the rurer of the worrd. (loudasthesun) wrote in linguaphiles,
the rurer of the worrd.
loudasthesun
linguaphiles

"concentration camp" in German?

From Clients From Hell:

Marketing people in Germany like to use the English language to give products or events an appearance of internationalism and modernity - even if their own language skills are somewhat lacking. A new client asked me to create promotional material for a camping trip on which the participants will meditate, focus on their inner strength blabla. Her naming idea was (in English of course) “concentration camp”. After I recovered I was able to tell her what that actually means. Well, she saw the necessity to come up with something different.

Funny at first, but even not having any knowledge of German, I'm tempted to call bullshit on this story. I was initially curious about what concentration camps ARE called in German, which led me to the German version of the Nazi concentration camp Wikipedia page here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konzentrationslager

I don't think Konzentrationslager is too far from "concentration camp", and it seems that "camp" is even a loanword used in German. Even assuming her English wasn't very good, I find it hard to believe that a German speaker wouldn't realize what "concentration camp" meant. Any native German speakers here care to comment? Does this sound like an actual mix-up that could occur?
Tags: german
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