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.
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Das postdramatische Theaterstück war eine große Enttäuschung, da keine Täuschungsversuche auf der Bühne stattfanden.
Posted by: Blume | November 12, 2008 at 01:29 PM
Ok.
Posted by: ben wolfson | November 12, 2008 at 01:53 PM
You know, I thought I'd noticed this before.
It's a terrible thing, growing old.
Posted by: ben wolfson | November 12, 2008 at 03:27 PM
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".
Posted by: Jeff Rubard | November 12, 2008 at 05:37 PM
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.
Posted by: ben wolfson | November 12, 2008 at 05:48 PM
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).
Posted by: Jeff Rubard | November 12, 2008 at 06:00 PM
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.
Posted by: Jeff Rubard | November 22, 2008 at 07:05 PM