cheeky sensibility

22:00 Sep 23, 2014 

"artist" hat ja keine markierte, weibliche Form – aber wie wäre es z. B. mit dem Satz: "This collection belongs to an ACTOR." Wärst du nicht auch überrascht, wenn sich herausstellt, dass sie in Wirklichkeit einer "ACTRESS" gehört? Ich frage mich, ob es bei solchen Wörtern mit zwei Formen immer noch einen Unterschied zu den Erwartungen gibt, wie sie bei einem deutschen Leser mit dem Wort "Künstler" geweckt werden.

21:09 Sep 23, 2014 

I think this is an interesting subject for translators and perhaps I'll open a thread in a forum - because I would like to discuss it further. But I think this is not the right place for it and I should close the question. So, thank you all for your input.

18:43 Sep 23, 2014 

"Am I now being a sexist?"

Well, as a woman yourself, I don't think "sexist" would be the right word. I guess I envy you here because it is definitely an issue for guys I think. Don't know whether the authors of the book are male?

"but I don't know which collection belongs to which collector"
Sure this is not a test book for art students :)? Just a thought: You could add a note to your translation saying that if the authors want, they can explain in the foreword or somewhere that Künstler covers both the male and female form "zur besseren Lesbarkeit". This is how I've seen it in many books. But it's just a suggestion!

18:40 Sep 23, 2014 

Thanks for the explanation! I guess ours kind of match then.

"The picture depicts one artist's collection, so I think it's safe to deduce it is one artist in particular, although he or she is not present."

Like I said, I think it depends. If it's a tour through the art world, saying things like "a baroque artist" / "an artist from the 18th century" / etc., it could mean they want to explain how things looked like in different periods. I would have had no difficulties with "This picture shows the collectibles belonging to a pop-modernist artist who gravitates..." The shortened version just looks a bit ambiguous to me unless I know how the book is structured, wouldn't you agree?

"Actually, there is a new rule, in English..." I've seen this one in German as well.

15:23 Sep 23, 2014 

you're being neutral. Actually, there is a new rule, in English, that requires nonspecific pronouns to be feminine. - When the player takes her turn, she must....
Can't remember where I read that. I am one of the few people I know who always refers to working women by their correct title -
Schreinerin, Gärtnerin, etc. Don't get your willy up over this one, Karin.

13:58 Sep 23, 2014 

Oh dear, that is so complicated. At the end of the book, there is a list with names but I don't know which collection belongs to which collector. The authors did that on purpose. So, when attempting to be politically correct, I would always have to say "der Sammler/die Sammlerin" or "der Künstler/die Künstlerin" and so on when only one person is meant. Who would want to read that? It is so clumsy. As I don't know the gender (and envying English native speakers) I decided to use the male form throughout. Am I now being a sexist? ;-)

13:20 Sep 23, 2014 

is gender neutral. And the entire structure does not infer that this means pop artists in general. The picture depicts one artist's collection, so I think it's safe to deduce it is one artist in particular, although he or she is not present.
@Björn 'offended my sensibilities' ....hmmm. I would define this to mean rather superficial social customs, what a person considers to be 'good manners'. Puts me in mind of E.M. Forster, something Helen or Margaret might say in Howard's End. In that case, it could mean both one's 'sense' of correctness as well as emotional state at a given moment.

10:41 Sep 23, 2014 

Yes, that simply depends on whether "a" means, as Oxford puts it, "Used to indicate membership of a class of people or things".

After all, it doesn't say "the".

If it's true in general, you could also say:
"Pop-modernist artists gravitate to collectibles with a similarly cheeky sensibility and offbeat sense of scale."

"collectibles" isn't specified, so we don't know whether Karin's "This one collects..." has any bearing on this sentence.


PS: It's like "A tiger is a dangerous animal" -> "Tiger sind gefährliche Tiere" - don't say "ein" here in German, IMO.

10:37 Sep 23, 2014 

Tatsächlich wird das noch eine harte Nuss, es geschlechtsneutral übersetzen zu müssen – denn es kann ja hier nur um diese/n spezielle/n Künstler/in gehen. Da diese/r nicht im Bild ist, könnte man nur hoffen, dass es aus dem Text noch hervorgeht.

