Talk:Ich bin ein Berliner/Archive 2

message: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ich_bin_ein_Berliner&oldid=73298058
A common urban legend asserts that Kennedy made an embarrassing grammatical error by saying "Ich bin ein Berliner," referring to himself not as a citizen of Berlin, but as a common pastry:
Kennedy should have said "Ich bin Berliner" to mean "I am a person from Berlin." By adding the indefinite article ein, his statement implied he was a non-human Berliner, thus "I am a jelly doughnut". The statement was followed by uproarious laughter.
The legend stems from a play on words with Berliner, the name of a doughnut variant filled with jam or plum sauce that is thought to have originated in Berlin. This urban legend is largely unknown in Germany, where Kennedy's speech is considered a landmark in the country's postwar history. 
The legend can be deconstructed on a number of points:
* While there is a "jam doughnut" variant that is common in Berlin, it is only known as Pfannkuchen (pancake) in the city and nearby regions. The name "Berliner" is based on etymologic travel: other parts of Germany picked up the pastry under the name of Berliner Pfannkuchen (= pancake from Berlin), which in turn has been shortened to Berliner. That name has travelled further abroad and is now known in some English-speaking regions. In the 1960s however the term "Berliner" for the pastry sounded strange to people in Berlin. 
* There is no grammatical error in Kennedy's statement; the indefinite article does not change its meaning. In German, the statement of origin "Ich bin ein Brandenburger" (I am from Brandenburg) is more common than "Ich bin Brandenburger", but both are correct. The article "ein" can be used as a form of emphasis: it implies "just one of many." As Kennedy did stress the "ein", the usage was, according to German linguist Jürgen Eichhoff , "not only correct, but the one and only correct way of expressing in German what the President intended to say." 
* The telling of laughter may stem from an associated incident based on the simultaneous interpretation of his speech from English to German (which is the reason for the many pauses apparent in the audio recordings even that most tapes do not carry the interpreter's voice). After the president said "Ich bin ein Berliner" the first time, he was applauded, and a few seconds later he added jokingly, "I appreciate my interpreter translating my German!" This statement was followed by laughter and applause. That timeline fact is evident, so there was no laughter connected to the German phrase but to the next English phrase.
The origins of the legend are obscure.
:Request for verification: Regarding the origins of this story, I seem to recall fairly clearly reading it in Tom Burnham's Dictionary of Misinformation (Thomas Y Crowell, 1975 edition). The passage was something to the effect of "While Kennedy wanted to say 'I am a Berliner, when he used the words 'ein Berliner' he in fact said 'I am a jelly doughnut.' 'Berliner' refers to a resident of Berlin; 'ein Berliner' refers to a jelly doughnut." (If not there, then Peter Farb's Word Play: What Happens When People Talk (Random House, 1974 edition [paperback].) I don't have those books available but it would be easy to check and clarify the origin of the story.--Paraprosdokian 19:54, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: "Jelly doughnut" urban legend (the long version) 

message: While it seems to be the consensus that "ich bin ein Berliner" is grammatically correct for "I am a citizen of Berlin", it may be worthwhile to point out that the translation to "I am a jelly-filled doughnut" is not illegitimate.  That is to say, if Kennedy had meant to say "I am a jelly-filled doughnut" in German, he could have said "ich bin ein Berliner", correct?
What I'm getting at is that the article implies that the jelly doughnut thing is a complete mistranslation on par with saying it means "I am an automobile transmission", and I think that that tone should be improved upon. —wfaulk 23:30, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: All right, if you can phrase this in a way that doesn't imply that there's something to this legend after all, please do so. ProhibitOnions (T) 13:26, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What a tempest in a teapot. I once asked a German-born colleague about this story. He acknowledged that Germans understood that JFK was slightly incorrect in his German grammar, that it could be interpreted as calling himself a jelly doughnut, and that no one cared because it was the sincerity behind it that counted: "We knew what he meant." Wahkeenah 05:28, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The point is that although "Ich bin ein Berliner" could be interpreted to mean "I am a jelly doughnut", it doesn't have to be interpreted that way. The urban legend is that Kennedy got his German grammar wrong and what he said could only be interpreted to mean "jelly doughnut", and that simply isn't true. He said a sentence that's syntactically ambiguous, but that has one sensible interpretation and one absurd interpretation. —Angr 08:11, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: And my point is that my German colleague did not consider it an absurd interpretation of the words themselves, just that it wasn't worth writing page after page about it. Maybe it's time to archive this talk page, which goes back 2 or 3 years on this overkilled subject. Wahkeenah 09:57, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  The point is that you are still stretching the attribution of being homonymous words: it did not need emphasis or any performance to "make" it into something that "yeah, we know what he meant", like being nice to an uninformed person. The standard German interpretation of "ich bin ein <name of town>" is simply that of a citizen of the named town, equally for Berliner, Frankfurter, Wiener, Hamburger or any other place in the world. - any other interpretation is very verrrrrryyyyy remote. The only way to let a native German pick up the pun is to say "Ich bin ein Hamburger" while holding a Hamburger in the air and pointing on it. Everything else would not work. Guidod 22:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: My friend was a native of Germany, so I'll take his word uber alles. Wahkeenah 23:06, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

