Anscheinend hat das Landgericht Münster das Wort “Zitronenauto” eingeführt (amerikanisch “a lemon”, besonders für Autos benutzt). Vielleicht haben sie es von Autohändlern? Siehe Bericht:

bq. Münster (DAV). Wer ein so genanntes Zitronenauto mit zahlreichen Mängeln erwirbt, darf das Fahrzeug zurück geben und vom Händler einen fehlerfreien Wagen verlangen. Dies ergibt sich aus einem Urteil des Landgerichts Münster, auf das die Verkehrsrechts-Anwälte (Arbeitsgemeinschaft Verkehrsrecht im Deutschen Anwaltverein – DAV) hinweisen.

bq. Landgericht Münster
Urteil vom 7. Januar 2004
Aktenzeichen: 2 O 603/02

Das Urteil ist online: hier nach Landgericht Münster und 2 O 603/02 suchen.

I know about the lemon laws in US states, but is that any reason to use the word ‘Zitronenauto’ in German?

I don’t know if the Hamburger Abendblatt’s use of Montagsauto (Monday car) is any better.
It appears to be a recent borrowing.

Here is a definition of a lemon:

bq. A vehicle that continues to have a defect that substantially impairs its use, value, or safety. Generally, if the car has been repaired 4 or more times for the same Defect within the Warranty Period and the Defect has not been fixed, the car qualifies as a Lemon. All States differ so you should consult the Lemon Law Summary and the State Statutes for your particular State. Note that the warranty period may or may not coincide with the Manufacturer’s Warranty.

What’s the German law? No statute. The judges said that there were so many defects that subsequent improvement (Nachbesserung) would not be enough.

There was a Daihatsu Cuore ‘Lemon edition’ a few years ago, all yellow with yellow fittings. Picture borrowed from here (this reminds me of how much I could get done if I didn’t spend all my time trying to sort out software problems).

Gespanschaft (Kroatien): deutsche Erklärung in der Wikipedia.

I knew that Bosnia has cantons, but I didn’t know that Croatia has Gespanschaften.

Gespanschaft was originally a German term for a regional administrative unit in Hungary (which included what is now Croatia) during the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, also known as Komitat. The head was a Gespan (Hungarian ispan), usually translated as Graf / Count. In Croatian the term for Gespanschaft is županija and that for Gespan is župan. (I suppose this is not directly relevant to the pig breeder Zsupán in Der Zigeunerbaron).

It seems logical but somehow disappointing that these districts translate into English as counties.

Aktenvermerk interessiert sich unter anderem für Fachsprache (ein Euphemismus?):

bq. Bezugnehmend auf unser Gespräch übernehmen Sie den Verkauf der Liegenschaft und ich erlaube mir folgende Punktationen festzuhalten:

The new Austrian weblog Aktenvermerk (meaning something like a memorandum entered in a file) looks very promising. It has some excellent examples of legalese.

(Über/via Juristisches und Sonstiges)

‘Creating and Interpreting Law in a Multilingual Environment’ is the title of a conference sponsored by the Brooklyn Law School Center for the Study of Law, Language and Cognition. The proceedings have been published in the Brooklyn Journal of International Law and can be downloaded free of charge (or bought on paper for a fee). Here it can be found on the publications page.

Contrary to my naive belief, the contributions aren’t about Brooklyn. Three are about Canada, three about the EU and one about an EU Civil Code. The last has the promising subtitle ‘When words translate better than concepts’. There are a few other contributions too, including an article about referee liability in amateur rugby in the UK.

Im Stern von dieser Woche zitiert Heinrich von Pierer, der angeblich ein englisches Sprichwort zitiert (die deutsche Version reiche ich vielleicht nach), etwa “Nur Säuglinge in nassen Windeln lehnen Veränderungen ab”. Was für ein Sprichwort ist das überhaupt?

bq. From the Observer column in today’s Financial Times:

bq. Sticky feeling
Who said German companies needed to catch up? The giants of Germany’s corporate scene are already miles (kilometres?) ahead of counterparts in the English-speaking world.
How else to explain comments on cutting labour costs by Heinrich von Pierer, chief executive of electrical engineering group Siemens, in yesterday’s Stern magazine?
Summing up the general reluctance of people to accept change, he referred to what he described as an “English saying” that went: “The only ones who like changes are babies in wet nappies.”
An English saying? Really? Observer would love to meet von Pierer’s tutor. Can anyone enlighten us? Or should the gruff German join Shakespeare in the book of English proverbs?
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A later poster points out that Google reveals ‘Only wet babies like change’ and other variations with the word ‘diapers’, that is, an American saying. Is that right?

(Thanks to Robin Bonthrone for this contribution to the pt group at Yahoo, which I repost with permission).

Keys Corner berichtet von einem Verkehrsinformationssystem in NRW, das so beliebt wurde, dass es weniger genau wurde.

Keys Corner mentions a system in North-Rhine-Westphalia for predicting where a traffic jam is going to occur in 30 minutes’ time. This was 99% accurate until so many people used it that it became less reliable. I suppose, taken ad infinitum, it could be so popular that jams would occur precisely where they were not predicted, and then you could start using it again and drive wherever it predicted jams, because you’d know there wouldn’t be any there.