).
  2. ^ Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm: German dictionary. Volume 11 (= Volume 5 of the original edition), S. Hirzel, Leipzig 1873, Sp. 244–245 (online at: http://woerterbuchnetz.de/cgi-bin/WBNetz/wbgui_py?sigle=DWB&lemid=GK02117 )
  3. ↑ a b c Pierre Kurby of importanceOnline: What does “German potato” / German potato mean? In: Meaning online. June 26, 2018, accessed April 9, 2019 .
  4. ↑ a b Ursula Bertels, Claudia Bußmann: Handbuch interkulturelle Didaktik . Ed .: Ethnology in School and Adult Education eV Waxmann, Münster, New York, Munich, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-8309-7889-3 , p. 23 .
  5. ↑ Per capita consumption of potatoes in the EU countries in 2016 (in kilograms per capita). In: Statista . Retrieved April 9, 2019 .
  6. ↑ a b Christopher Kloë: Comedy as Communication of Cultures: Examples of Turkish and Muslim groups in Germany . Springer Fachmedien, Wiesbaden 2017, ISBN 978-3-658-17201-5 , pp. 238 .
  7. ↑ Cordula Weißköppel: Foreigners and Potato Germans: Identity performance in everyday life in an ethnically mixed secondary school class . Juventa, Weinheim / Munich 2001, p. 158 ff .
  8. ^ Eva Neuland: Youth Language: An Introduction . 2nd Edition. UTB 2397. A. Francke Verlag Tübingen and Basel, Tübingen 2018, ISBN 978-3-8252-4924-3 , p. 222 .
  9. ↑ Anna Kemper : Swear words . We potatoes. In: Zeit Magazin . No. 48 , December 5, 2016, ISSN  0044-2070 ( zeit.de [accessed April 9, 2019]).
  10. ↑ Cordula Weißköppel: Foreigners and Potato Germans: Identity performance in everyday life in an ethnically mixed secondary school class . Juventa, Weinheim / Munich 2001, p. 148 f .
  11. ↑ Frédéric Schwilden: Hip-Hop: Explain that to your neighbor in Kanakish . March 18, 2014 ( welt.de [accessed April 19, 2019]).
  12. ↑ Hengameh Yaghoobifarah: Column Habibitus: Which Potato Are You? The test . In: The daily newspaper : taz . November 11, 2017, ISSN  0931-9085 ( taz.de [accessed April 19, 2019]).
  13. ^ A b Family Minister: Schröder warns of hostility towards Germans. In: Spiegel Online. October 10, 2010, accessed April 9, 2019 .
  14. ↑ Simone Schmollack: Alleged German hostility. Potato debate without evidence. In: taz . November 15, 2010, accessed April 9, 2019 .
  15. ↑ PM: 10 years of New German Media Makers - and a new media award: “The Golden Potato”. In: neuemedienmacher.de. Retrieved April 9, 2019 .
  16. ↑ Andrea Dernbach: An anniversary and a potato for Julian Reichelt. In: tagesspiegel.de. November 3, 2018, accessed April 9, 2019 .
  17. ^ David Hein: "Goldene Kartoffel": Julian Reichelt appears for the award ceremony, but rejects the award. In: horizont.de. November 5, 2018, accessed April 9, 2019 .
  18. ↑ Rafael Buschmann , Marc Hujer, Gerhard Pfeil: Like a traditional eleven . In: Der Spiegel . August 25, 2018, ISSN  0038-7452 , p. 92-96 ( Spiegel Plus ).
  19. ↑ From "Potatoes" and "Kanaken" - Löw's difficult squad planning. In: welt.de. August 27, 2018, accessed April 22, 2019 .
  20. ↑ "Kanaken" vs. "Potatoes" according to Podolski and Gündogan "a flax". In: welt.de. August 28, 2018, accessed April 22, 2019 .
  21. ↑ Die Telelupe: Wikipedia - Neo Magazin Royale with Jan Böhmermann - ZDFneo on YouTube , April 18, 2019, accessed on May 20, 2019.
  22. ↑ 187 Strassenbande (Ft. AchtVier, Bonez MC, Gzuz & Sa4) - A code. In: genius.com. Retrieved April 18, 2019 .
  23. ↑ Acne Kid Joe - Potato. Retrieved April 20, 2020 (English).
  24. ↑ German / Foreigner (Feat. Petty Mo) - Ali As. In: genius.com. Retrieved April 18, 2019 .
  25. ^ Audio88 & Yassin - Bells. In: genius.com. Accessed April 19, 2019 .
  26. ↑ Egotronic - on the wall. In: genius.com. Retrieved April 24, 2019 .
  27. ↑ Eko Fresh - The billing. In: genius.com. Retrieved July 16, 2019 .
  28. ↑ Fler - Cry For Love Lyrics. In: genius.com. Retrieved April 18, 2019 .
  29. ↑ Jan Delay - Potatoes. In: genius.com. Retrieved April 18, 2019 .
  30. ↑ JAW - Fremdkörper (2013). In: genius.com. Retrieved April 18, 2019 .
  31. ↑ Sorrow - Ship. In: genius.com. Retrieved January 23, 2020 (English).
  32. ↑ Love A - weeds. Accessed January 16, 2020 (English).
  33. ↑ NMZS - Freaks 'n' Geeks. Retrieved April 24, 2019 .
  34. ↑ Yassin - hair gray. In: genius.com. Accessed April 19, 2019 .
  35. ↑ Plattenbau OST Accessed on April 25, 2019 .
  36. ↑ Amador García Tercero: "Kiezdeutsch" - its representation and its use in the media. Introduction of the linguistic variety in GFL lessons . Máster Universitario de Profesor de Educación Secundaria Obligatoria, Bachillerato, Formación Profesional y Enseñanza de Idiomas. Salamanca June 21, 2017, p. 71 ( online (PDF) ).
  37. ↑ Ulrich Gutmair: Freedom of the press day: Jilet Ayse knows . In: The daily newspaper: taz . May 5, 2017, ISSN  0931-9085 ( taz.de [accessed April 23, 2019]).