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Is there a word in English which is untranslatable?
The Welsh word hiraeth, the Portuguese word saudade, the Spanish word duende, the German word weltschmerz, Han in Chinese, and others, are considered untranslatable into another language. We can give an approximate translation. "Wistfulness"; "Nostalgia"; "Passion"; "Worldweariness"; "Bitterness". But to properly understand the elusive meanings of these words—understand them in the way that they are used by the native speakers of the language they belong to— you probably have to have lived in the culture in which they are used because the meanings are a unique part of the cultural psyche.
I'd really like to know if we have any words like this in English. But I can't think of a single candidate. Maybe it's impossible to identify these words in your own language.
Any ideas?
Last edited by Hydra; 12/10/06 01:47 PM.
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Eh? 
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Quote:
Eh?
Let me give you another example.
C. S. Lewis defined the German word Sehnsucht rather succintly as "an inconsolable longing for one knows not what."
Germans tend to be somewhat more expansive.
Consider the following. It is excerpted from the speech When Sehnsucht Leads You Up the Garden Path given by Federal Councillor Christoph Blocher at the Ninth International Woodcarvers Symposium in Brienz on the theme of Sehnsucht , 10 July 2006.
Quote:
Sehnsucht is one of those German words that it is almost impossible to translate adequately. Along with Weltschmerz (world weariness or taedium vitae), the stage director and author Georg Tabori called Sehnsucht one of those quasi-mystical terms in German for which there is no satisfactory corresponding term in another language. [...]
It is already a tough proposition for us German speakers to describe sehnsucht. Tender longing goes hand in hand with the painful knowledge that the thing longed for will never quite be attained. Indeed, you even get the feeling that the granting of an eagerly awaited wish could immediately bring about the destruction of the desired object.
The English writer Oscar Wilde described the dilemma aptly when he said: "In this world there are only two tragedies: one is not getting what you want, the other is getting it."
The word sehnsucht itself expresses this conflict.
Despite these rational objections, once people have been gripped by sehnsucht they are unable to shake off their longing. It is this close relationship (encapsulated in one word) between ardent longing or yearning (das Sehnen) and addiction (die Sucht) that lurks behind each longing waiting to turn the feeling into a destructive, self-defeating force.
If it is true that the word sehnsucht is untranslatable—and indeed most languages make do with the word Verlangen (désir, desire or longing) or Nostalgie (nostalgie, nostalgia)—this in no way means that the feeling of sehnsucht is a state of mind peculiar to German speakers.
The feeling of sehnsucht is universal. And it is in the non-verbal means of expression—in painting, music and the visual arts—that this universal nature can be seen to best advantage.
What word in the English language could possibly require such a metaphysical, circuitous, expository definition?
Last edited by Hydra; 12/11/06 01:16 PM.
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Pooh-Bah
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Hi Hydra: If you are asking whether we have any untranslatable words like that, I would guess we have hundreds if not tens of thousands. Trouble is, because the typical English-speaking clod (me)wouldn't recognize them as unique, you'd have to assemble a cadre of language experts and translators to identify them
dalehileman
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Carpal Tunnel
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OK, okay.
Cool.
(Both words being borrowed into myriad languages from English because of their "untranslatability", which, by the way, I don't really believe in.)
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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Carpal Tunnel
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the facile answer: much specialty jargon and Netspeak (internetese)
-ron o.
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old hand
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You possibly know the famous "traduttore traditore" (a translator is a traitor). So the number of untranslatable words (from zero to infinity) depends on how much treason you are ready to accept..
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veteran
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Quote:
You possibly know the famous "traduttore traditore" (a translator is a traitor). So the number of untranslatable words (from zero to infinity) depends on how much treason you are ready to accept..
Just when I think that wsieber has said the most insightful thing possible he keeps on talking. What a guy! 
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Carpal Tunnel
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AnnaS. posted one time about foreign translaters having difficulty with George Bush's "Bring it on".
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I think I have a candidate. In my experience, Japanese and Korean people cannot be made to understand the meaning of "kitsch" or "tacky". Japanese pop culture is overwhelmingly cutesy-cutesy. Even the offical promotional emblem of the Japan Self-Defense Forces is comprised of a couple of doe-eyed, infantile munchkins. But then, this is only a case of English-Japanese untranslatability. > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuteness_in_Japan
Last edited by Hydra; 12/11/06 01:20 PM.
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