Merkel’s surprising storm of vulgarity

BERLIN— Some words can’t be-translated easily. But they can cross national borders, lose their original context along the journey, assume different meanings and crop up in unlikely places.

Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany proved that point — memorably.

Speaking at a technology conference recently, Merkel, known as a staid, no-drama politician, told a self-deprecating anecdote about being widely mocked online five years ago after she described the internet as some mysterious expanse of “uncharted territory.”

She chuckled at the memory of the digital blowback.

“It generated quite a sh-storm,” she said, using the English term — because Germans, it turns out, do not have one of their own.

That, as you might imagine, stirred yet another online reaction, at least among many English speakers. “I can die happy now that Merkel has used the word,” Anne McElvoy, a senior editor with the Economist, wrote on Twitter.

Merkel is in the twilight of her political career. It would be tempting to interpret her word choice as a devil-may-care gesture.

But, no. Merkel has actually used the word a number of other times in public. As do many other Germans.

It was adopted into the country’s standard dictionary, Duden, in 2013.

The listing defining the word noted that it originated from the English. But its meaning in German is a little more specific: It denotes a “storm of outrage” on the internet, such as blow- back generated over social media.

Merkel is cited as having first used the word in 2012 in a town hall meeting in Heidelberg, and some credit that for contributing to its acceptance among German speakers. Most Germans remain unaware that in English, the word is considered a vulgarity, and its use is not limited to internet outrage.