« Most popular names
Teaspoons exhibiting resistentialism? »

X-mas does NOT exist

This word does not exist

This year a new un-word has been doing the rounds in German Christmas advertising: X-mas.

Now, given that the Germans like polluting their language with all sorts of English words and phrases, many of which get used to mean something different to what an unsuspecting native English speaker would expect, I am actually surprised that Xmas hasn’t caught on more quickly. But it’s one thing to have semi-literate advertising copy writers mangle both English and German, it’s quite another when a normally literate editor at the Süddeutsche Zeitung does it.

Liebe Süddeutsche Zeitung, X-mas ist ein Unwort. Es gibt es nicht. Wirklich.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 24th, 2005 at 09:12:27 and is filed under Germany, Language / Culture, Reading matter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

5 Responses to “X-mas does NOT exist”

  1. Howard Says:
    December 24th, 2005 at 16:12:31

    Then maybe you should send them a Leserbrief.
    Another annoying example is the mis-use of “City” taken here to mean anywhere with a few shops.

  2. John Says:
    December 24th, 2005 at 17:12:30

    I already did, before I posted on the blog. If I get a reply, I’ll post it here.

  3. k.d. Says:
    December 27th, 2005 at 11:12:54

    another annoying example: “performance”
    can’t wait for the reply… ;-)

  4. Howard Says:
    January 7th, 2006 at 22:01:03

    Did your Leserbrief get published or answered?

  5. John Says:
    January 7th, 2006 at 22:01:23

    I didn’t get an answer, I only read the SZ occasionally, so I don’t know if it was published…