17 ms·
It's actually a verb, "Verschlimmbesserung" is the substantivization. Base: verschlimmbessern Present conjugation: I verschlimmbesser[e], you verschlimmbesser
by eqvinox 19d ago
It's actually a verb, "Verschlimmbesserung" is the substantivization.
Base: verschlimmbessern
Present conjugation: I verschlimmbesser[e], you verschlimmbesserst, he/she/it verschlimmbessert, we verschlimmbesser[e]n, (plural-)you verschlimmbessert, they verschlimmbesser[e]n
Past/perfect: verschlimmbessert (e.g. "it got verschlimmbessert")
Imperative: verschlimmbesser[e] (e.g. "don't verschlimmbesser that!")
The [e] at the end is leftover from an older form, in the cases where I omitted it it would sound archaic to a German speaker, but in the other cases it's equivalent or may even sound better. It's also regionally different. The archaic versions kinda sound south German (Swabian, Bavarian).
[ed. made some adjustments]
P.S.: "Verbesserung" means improvement, "Verschlimmerung" means worsening/aggravation. The combined word is understood quite specifically though, not just as a combination of the two. It's *not* a normal case of German "paste words together", that's for nouns (you can do it with the substantivization, e.g. Donaudampfschiffverschlimmbesserungskapitän = "captain of verschlimmbessern the steam ships on the Donau", which makes little sense of course). It's not identical to enshittification either, the latter (to me at least) implies intention; verschlimmbessern you can (and probably often will) do by accident.
- schoen 19d agoCases apply only to nouns; the present and past perfect are called tenses.
- eqvinox 19d ago(already edited in)
- WesolyKubeczek 19d agoWould there be a semantic difference between Verschlimmbesserung and Verbesserschlimmung?
- eqvinox 19d ago無 (the question cannot be answered because it relies on unmet prerequisites) "Verbesserschlimmung" isn't a word in active use & depending on how it (theoretically) were to enter use, its meaning might vary. It could enter usage with identical meaning, or it could mean the opposite: a change intended to worsen things that made them better. It's a bit like "inflammable". (Also: this is why I pointed out it's not formed according to the agglutination rules that apply for concatenated nouns in German. For those, the meaning can be logically derived. This is a portmanteau, those don't quite follow rigid rules.)
- 1718627440 17d ago(German) Words do not work like that. First, it's called 'schlimmer', so -> "Verbesserschlimmerung". Second "schlimm" is positiv, while "besser" is the comparativ, so you need to swap these too: "schlimmer" and "gut". Also the genesis of the word works like this: "besser" -> "bessern" -> "verbessern" -> "verschlimmbessern" -> "Verschlimmbesserung" (better -> becoming better -> making better -> making better towards a worse state -> same, but as noun) So you append to the beginning, while keeping the existing prefix. If you want to end up with "worse" at the end, you need to start with it too. "schlecht" -> "verschlechtern" -> ??? But then "gut" doesn't fit, because that implies an absolute, that "schlimm" does not. Note, that "schlimm" does not plainly mean "bad", that's "schlecht". It also contains the notion of pity, guilt and impotence. That doesn't really exist for the opposite.