Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2013 August 17

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August 17

German speakers: What does this mean in English?

I believe it is a medical term: Beeinträchtigenschulterstörung.

What what about the sentence: Ich trinke Beeinträchtigenschulterstörungstärkungsmittel!

Thank you very much. --Ashetuger (talk) 13:55, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

According to Google Translate: The first is Impaired shoulder disorder. And the second doesn't really make any sense, "I'm a shoulder disorder Impaired tonic". That said, the second is being translated in a way that I'm not familiar with since "trinken" is the verb "to drink" and not "to be". Dismas|^(talk) 14:11, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

The word doesn't exist and isn't well-formed. Sure, the three component words exist: "beeinträchtigen" ('to affect, to impair'), "Schulter" ('shoulder'), and "Störung" ('disorder'), but you could never form a compound with the first element in this (infinitival, verbal) form followed by its implied object. A possible compound that would mean something like 'shoulder impairment disorder' would be "Schulterbeeinträchtigungsstörung". The second sentence would mean "I drink a tonic against X" (with X being whatever that nonsense compound is supposed to mean). Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:40, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your answers. --Ashetuger (talk) 15:28, 17 August 2013 (UTC)