Articles and Stories

March 10, 2015

By Uta Nelson

Being fluent in several languages, I regularly find words that do not quite translate the same way into a foreign language, or do not translate at all.

The simple expression “I love you”, which in English is used for a variety of people close to someone (and sometimes even not so close), is reserved mostly for one’s life partner or spouse in the German language. In Italian, there is “ti voglio bene” reserved for situations where “ti amo” is too much. Though these two expressions are used differently, they both translate to “I love you”.

The German “Zeitgeist” is another word with no exact one-word translation, the English language even adopted it to express the spirit of a time.

Italian has a way of adding diminutives to items of clothing to express a lighter, finer version of the same. “Maglione” and “maglioncino” both translate as sweater, latter is of a finer fabric and often more elegant. The same is true for “mantello” and “mantellina” used for a coat/lighter coat.

Beside situations in which there is no work to translate a given one, there are also certain feelings attached to words in a given language that can get lost in translation. I am thinking about the word “Gemütlichkeit” in German, which is translated as “coziness” in English. The translation does not entirely reflect the meaning and the feeling conveyed by the German word.

There would be so many more words to add to the list, every language is just so much more than words, there is history, there is culture, there is geography and more, all of it is part of the way people express themselves.

In connection with this topic, I found a blog by a well-travelled British illustrator, Ella Frances Sanders, who compiled a list of words from a variety of languages that are absolutely unique to each one with beautiful pictures, it can be viewed at:
http://blog.maptia.com/posts/untranslatable-words-from-other-cultures