Talk:Nazi

Tea room discussion

Note: the below discussion was moved from the Wiktionary:Tea room.

When I called myself a "sum-of-parts Nazi" in the section above, I looked up Nazi to see whether Wiktionary had the slang sense of a disciplinarian, and I suddenly remembered my history teacher at secondary school. She insisted on calling them the "nazzies" (a bit like the navvies, who also came up in modern history), which tended to amuse the class because we all knew they were "nart-sees". So I suddenly wonder whether this is a legitimate Anglicisation or merely one teacher's bizarre kink. Anybody know? Equinox 22:31, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I've heard that too, but I suppose it must be an affected use, because my standard references don't have it. I'll add pronunciation, though. —Michael Z. 2009-01-22 22:56 z

Sounds like a spelling pronunciation. (Taivo 02:36, 23 January 2009 (UTC))

I seem to recall Winston Churchill was known for deliberately and consistently mispronouncing "Nazi" as "nah-zee" (i.e., without the "t" sound). Pingku 06:38, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

John S. Kenyon and Thomas A. Knott argue in A Pronouncing Dictionary of American English that it is in the best principles to English to so pronounce foreign words instead of using a bastardized version of the foreign pronunciation. I uploaded File:Henry Hall - Japs and Nazis.ogg as an example of this pronunciation; unfortunately, due to the nature of flowing speech, I couldn't extract just the word Nazi and have it sound natural.--Prosfilaes (talk) 10:45, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

RFC

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for cleanup.

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

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I think the sense "consisting of Nazis" (as opposed to "pertaining to Nazism") is an effort to distinguish "Nazi" as in "a Nazi group" from "Nazi" as in "his Nazi ideals"... but if that distinction is worthwhile, and I'm not sure it is, there must be a better way of wording the sense. - -sche (discuss) 05:50, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

For me, it's a delete. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:18, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

As a noun, English has Nazi and Nazism (National Socialist and National Socialism). It is quite possible that other languages have that distinction in adjectives, and then the distinction would be worthwhile. --129.125.102.126 22:22, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

That's a fair point. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:01, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

I've combined the senses. - -sche (discuss) 08:38, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Etymological info

From diff: "In the 24th edition of Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache - 2002, it states that the word Nazi was favoured in southern Germany (supposedly from c.1924) among opponents of National Socialism because the nickname Nazi, Naczi (from the masculine proper name Ignatz, the German form of Ignatius) was used colloquially to mean "a foolish person, clumsy or awkward person." - a Bavarian oaf. The popular Austrian Catholic name Ignatz was, according to a source in World War one a generic name German Empire term for Austrian-Hungarian soldiers."

As de:Nazi points out, Nazi was formed in analogy to Sozi (i. e., Sozialist or Sozialdemokrat) as well. This is supported by the additional formation Kozi for Kommunist (which I had never encountered before until now).

There's also de:Bazi, a derogative term for Bavarians, which may have played a role, if it was already current at the time – it is very usual now. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 15:06, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

Pejorativeness as a political designation

As revert to my edit correctly points out, "Nazi" as a pejorative for "neo-Nazi" doesn't make a great deal of sense; however, "Nazi" as a pejorative for some of the other ideologies which are lumped together most certainly does. Also, put "identitarian" for "ethnic," ("ethnic ideology" is awkward, "identitarianism" is an ideology, "ethnicity" isn't, neither is "xenophobia", which is merely an attitude, not an ideology) and "White supremacist" and/or "White nationalist" for "racist," as this is by and large, the only sort of racism which the term is used for (even someone like wikipedia:Louis Farrakhan, a very serious anti-Semite, and arguably one with fascistic characteristics and even aesthetics, is not at all likely to get the label although I'm sured it's been used against him from time to time.)

Also thanks to same user for improving my addition as regards to etymology. (However, I think it is rather more than "possible" that this is the etymology; if I recall correctly, a specific journalist, Jewish and associated with the KPD if memory serves, is identifiably the source of this usage. Not recalling his name I would have to do further research.) PavelCristovic (talk) 20:32, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

I don't think that e.g. a newspaper calling e.g. a white supremacist fascist who would prefer not to be called a Nazi is pejorative (belittling), though; I think it's just claiming that the person is within the scope of the term as it is generally used to denote people who occupy a certain part of the ideological spectrum. Such claims can also be made in greyer cases, about people who are less obviously in that part of the ideological spectrum, but I'm not sure how that should be handled; in less extreme cases, it doesn't seem like a separate sense. At the extreme, of course, it bleeds into the tendency to use several political terms, not just this one, without any real meaning at all (think of all the people who described Barack Obama as a Nazi, communist, fascist, socialist, capitalist and Marxist, sometimes in the same sentence).
Regarding the etymology, many of the books cited as references for the etymology hedge the claim of influence to varying degrees, noting that Nazi as a shortening of national-sozial predates the NSDAP and has a straightforward phonological basis, and the "peasant" slang homonym only "possibly" or probably influenced the term's popularity. - -sche (discuss) 22:07, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

RFV discussion: June–July 2018

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Nazi

Rfv-sense "(derogatory) the German language". I found one citation that is probably this sense, but everything else I see looks like the preceding sense, "the language (ideological jargon) of Nazis". - -sche (discuss) 00:46, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

Ha, I bet I can guess who added that! Mulder in The X-Files (episode "Triangle") did once say "I don't speak Nazi": he was talking to a Nazi but presumably referring to German and not jargon. Equinox ◑ 18:45, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