10:36 Sep 23, 2014 

the source text, however, is in the singular - A pop artist.

10:31 Sep 23, 2014 

Björn, herzlich willkommen zur Party und Danke dafür, dass du auf diesen Fehler hingewiesen hast. Es passiert mir persönlich tatsächlich auch noch viel zu oft, dass ich den englischen Singular erst mal mit deutscher männlicher Einzahl übersetze. So leicht übernimmt Sexismus die Regie im Kopf!

10:23 Sep 23, 2014 

Really interested what Ramey has to say here: When I hear "offended my sensibilities", I most likely will not think about "you hurt my feelings" first. The former can also be about moral issues and, unlike the latter, is not prone to evoke feelings of sadness, heartbreak, and gloom. More like disgust and offense.

Maybe I'm not explaining it well enough. Like to share the following picture with you - could make your day :)

http://cheezburger.com/6286780672

10:17 Sep 23, 2014 

Guess I'm the party crasher now.

I like Andreas first suggestion. Didn't we just talk about personification somewhere else, Andreas and Ramey :)? "ausstrahlen/Ausstrahlung" is - like "verlassen" - one of these difficult and debatable words - basically, the first that comes to mind when hearing "Ausstrahlung" is a person. But, of course, you can also use it for inanimate objects, etc. Just don't think "Respektlosigkeit" + "Ausstrahlung" + "Sammlerstücke" collocate that well. "an sich haben", I think, is quite perfect. Second alternative is respektlos = unverforen = add "an den Tag legen".

Künstler der Popmoderne fühlen sich von Sammlerstücken angezogen, die eine ähnliche Respektlosigkeit/Unverfrorenheit und ein ebenso schrulliges Verhältnis zur Größe an den Tag legen.

I said "Künstler" as plural because of some sexism issue here. Plural is less likely to arouse suspicion (after all, you don't see who's meant or am I wrong). "wie er" doesn't have to be added either.

09:11 Sep 23, 2014 

Guten Morgen! Die Konstruktion mit "sie teilen…" ist wirklich sehr elegant – der Satz wird dabei gewissermaßen vom similarly her aufgeschlüsselt – und die Ehre für diese Idee gebührt Ramey. Wem du auch die Punkte gibst, ich bin nicht böse – ich freue mich, in der Gesellschaft so netter Kollegen zu sein!

05:58 Sep 23, 2014 

I would give the points to Andreas since he gave the suggestion for your original question, it's that simple. But I know the feeling, it's quite uncomfortable.

20:05 Sep 22, 2014 

I think you hit the nail. The ideal solution is a combination of both. I don´t know about the points, but at least it is not contradictory anymore to agree with both.

19:45 Sep 22, 2014 

You guys make it really difficult! Is there a possibility that I can give points to both of you? Because my solution would be: "Ein Künstler der Popmoderne fühlt sich von Sammlerstücken angezogen, die eine ähnlich respektlose Ausstrahlung, ein ebenso schrulliges Verhältnis zur Größe haben wie er."

17:33 Sep 22, 2014 

Now that you've posted it here, you can add it as note to your answer.

17:09 Sep 22, 2014 

Ich weiss nicht so genau, wie das geht, bin selber noch neu hier, aber man darf anscheinend unter Umständen zwei Lösungen anbieten.

15:27 Sep 22, 2014 

Okay, nachdem der Preis nun auf den ganzen Satz ausgesetzt ist, möchte ich auch noch einen Vorschlag machen: Diese Sammlerstücke haben mit ihrem Sammler, einem …Künstler, gemeinsam, dass sie sich weder dem gewöhnlichen Geschmack noch gewöhnlichen Dimensionen unterordnen wollen.

14:46 Sep 22, 2014 

Ich wollte noch etwas zu "cheeky" sagen, auch wenn es schon gar nicht mehr darum geht.

