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Idioms | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| yantai_scot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4804 days ago 157 posts - 214 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 1 of 31 02 May 2014 at 10:59pm | IP Logged |
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Just a query coming out of observing my own daily speech vs my still very basic German.
English is full of idioms. So is Scottish English (I can't claim to speak Scots). Maybe more so. And Chinese has 成語 chéngyŭ. And French has lots as well. There ends my basic experience of languages. At the moment, German doesn't seem to have as many (I may be completely wrong). Are there any languages that have few or no idioms or is it a universal feature? 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6911 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 31 02 May 2014 at 11:42pm | IP Logged |
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How about these?
http://german.about.com/library/blredew_intro.htm http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:German_idioms http://translationjournal.net/journal/german-glossary.htm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6661 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 3 of 31 02 May 2014 at 11:42pm | IP Logged |
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All idioms aren't pretty or poetic. The fact that you in German use the construction "mir ist ..." to say you're bored or
cold, is an idiomatic expression, an idiom. Even our perception of time is a subject to idiomaticy: the past is behind us, the future is ahead of us. That is just a convention and could as well be the other way around (and in a few languages, it is). 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7207 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 4 of 31 02 May 2014 at 11:44pm | IP Logged |
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I imagine idioms are used more by abstract thinkers and people who like to play with words. Perhaps there are cultures that foster that sort thing.
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| Glarus Girl Groupie United Kingdom Joined 4577 days ago 50 posts - 108 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Swiss-German | Message 5 of 31 03 May 2014 at 12:18am | IP Logged |
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At the night school I go to, we were all given the book 'Baron's German Idioms' which
contains more than 2000 idioms in it. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5768 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 6 of 31 03 May 2014 at 1:11am | IP Logged |
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Da wird doch der Hund in der Pfanne verrückt.
I mean, what?! Of course German has idioms. Hampie, I don't perceive that as an idiom. It's just a sentence pattern to say you are experiencing one of a number of physicl states that work with that expression. OP: If anything, I would assume that your textbooks/teachers or language partners tried to spare you the more colourful expressions until now. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4670 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 7 of 31 03 May 2014 at 1:57am | IP Logged |
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I still remember the expression'' die Leitungen brennen durch'' from my high school times. ;)
In Chinese, chengyu(成语）are not typical idioms, they're more like proverb-like sayings. Expressions more similar to Western idioms are called suyu(俗语）. Edited by Medulin on 03 May 2014 at 2:03am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Retinend Triglot Senior Member SpainRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4310 days ago 283 posts - 557 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish Studies: Arabic (Written), French | Message 8 of 31 03 May 2014 at 8:58am | IP Logged |
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"du hast ins Fettknäpfchen getreten" (you've said something gauche/ stepped into a little
bowl of lard) "sei nicht so ein Frosch" (don't be such a stick in the mud/ don't be a frog) Edited by Retinend on 03 May 2014 at 9:01am 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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