word cloud

The Association for the German Language (GfdS, Gesellschaft für deutsche Sprache) last week in Wiesbaden announced its superlative word for the year: Wutbürger (enraged citizen). This choice reflects the mobilization of many to call attention to various, serious causes during this past year--protest rallies in Germany and abroad, from anger over the Stuttgart 21 train station renovation, to raising tuition fees, to atomic energy, to genetically modified crops, to austerity measures cued by financial instabilities, to immigration, to the privacy and protection of personal data, and all shades of solidarity in between. The German language is more tolerant of nonce words--and does not emphasize the novelty of the neologism as much, when appropriate to string a daisy chain of words along into a compound meaning. Wut, however, can also connote rabid--whereas, not all causes being equal, many of these protesters, I think they deserve to be called Mutbürger, brave citizen.