Ich finde zwar, auch "ironisch" würde gut passen, weil ein konventioneller Wert (z. B. "wertvolle" Sammlerstücke) in Frage gestellt wird. Ich würde aber, wie in der Antwort vorgeschlagen, eher "respektlos" nehmen, eben weil es hier um Kunst bzw. Künstler geht: Während Ironie eher etwas rein Negatives hat (es richtet sich nur *gegen* eine konventionelle Bedeutung), hat Respektlosigkeit eher etwas von allen Konventionen Befreites bzw. Befreiendes (es macht offen für neue Bedeutungen).

Ich denke, ein Künstler würde seine Kunst lieber mit dem Begriff "respektlos" als mit dem Begriff "ironisch" bezeichnen, und wahrscheinlich auch eher nicht als "augenzwinkernd", weil man dabei nicht an eine ernste Absicht denkt (die der Künstler vielleicht ja doch mit seiner Kunst hat).

14:32 Sep 22, 2014 

Yes, please, post it!

14:24 Sep 22, 2014 

although Karin did not ask for a complete solution, I don't see how to otherwise get around it.

14:18 Sep 22, 2014 

Lol.As it includes both collector and collection it should make everybody happy. You should post it.

14:09 Sep 22, 2014 

but if it works, use the same structure:
Ein Neopopkünstler ist von Sammelstücken angezogen, die die gleiche, augenzwinkernde Ausstrahlung und schrulligen Sinn für Dimension mit ihm teilen.

13:59 Sep 22, 2014 

"Cheeky sensibility" bezieht sich auf die Sammlerstücke.

13:55 Sep 22, 2014 

...there is no artist, only the dining room with the faux-bar and the bottles.

13:54 Sep 22, 2014 

Ihre Lösung ist sehr gut begründet. Es geht hier lediglich darum zu bestimmen, auf wen oder worauf sich der entsprechende Ausdruck bezieht. Das ist manchmal nicht so leicht, wenn man nicht den ganzen Text vor sich hat.

13:49 Sep 22, 2014 

All of your examples, except the FPS (?), refer to something human or abstract. That doesn't mean collectibles cannot have a sensibility, as an aura, but this also projected on them by human sensibility.

13:45 Sep 22, 2014 

Is the artist approaching collectibles? Or are the collectibles in the forefront?

13:41 Sep 22, 2014 

Hier weitere Beispiele aus dem "Corpus of Contemporary American English" (http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/), wo Orte/Bücher/Erzählungen/Spiele ein bestimmtes Gefühl "vermitteln", also warum nicht auch Sammlerstücke:

Southampton and East Hampton are as opposite in sensibility today as they ever were.

The other form the debate asks: does the Christian narrative as a whole convey a tragic sensibility?

Highlife songs in the 1960s and 70s often addressed social change often through oblique storytelling metaphors. But hiplife has a bawdier sensibility.

The bone-crushing sensibility of this gorgeously gritty FPS can be summed up in its signature weapon

But Tracy Letts' sprawling dysfunctional-family saga has a black-comic sensibility entirely its own.

I'd grown to appreciate the town's gaudy, burned-neck sensibility

13:37 Sep 22, 2014 

...and there is no sentence before that! After that, it is explained that he collects oversized bottles which are displayed in a faux-bar setup in his dining-room. That is all.

12:58 Sep 22, 2014 

Okay, it CAN refer to the collectibles - took a minute. It could be BOTH. Karin, CONTEXT!

12:53 Sep 22, 2014 

perhaps. Cheeky can be frech, ironisch, augenzwinkernd, witzelnd, keck, kess, neckend und neckisch. What fits?

12:49 Sep 22, 2014 

refers to the artist, how he/she is drawn to collectibles - collectibles do not have a sensibility. but similar to what? this is the context we need.

11:44 Sep 22, 2014 

Es würde helfen,wenn sie auch den vorigen Satz als Kontext dazu tun würden. Es ist mir nicht ganz klar of die "cheeky sensibility" sich hier auf den "artist" oder auf die "collectibles" bezieht.

09:09 Sep 22, 2014 

heißt so viel wie frech. Also eine freche Attitüde o.ä.