The corona virus changes the whole world - including our language, says publisher Dirk Ippen in his Saturday column.
Each regime has its own language. The rule of the Sars-CoV-2 virus, known as the corona virus, has already changed our language. Terms that we had only heard marginally at best are suddenly omnipresent as everyday words. But where do terms like corona, pandemic, epidemic, draconian, lockdown, triage or panic come from? And what do they actually mean?
The virus from the Sars family has the medical name Sars-CoV-2. Under the microscope, it looks like a small ball with spiky crowns. Therefore, the name Corona = crown has become natural for it. Some virologists think it looks more like a misshapen sea mine from the last war. And just like the fragments of an exploded mine destroy everything around it, this virus wreaks havoc across the people, ancient Greek “demos”. Hence our word "Demie", what the people meet.
Coronavirus and the language: disease for all peoples
Again ancient Greek means " Epi " and " panthes " means everyone. A demie can therefore only occur as an epidemic "with" one people or as a pandemic, as a disease that has affected all peoples of the world. So that's what we have to experience today.
Our legislature and legislator takes a draconian approach with strict conditions, threatened punishments and a swish through the Bundestag and Bundesrat. The expression refers to the legendary Athenian legislator Drakon. Its legal tables stood for centuries in Athens. We can only pray that our corona laws, knitted with a needle that is too hot, will quickly disappear.
Corona virus and the language: lockdown, home office and triage
Now we are in the lockdown and home office , the whole country is closed. Triage comes from French " sort " and means something that we hope we won't experience in Germany. The division of the sick into those to whom the scarce intensive care beds and breathing apparatus are assigned, and the others who can only be given additional care to die.
However, none of this should tempt us to " panic ". The Greeks and Romans attributed every horror caused by blind noise to the forest and shepherd god Pan - so it is said.
The virus that threatens us, however, is not the hour of panic for no reason, but very real. It has now moved into our everyday language. On the Internet, the search queries for these terms have skyrocketed.
Corona virus and the language: poet Stefan George on self-isolation
An old master of our language, the poet Stefan George , almost foresightedly forged a verse that fits these days of "self-isolation". A reminder, completely free of Corona German:
"Let's keep silent
what we are denied
We vow
to be happy
If not more
is given to us
As a tour of two. "
In the last weeks of the Second World War - exactly 75 years ago - people said goodbye with "Remain". It's not that bad yet. Now, under the sign of "Corona", it confidently says "stay healthy"!
Write to ippen@ovb.net
Dirk Ippen
The corona virus paralyzes Bavaria * - Prime Minister Markus Söder proclaimed the disaster. One death was confirmed in Munich - it is the third in total.
* merkur.de is part of the nationwide Ippen-Digital editors network.
