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- "Min syster är brandman."
33 Comments
Brandman etymology: from Swedish brand + man. Brand is from Old Norse brandr and means, according to wiktionary, "accidental, uncontrollable fire." Therefore, my sister is an accidental, uncontrollable fireman. :D Languages are fun.
It's funny: in Dutch we have retained this distinction between controllable and uncontrollable fire with the words 'vuur' en 'brand', like in 'vuursteen' 'brandalarm'. I think that's even not so weird because they're quite different things: the former is something useful and spectacular, while the latter is a feared and devastating monster which swallows everything on its path.
Swedish had the same.
"En eld" is a controlled fire, like when you go camping or in a fireplace.
"En brand" is an out of control fire, like a forest fire, or a house on fire.
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In Russian (and probably in all Slavic languages) we also have distinctive words for controllable an uncontrollable fire: "огонь" and "пожар". And we call a firefighter "пожарный".
English "brand", as in branding iron, came from the same root. Both related to fire.
English bright has the same etymology as swediah brand. Dont be silly.
According to who?
"bright (adj.) Old English bryht, by metathesis from beorht "bright; splendid; clear-sounding; beautiful; divine," from Proto-Germanic *berhta- "bright" (cognates: Old Saxon berht, Old Norse bjartr, Old High German beraht, Gothic bairhts "bright")..." It goes on, but I think you get the point.
"brand: from Old Norse brandr, from Proto-Germanic *brandaz"
Not really. It's become a fixed expression for the profession, just like sjuksköterska has become the fixed title for nurses despite it being feminine.
There are however many more examples of -man forming the title of profession, and this is not unproblematic. Thus we now prefer talesperson (spokesperson) rather than talesman (spokesman), for example.
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talesman, taleskvinna, talesperson, and språkrör are all good words. Språkrör has become a bit tied up with the Green party though, because they call their party leaders that way.
Yes, that's what I did mean. Thanks for pointing it out. Edited it to make sense :)
interesting....so that's where brand like the act of marking with fire probably comes from
I am a bit confused, why isn't it like so Min syster är "en" brandman. Is there no room for "en" here even though in English we would say it?
The indefinite article is not used for occupations in Norwegian (or in a few other languages such as French, generally).
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Or Ukrainian.
Wait. We don't have any indefinite articles in Ukrainian at all. Why do you need them?
It is not - we accept that, too. Although that said, I would prefer "firewoman" or better yet the gender-neutral "firefighter".
Thank you, Duolingo! I wouldn't mind seeing all of the 'brandman' translations to English as 'firefighter,' unless the gender of the person is specified in the given sentence.
No, Swedish doesn't use the article for people being things such as professions.
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That's in the suggested translation, see on top of this page. Maybe it was something else that the owl didn't like?
