Occasional musings, Geistesblitze, photos, drawings etc. by a "resident alien", who has landed on American soil from a far-away planet called "Germany".

Friday, September 7, 2012

National Anthem of Herland

Another parody on occasion of the MOOC I'm currently taking: This is a spoof of a classic of feminist literature, Herland, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (to be sung to the melody of Woody Guthrie’s “This land is your land, this land is my land”):

This land is her land, this land is my land,
Between high mountains we are an island,
A land of gardens, without male wardens.
This land was made for her and she.

A land of mothers, a land of sisters,
We need no brothers, we need no misters.
Parthénogenésis is our thesis.
This land was made for her and she.

If ever men came, we will not blame them.
We’ll keep them locked up, and train and tame them,
To mate with reason, only in season.
This land was made for her and she.

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Word of the Month: Karteileiche

To continue with the bureaucratic theme started last month (and to provide some light summer fare): A Kartei is a card catalogue (from Karte - card), and a Leiche is a corpse. Put together, they indicate someone whose membership in some organization has expired, but whose name has not yet been removed from the organization's files. The term is no longer restricted to collections of physical cards—it can be applied to electronic databases as well.

Note on pronunciation: The stress is on the second syllable, and the "ei" in both Kartei and Leiche is pronounced like English "eye" or the "ie" in "tie": car·TIE·lie·chah.
See my post of Jan. 2013 on how to pronounce the "ch" in this case.

Word of the Month: Index