There is a (somewhat) common phrase "I don't speak X" used when one wants to imply that one doesn't care about what a person is saying due to the class of person they are/represent. I have also heard that formation used when someone is using excessive jargon. I have heard "I don't speak moron", "I don't speak fascist", "I don't speak cop", etc. This might be an instance of that. - TheDaveRoss 00:08, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 03:01, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

@-sche, Equinox, TheDaveRoss, Kiwima: Just notifying you that I have readded the sense after finding quotes. Please take a look to make sure you're okay with it. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:21, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

clumsy peasant definition

From etymology:

A homonymic term Nazi was in use before the rise of the NSDAP in Bavaria as a pet name for Ignaz and (by extension from that) a derogatory word for a backwards peasant

Wikipedia article phrases it:

The term "Nazi" was in use before the rise of the NSDAP as a colloquial and derogatory word for a backwards farmer or peasant, characterizing an awkward and clumsy person. In this sense, the word Nazi was a hypocorism of the German male name Ignatz (itself a variation of the name Ignatius) – Ignatz being a common name at the time in Bavaria

https://books.google.ca/books?id=UaggHAJ7jToC&pg=PA247 says:

may have been influenced by Bavarian Nazi, a familiar form of the proper name Ignatius and used to refer to or characterize an awkward or clumsy person.

No actual reference to 'backwards' or 'peasant' there, does anyone know where we got that? I am also interested if we could list a definition for the pre-NDSAP usage of the term (as well as Inter-Nazi derived from Internationale) and find some dated citations of it being used in literature. 70.49.41.99 16:58, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

1903 and 1924

https://www.etymonline.com/word/Nazi

• the word Nazi was favored in southern Germany (supposedly from c. 1924) among opponents of National Socialism
• the nickname Nazi, Naczi (from the masc. proper name Ignatz, German form of Ignatius) was used colloquially to mean "a foolish person, clumsy or awkward person."
• An older use of Nazi for national-sozial is attested in German from 1903

Is this covered in detail somewhere? Like for example, which source attests a Nat-Soc etymology from 1903? Or which source attests it's re-introduction in new context in 1924?

Furthermore, if the 1924 favoring was because of the Ignatz nickname, how long prior to 1924 was the Ignatz slang in use for? Olivia comet (talk) 06:41, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Conrad Heiden (credit for the word "Nazi")

Check out this film from 1:25 to 1:50:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihufFVR4fME

Someone should do some research and give Conrad credit on his wikipedia page:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konrad_Heiden

RFV discussion: March–May 2023

The following information has failed Wiktionary's verification process (permalink).

Failure to be verified means that insufficient eligible citations of this usage have been found, and the entry therefore does not meet Wiktionary inclusion criteria at the present time. We have archived here the disputed information, the verification discussion, and any documentation gathered so far, pending further evidence.
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Nazi

This entry, or one or more of its senses, has been nominated as derogatory pursuant to WT:DEROGATORY. It may be speedily deleted if it does not have at least three quotations meeting the attestation requirements within two weeks of the nomination date, that is, by 3 April 2022.

Rfv-sense "a person of German descent". Added by @Romanophile in diff. Ioaxxere (talk) 17:01, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

"Cited(?), but...": The definition "A German, a person of German descent, or a person perceived to be of German descent" is probably more detailed than citations could support, but the core idea ("A German") seems to be citeable but to exist in a grey area of "is this the best way to intepret/handle this?" (like the many senses of transgender discussed above, or like how the sort of people who use Kraut aren't concerned with distinguishing e.g. a German-speaking Sorb from Germany from a German, yet it's reasonable we still just define it as referring to a German). In these cites, "the Nazis shelled [X]" in practice means "the Germans shelled X", "the German military shelled X", without any concern for whether the soldiers in question were National Socialists. But should we interpret and handle that as a separate sense, "German", or just the loose way people use words? I'm not sure, but we do have a sense at Communist for "any citizen of a country governed by a communist party". - -sche (discuss) 21:21, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

No, none of those citations show the term being used against an ethnic slur against Germans. I don't see the point in splitting hairs between "Germans" and "German military" and "Nazis" in a World War II context. Can you find citations that don't involve actual Nazis at all? Ioaxxere (talk) 05:08, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

-sche added some more cites today, but lulu.com is a self-publishing outlet and I would expect that we'd exclude that or at least put it in the same category as Twitter. —Soap— 21:29, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

What we need to see are uses in which the recipient of the utterance does not already know from the context that the referent is German. Like here, where the character named Tojo says, "The whole damned business run by kikes an niggers an dinks an spics", a reader who does not know the meanings of the ethnic slurs kike, dink and spic cannot guess them from the context, but has to look these terms up. But here, where the character Hani calls Stephano not only “Wop” but also “spaghetti eater”, the reader knows that both Hani and Stephano know that Stephano is Italian, so this would IMO not be usable for attesting the sense “a person of Italian ethnicity” for the term spaghetti eater.  --Lambiam 22:40, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• RFV failed as it timed out Wonderfool69 (talk) 20:51, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

"Avoidance by the Nazis themselves"

That's not true. The term originated as an "exonym", but the Nazis later adopted it. It can even be cited from speeches of Himmler and Heydrich, for example. Such use was informal, of course, but the word is generally somewhat informal in German (unlike English). 2.202.159.64 15:15, 9 July 2023 (UTC)