Luftmensch

[Dr. Goodword]

• luftmensch •

Pronunciation: luft-mench • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: 1. An airhead, a contemplative person whose head is in the clouds and has little if any idea of practical matters, like earning a living. 2. A petty tradesman, peddler, unsuccessful businessperson.

Notes: Today's word is another gift from Yiddish. Although chiefly limited to Jewish usage, it still occurs in the major English dictionaries like Merriam-Webster and the Oxford English Dictionary. It is condemned to bachelorhood as a lexical orphan. The plural still follows the Yiddish: luftmenschen.

In Play: The original sense of today's word might be heard in this sort of statement: "Professor Silverstein loves to float about the rocket science conventions and chat with all the luftmenschen who convene there." The derived sense could be used in expressions like this: "That poor luftmensch Egon Loeser won't be able to keep his job even if he returns to work."

Word History: Today's Good Word came unchanged from Yiddish in the early 20th century. Yiddish borrowed it from German, where it is a compound consisting of Luft "air" + Mensch "man, person". We do not know how Luft came to be in German. It must have originated in Proto-Germanic, though, for we find luft "air" in Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish, Icelandic loft "air", and English luff "sailing closer into the wind". Mensch seems to have the same limitation to Germanic languages. We can establish a PIE source for it, though: manos "man, person", source also of German Mann "man, husband", Danish and German man "one, someone or other", and Dutch and Swedish man "man, husband". (Now an e-bow to Rabbi Fred Davidow for his suggestion of today's recently adopted Good Word.)

[Dr. Goodword]

Monika Freund sent this comment about luftmensch:

In German there is a similar expression: Luftnummer. It means, if someone promises something that, upon closer inspection, turns out to be impossible, that is also a „Luftnummer“. “Das ist eine Luftnummer,” is what people say, for example, when someone announces that they will complete a large construction project with very little money and within a few months.

[Slava]

While it doesn't match any internot translations I came across, I'd translate the example usage as a 'pie in the sky' promise.

Many years ago I read that large projects are almost always 20% over budget.

[George Kovac]

In “The Joys of Yiddish,” Leo Rosten provides this charming gloss on luftmensch (Rosten spells the word without a penultimate "c"):

The prototype of the luftmensh was one Leone da Modena, a sixteenth century Venetian Jew, who listed his skills and cited no fewer than twenty-six professions. His talents ranged from preaching to composing epitaphs. Why would so accomplished a man be classified as a luftmensh? Because out of all twenty-six professions (plus assiduous alchemy on the side), he barely made a living.

English is flavored by a masala that borrows from many linguistic cuisines, and Yiddish is one of my favorite spices.

Rosten’s book was published in 1968, and still amuses and charms, though some of his jokes and anecdotes are dated or not consistent with current tastes. But it is worth revisiting the book’s Preface, for what it says about language. When you read Rosten’s Preface, substitute some other source material--Irish, Spanish, Slavic, Old French, Asian, African, Indigenous, non-PIE fragments, any of various subcultures or dialects--and you can see the larger point in Rosten’s delight in the richness of modern English. It could almost be a mission statement for the Agora.

From Rosten’s Preface:

What This Book Is Not: This is not a book about Yiddish. It is not a dictionary of Yiddish. It is not a guide to Yiddish. It is not written for experts in, or students of, Yiddish.

What This Book Is. This is a book about language—more particularly, the English language. It shows how our marvelously resilient tongue has been influenced by another parlance: Yiddish. It illustrates how beautifully a language reflects the variety and vitality of life itself; and how the special culture of the Jews, their distinctive style of thought, their subtleties of feeling, are reflected in Yiddish; and how this in turn has enhances and enriched the English we use today.

[David Myer]

Presuming Leo wrote the Preface, we can credit him with excellent writing skills. Simple, clear and informative. Bravo. Certainly not a luftmensh.