blake murphy > wrote:
> (Victor Sack) wrote:
>
> >blake murphy > wrote:
> >>
> >> but 'mensch' is pretty unambiguous.
> >
> >Not if you speak German. In German, "Mensch" means "man" (in the sense
> >of "human being", "person"). It is pretty generic.
> >
> i'm probably in over my head here, but i guess that in yiddish it also
> basically means 'human being.' but you don't often hear it except in
> reference to an exemplary person.
Because the meaning is emotional rather than just factual, as it would
be in German. "Mensch" in the sense of simply "person" is as impersonal
as could be.
> i mean, you also hear in english 'be a man,' or something like that,
> but it can also refer to less than stellar persons, especially when
> the word 'man' is used by a woman.
Because here, too, emotion is involved. "Dog", too, can be used in an
abusive or endearing sense, but more often it is just a designation of a
particular kind of quadruped or, in a particularly sloppy fashion, as a
certain kind of sausage in a bun, or even of that kind of sausage as
such.
Victor