Friday, October 2, 2009
Word of the month: Lebensgefährte, Lebensgefährtin
Both words mean literally "life companion" (male and female form, respectively--they combine Leben ("life") with Gefährte/Gefährtin ("companion"). The words are used to indicate the person one is sharing ones's life with without being married, i.e. a live-in lover. I do not expect these terms ever to enter English usage, but they are interesting to me because they point to a real difference I perceive in the way Americans and Germans deal "officially" with sexual relations. More in my first comment...
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During my life-time, there has been a cultural revolution in Germany. I was born in a prudish country, in which having a child out of wedlock was considered shameful and a never-ending embarrassment that could be rectified only if both parents married later. But Germany has turned over the last 40 years into one of the most permissive and tolerant countries that I know when it comes to sex. It is by now far less prudish than the US, as far as I can see.
I am always reminded of this when I show couples one of our rental properties and one of them introduces the other as "my fiance"--my (internal) reaction is always "oh sure!". Apparently, claiming to be engaged is supposed to make cohabitation more acceptable to me, the landlord (who couldn't care less). I have no experience as landlord in Germany, but in other contexts in recent years, I have often been introduced, matter-of-factly, to the Lebensgefährte or Lebensgefährtin of someone. These are also the designations used in obituaries, when the people closest to the deceased are being identified by their relations to him/her--it doesn't get more official than that.
What I like about these terms is that they express conscious commitment to a shared life, and I can't think of a term in English that expresses the same commitment in a non-judgmental way (I'm open to suggestions on this!).
As an aside: The party that had the highest gains in the recent election in Germany is led by the openly gay Guido Westerwelle, who appears at official occasions with his Lebensgefährte--he will be the new German foreign secretary if his party, the Free Democrats, succeeds in forming a coalition goverment with Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats, which everyone expects.
Hi Ulrich, I found this whole post very interesting, and I think you are right about the relaxed way in which Germans, and people in many other countries, view partnerships that don't involve marriage.
I don't think English has an equivalent to Lebensgefahrte/in and it is desperately in need of one. I am always mortified when my single women friends talk about their "boy friends." These women are fifty and over (and yes I would feel the same about men of that age talking about their girlfriends, but all the men I know are married).
I have one question could you use these words to describe someone you were involved with and planning to stay with, maybe forever, but with whom you were not living? To me, you don't have to live in the same house to share your life with a person.
I think some people might assume "Significant Other" could be a synonym for Lebensgefahrte/in, but I wouldn't. First of all, I hate the phrase. What does the person become if you part, an "insignificant other"? But it also doesn't include that sense you point to of being a person with whom you share a life i.e. passions, thoughts, time, pets etc.
I do love your words of the month.
US obits these days are using "life companion", OK by me! Hope you are feeling better, Ulrich?
I wanted to mention a recent book by Lawrence McDonald, "A Colossal Failure of Common Sense" which gives a hair-raising insider view of how Lehmann Bros. ended in a rushed bankruptcy, and how that precipitated a domino crisis effect (AIG, Merrill-Lynch, etc.), costing us much more in the ensuing bailouts than it should have done. Sigh.
p.s. Lots of terms explained in that book I noted, including "Ninja" mortgages, i.e. those made available to unqualified borrowers with No Income, No Job, and no Assets!
@artlvr: Interesting what you say about "life companion". I wonder if the term was formed in analogy to the German term, or if it was the other way around. And do people here introduce their partner as "life companion"? I can't remember hearing it...
@Heika: I have the same reaction when an older person talks about his girlfriend or her boyfriend. The German words would be Freundin and Freund, respectively (simply "friend"), and they were used before the current words of the month came along in the same sense that you indicate for boy- and girlfriend. The German terms are less awkward b/c they do not hint at young age, but are ambivalent b/c they are so general. When a guy introduced someone as his Freundin, it was pretty clear that they were lovers--same thing when a woman introduced her Freund. But when a man introduces his Freund or a woman her Freundin, it is absolutely not clear what the relationship is. Lebensgefährte and Lebensgefährtin are much clearer, when they apply.
There are married couples that do not live in the same place, and so, I would think that Lebensgefährte and Lebensgefährtin do not imply this either in the strict sense. But unless you have information to the contrary, you may assume that this is the case, as it is with married couples.
I just found an article in Der Spiegel that illustrates how the present word of the month is being used in Germany. With respect to visits by the openly gay German foreign secretary, Guido Westerwelle, to Muslim countries, some of which may impose death penalties for homosexual acts, the article states (m.t.)
...Before Westerwelle travelled to Turkey, the [Turkish] foreign ministry had asked German diplomats if Westerwelle would bring his Lebensgefährte along. He had done this during his visit to Italy. In terms of protocol, this would have posed a problem for Ankara. But the German side could tell the Turks that the secretary would arrive alone. Westerwelle, after all, is a pragmatist...
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