Ersatz

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Ersatz

Ersatz is a German

German language

German is a West Germanic languages, thus related to and classified alongside English language and Dutch language. It is one of the world's world language and the most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union....
word literally meaning substitute or replacement. Although it is used as an adjective in English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that originated in Anglo-Saxon England and has lingua franca status in many parts of the world as a result of the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries and that of the United States from the mid 20th century onwa...
, Ersatz can function in German as a noun

Noun

In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open class lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition....
on its own, or as a part in compound nouns such as Ersatzteile (spare parts) or Ersatzspieler (substitute player). While the English term often implies that the substitution is of unsatisfactory or inferior quality, this connotation does not necessarily exist in the German context.

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Encyclopedia

Ersatz is a German

German language

English language

Noun

Margarine

Margarine , as a generic term, can indicate any of a wide range of butter substitutes. In many parts of the world, margarine has become the best-selling table spread, although butter and olive oil also command large market shares....
as a substitute for butter

Butter

Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermentation cream or milk. It is generally used as a spread and a condiment, as well as in cooking applications such as baking, sauce making, and frying....
.

In English, "ersatz" arose as a pejorative adjective

Adjective

In grammar, an adjective is a word whose main syntax role is to grammatical modifier a noun or pronoun, giving more information about the noun or pronoun's definition....
from the experiences of thousands of U.S., British, and other English-speaking combat personnel, primarily airmen, who were captured in the European Theater of Operations

European Theater of Operations

The European Theater of Operations , is the term used in the United States to refer to US operations north of Italy and the Mediterranean coast, in the European Theatre of World War II....
during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
. These Allied Kriegsgefangene (prisoners of war) were served Ersatzkaffee (replacement coffee

Coffee

Coffee is a brewed drink prepared from roasted seeds, commonly called coffee beans, of the Coffea. Caffeinated coffee has a stimulating effect in humans....
) by their German captors, who had no real coffee to offer them. Needless to say, this substitute drink (a Getreidekaffee or "grain coffee") was not popular with the POWs, who longed for the real thing.

As to why Ersatz is a noun only in German but an adjective in English, the explanation is the German language's propensity for building new words out of existing ones by combining nouns. In the case of Ersatzkaffee, the latter two syllables were recognizably "coffee" to English-speaking ears so the first half of this word was logically but mistakenly assumed to be an adjective, when it is in fact the first half of a single German word. In this way, "ersatz" came to be an English adjective connoting something inferior if not entirely phony, as when one thing masquerades as another.

Historical context

The term ersatz probably gained international attention during World War I

World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
, when Allied fleets cut off all sea transports to Germany, forcing Germany to develop substitutes for products like chemical compound

Chemical compound

A chemical compound is a Chemical substance consisting of two or more different chemical element Chemical bond together in a fixed mass ratio that can be split into simpler substances....
s and provisions. Ersatz products developed during this time included: synthetic rubber

Rubber

Natural rubber is an elastomer?an Elasticity_ hydrocarbon polymer?that was originally derived from a milky colloidal suspension, or latex , found in the sap of some plants....
(buna

Synthetic rubber

Synthetic rubber is any type of artificially made polymer material, which acts as an elastomer. An elastomer is a material with the mechanical property that it can undergo much more Elasticity deformation under stress, than most materials and still return to its previous size without permanent deformation....
produced from oil

Petroleum

Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid found in rock formations in the Earth consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights, plus other organic compounds....
), benzene

Benzene

Benzene, or benzol, is an organic compound chemical compound and a known carcinogen with the molecular formula Carbon6Hydrogen6....
for heating oil (coal gas), tea

Tea

Tea refers to the agricultural products of the leaves, leaf buds, and internodes of the Camellia sinensis plant, prepared and cured by various methods....
composed of ground raspberry

Raspberry

The raspberry is the edible fruit of a multitude of plant species in the subgenus Rubus#Scientific classification of the genus Rubus; the name also applies to these plants themselves....
leaves or catnip, and coffee

Coffee substitute

Coffee substitutes are non-coffee products, usually without caffeine, that are used to imitate coffee. Coffee substitutes can be used for medical, economic and religious reasons, or simply because coffee is not available....
, using roasted bean

Bean

Bean is a common name for large plant seeds of several genus of the Family Fabaceae used for human food or animal feed.The whole young pods of bean plants, if picked before the pods ripen and dry, can be tender enough to eat whole, whether cooked or raw....
s, which were not coffee

Coffee

Coffee is a brewed drink prepared from roasted seeds, commonly called coffee beans, of the Coffea. Caffeinated coffee has a stimulating effect in humans....
beans. Though a similar situation arose in Germany during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, this connotation with the term ersatz has sunk into oblivion in present Germany.

Another example of the word's usage in Germany exists in the German naval

German Navy

The German Navy The German Navy traces its roots back to the Imperial Fleet of the Revolutions of 1848 and more directly to the Prussian Navy, which later evolved into the Northern German Federal Navy and became the Imperial Navy ....
construction programs of the beginning of the 20th century. In this context the phrasing "Ersatz (shipname)" indicates that a new, larger, or more capable ship was a replacement for an aging or lost previous vessel. Because German practice was not to reveal the name of a new ship until its launch, this meant that the vessel was known by its "Ersatz (shipname)" throughout its construction. At the end of World War I

World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
the last three ships of the planned Mackensen class

Mackensen class battlecruiser

The Mackensen class was the last class of battlecruisers to be built by Germany in World War I. None of them were ever completed as shipbuilding priorities were concentrated on U-boats and destroyers....
battlecruiser

Battlecruiser

Battlecruisers were large warships in the first half of the 20th century that were first introduced by the Royal Navy. The battlecruiser was developed as the successor to the armoured cruisers, but their evolution was more closely linked to that of the dreadnought battleships....
s were redesigned and initially known simply as the Ersatz Yorck class

Ersatz Yorck class battlecruiser

The Ersatz York class were a group of three battlecruisers ordered for the Kaiserliche Marine in 1916. They were a slightly enlarged version of the Mackensen class battlecruiser, armed with 15 inch guns....
, since the first ship was considered to be a replacement for the lost armored cruiser

Armored cruiser

The armored cruiser, or armoured cruiser , is a type of cruiser, a warship. The armored cruiser is protected by a belt armor of vehicle armor, in addition to the armored deck and protective coal bunkers that define the protected cruiser....
, Yorck

SMS Yorck

SMS Yorck"SMS" stands for "Seiner Majest?t Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German. was the second and final ship of the Roon class armored cruiser of armored cruisers built for the Imperial Germany Kaiserliche Marine....
.

Ersatz capitalism

Relating to the scholarly work of Kunio Yoshihara, ersatz capitalism
Capitalism

Capitalism is an economic system in which wealth, and the means of producing wealth, are private property and controlled rather than commonly, publicly, or state-owned and controlled....
refers to the early rising economies of East Asia and their dynamic and technologically intensive development. Yoshihara's definition classifies Japanese, South Korean and Taiwanese nations' capitalist drives as what might be called "pseudo capitalism." This refers to such government and business actors' abilities to utilize a nation's comparative advantages and artificially motivate an economy toward higher-end economic activities, specifically similar to those of developed Western nations, including areas such as capital investments and technologically intensive production.