text:  Go and ask him if it is a stretched interpretation. He has been merily agreeing on the fact that it is homonymous sentence - you are interpreting it being on a similar level. Which is plain wrong. Go and ask him. or just take the word of the very many native Germans on this talk page. IMO, you colleague has been nice to you and that's about it. Guidod 23:24, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Later. Right now, I've got a craving for a Hamburger and a Berliner. :b Wahkeenah 23:30, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

text: Keep in mind the part that is an urban legend is that Germans did not understand and appreciate what he meant, but thought he was a fool. The fact that he said something that could be amusing (in another context, most likely) is not in dispute. --Dhartung | Talk 08:46, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: At least, the urban legend is that what he said was grammatically wrong (it wasn't) but close enough that Germans understood what he meant. What he said was grammatically fine in the meaning he intended, but it could be interpreted the other way as well. —Angr 12:44, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Let's assert it once more: it was not just fine /in the meaning he intended/ - it is generally fine, valid and correct. In any general context it can not be misunderstood. All the homonymous part is merily a play on words, a pun, and it's born in the USA. That fact will still be there even when the US origin is being deleted from the text. There is not the slightest root for the legend in Berlin, Germany or the German native-speakers. Guidod 14:13, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Excuse me, but I did not "delete the US origin from the text". If you'd read my edit summary (or any of the remarks I've made here or, indeed, any of my edits to the article), you'd see this is the same point I have been making all along. BTW, I am myself one of the Wikipedians in Berlin. ProhibitOnions (T) 15:35, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't mind the intention of the change as shown in the comment but the more the text is being trimmed down the more we see another one arguing for the thruthful part in the myth - see the section below (my comment above was given the same minute as the one below). I don't think the wording is strict enough at the moment - it is too much encyclopedic, too much just stating the fact, and that's surely not enough to kill a myth. Guidod 17:18, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I am amazed to see that "native speakers" allegedly confirm the doughnut legend. OK, so JFK could have been understood as saying "I'm a doughnut". About as much as someone saying "I'm a New Yorker" could be understood as saying they are a magazine, a car, or a train. --Thorsten1 20:05, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overstating the fallacy of "jelly doughnut" 

message: I am a German. I read about that donut legend, which to my mind is very absurd. Some stated that the use of the german article "ein" would be an indicator that he doesn't mean a person, but the jelly donut. Sorry - completely wrong!
Let's compare the two German sentences:
* "Ich bin ein Berliner."
* "Ich bin Berliner."
The strict semantics of both are almost identical, although the connotation/interpretation of both has a slight divergence:
* "Ich bin ein Berliner." -> I am a person living in Berlin, or coming from Berlin. Like: "I am one of many people who might be called 'Berliner'." Emphasizes the personal bond to Berlin, and an association to a probably larger group. The message of this variant is that Kennedy feels a personal association with all the people from Berlin.
* "Ich bin Berliner." -> Being a Berliner is part of what makes me up. Like: "Being Berliner is something that differentiates me from other people." Emphasizes that being a Berliner is an important trait of that person. This variant is more personal, stressing less that Kennedy is part of a larger group who are all Berliners. It just says that Kennedy has the property of being a Berliner, not more.
Obviously, the first variant is the better one. It is the one that Kennedy used. If Kennedy hat used the latter, this would surely have been irritating for the audience. Like, as if Kennedy would spontaneously come out with the public revelation that he was not born in the US, but in Germany! What a sensation.
MadocDoyu 11:46, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Donut: "Ich bin ein Berliner" is better German than "Ich bin Berliner"!

message: In fact, the statement is grammatically correct and cannot be misunderstood in that context. The urban legend is largely unknown in Germany ,...
: There has been no native German so far to have known this legend before reading the Wikipedia article. The "largely" is just a tribute to that nerve-shattering "I known someone" of our US comrades. As the legend is strictly unknown in Central Europe there has never been an incentive to make something like a "poll" about it. Drop that  sh** and keep it that way. Guidod 22:23, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree the  tag is rather pointless, since you can't prove a negative, but it isn't true that the Wikipedia article is the only way native Germans could encounter the legend. Germans do talk to Americans, you know. And sometimes those Americans say, "I heard that Ich bin ein Berliner means 'I am a jelly doughnut'. Is that true?" So I think there are a fair number of Germans who know that Americans think that JFK said something other than what he meant. —Angr 08:00, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Agreed, may be I was misguided here as none of my friends in the US did bring it up so far. Still I'd maintain that there is no hearsay among Germans - if there is a German text about the legend then it is basically pointing to the US myth. Guidod 12:37, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  {Fact}