Lexicon of threatened words
The Lexicon of Threatened Words is a two-volume work by the author Bodo Mrozek . The two volumes were published by Rowohlt Verlag in 2005 and 2006 , and a one-volume special edition was published in 2008.
content
The author of the lexicon is a studied philologist and historian, but in his book does not see himself as a linguist, but as a “word collector” who has written a book that is easy to understand. The lexicon is not a scientific reference work, but a compilation of sometimes humorous word stories with a columnist character. It brings together etymological and journalistic working methods in a popular non-fiction book.
The book contains around 600 terms from different categories:
- Almost forgotten words that hardly anyone knows anymore. The reasons for their disappearance are different. Often they are based on social change, for example in the form of address Miss or the word dowry . Both are "linguistic witnesses" (Mrozek) for a change in the social position of women.
- Words that are replaced by neologisms , such as Hagestolz (now “ Single ”) or Gabelfrühstück (now often replaced by “Brunch”).
- Terms whose original meaning is lost, such as the phrase "impromptu". Originally doing something without getting off the stirrup . Nowadays the word is often written as “standing upright” and so gradually changes its semantics .
- Short-lived buzzwords from the trend or youth language of past decades, such as smell or knorke .
- Terms used to describe things that are themselves lost and forgotten. According to a survey, the word “ rotary dial ” is no longer understood by young people.
- Words that briefly gained importance in their time-bound political or social context. Examples are the abusive word evil crow , which Herbert Wehner invented, as well as the “problem bear ”, the jute bag or the “ moose test”.
In the introduction, Mrozek explains the linguistic terms archaism and historicism and gives numbers on the obsolescence of terms in the German language, which, in contrast to neologisms, has so far hardly been researched. The Duden has added around 8,000 new words within eight years. At the same time, however, terms would be sorted out that are classified as "obsolete" by the specialist dictionary editors because they no longer appear sufficiently often in the current corpora . The number of these vanishing terms is unknown.
According to Mrozek, the revival of forgotten words rarely happens. An example is the French loan word "Petitessen" (little things). It was considered obsolete in the 1970s and was deleted from the dictionary. But when Willy Brandt used it again prominently in a speech, it was suddenly on everyone's lips again - and was also taken up again by the Duden.
With every word that disappears from the vocabulary, its history, which is often centuries old, is also forgotten. By telling these stories, one can track down small changes in everyday life and in private life that are normally not recorded by historiography. The lexicon of threatened words therefore sees itself as “a small cultural history of disappearance”, according to the preface.
effect
Although the publisher had not earmarked any advertising budget for the Lexicon of Threatened Words, the first volume came as a surprise into the list of the best. The website for the book reached more than a million visitors in just a few weeks. In addition to the book, an internet project served as a red list for collecting dying words. Several thousand word suggestions from the population were received on the website www.bedrohte-woerter.de (now offline).
Die Welt am Sonntag wrote about Mrozek's book that it contained “clever, finely ironic explanations”, the Berliner Zeitung described the lexicon as “an amusing panopticon of language nerd”. The second part also became a bestseller. Mrozek presented his book at a number of readings and in television programs, for example in the ZDF night studio.
On the occasion of the Literature Days in Bad Wildungen, an exhibition on the lexicon of threatened words was shown in 2006. The exhibition moved to the Plettenberg City Library in 2007 and was shown at the Düsseldorf Book Tour, which held its 2007 closing event under the motto “Threatened Words”.
In the summer of 2007, a language competition determined the most beautiful threatened word from several thousand entries. The word gem came first . The jurors of the jury headed by Mrozek included a. the writers Jakob Hein and Eva Menasse .
Bodo Mrozek's book found its way into German school lessons. In May 2006 the Westermann-Schulbuch-Verlag prepared texts from the Lexicon of Threatened Words as materials for German lessons.
In 2007 the Austrian author Robert Sedlaczek published a small handbook of the threatened words of Austria in Ueberreuter Verlag, which refers in the foreword to Mrozek's idea and transfers it to the Austrian. Mrozek's book also resulted in several plagiarisms , which, however, were nowhere near as successful and largely went unnoticed.
swell
- Ö1 broadcast “Radio Journal” from January 10, 2006.
literature
- Bodo Mrozek: Lexicon of threatened words . Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 2005, ISBN 3-499-62077-4 .
- Bodo Mrozek: Lexicon of Threatened Words 2 . Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 2006, ISBN 3-499-62193-2 .
- Bodo Mrozek: The great lexicon of threatened words . Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 2008.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Audiofile NDR feature (MP3; 917 kB)
- ↑ Berliner Zeitung of January 9, 2006
- ↑ Nachtstudio: What is good German? - Language criticism as entertainment in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- ↑ Tagesschau from December 18, 2006 (tagesschau.de archive)
- ↑ Arno Frank : "Dying words have no lobby" . Interview with Bodo Mrozek in the taz of December 6, 2005. Accessed on October 14, 2015.