Doubtless extremely significant
This is my current favorite bit of German word-formation. The prefix "ent" generally denotes that something is being taken away, something is being freed of something, or something is moving away. Täuschung. Enttäuschung.
Comments
on 2008-11-12 13:29:10.0, Blume commented:
Das postdramatische Theaterstück war eine große Enttäuschung, da keine Täuschungsversuche auf der Bühne stattfanden.
and, further, on 2008-11-12 13:53:05.0, ben wolfson commented:
Ok.
and, further, on 2008-11-12 15:27:55.0, ben wolfson commented:
You know, I thought I'd noticed this before.
It's a terrible thing, growing old.
and, further, on 2008-11-12 17:37:53.0, Jeff Rubard commented:
Yes, the title of the section of the Phenomenology where he talks about the famous Bildung is "Der sich entfremdete Geist; die Bildung". Sich entfremdete? WTF? I translated it as "The Auto-Assimilated Spirit: Culture" but I was wrong, since entfremd clearly means the same thing as verfremd (just like "Verstand" is etymologicamally equivalent to "understanding".
and, further, on 2008-11-12 17:48:47.0, ben wolfson commented:
since entfremd[en] clearly means the same thing as verfremd[en]
Except it doesn't; verfremden is better defamiliarize than alienate or estrange (even if the effect of estrangement is—surprise!—a making strange), while entfremden is, well, estrange in a more colloquial (ie nontheatrical, interpersonal) sense.
and, further, on 2008-11-12 18:00:31.0, Jeff Rubard commented:
Yes, that was implied: the distinction is most familiar from Brecht's famous Verfremdungseffekt, which is given a positive valuation which Hegel does not give to Bildung (a waystation to morality and religion, rather).
and, further, on 2008-11-22 19:05:22.0, Jeff Rubard commented:
Thanks for subtly cuing the reader that the adjectival form given was wrong by giving the verb form, though: entfremdet and verfremdet. Homemade Germanistik: don't do it, kids.