Speaking of words ... here's one of my favorite German compound words:
Verschlimmbesserung — "an intended improvement that makes things worse"
I'm sure many of us here can relate to the word :D
History of the word:
"This construction doesn’t just present contrasting concepts. It also employs a playful use of German’s grammatical structures to tie them together. The word begins with two verbs – verschlimmern (“to worsen”) and verbessern (“to improve”). It then conflates their prefixes (ver-), and adds the suffix (-ung) to turn it into a noun. This process compresses an idea that only a wordy English translation can unpack: “an intended improvement that makes things worse."
Verschlimmbesserung — "an intended improvement that makes things worse"
I'm sure many of us here can relate to the word :D
History of the word:
"This construction doesn’t just present contrasting concepts. It also employs a playful use of German’s grammatical structures to tie them together. The word begins with two verbs – verschlimmern (“to worsen”) and verbessern (“to improve”). It then conflates their prefixes (ver-), and adds the suffix (-ung) to turn it into a noun. This process compresses an idea that only a wordy English translation can unpack: “an intended improvement that makes things worse."
Source: https://theconversation.com/why-the-german-language-has-so-m...