Hello everyone,
and welcome to our German Word of the Day, this time with a look at the meaning of
aufraffen
A nice colloquial gem.
And aufraffen is totally one of those “below the radar” words. So if you’ve spent time in Germany, chances are that you have heard or seen it multiple times, but chances are also that you never really noticed it.
But you will after reading this article, because it’s actually quite a nice word to have, because… it helps us get off of the couch and do these things that we always wanted to.
Like going for a run.
Or taking a shower.
Or at least get a coffee. Baby steps.
Anyway, aufraffen is of course a prefix version of raffen, so let’s start with the look at that.
“Raffen” and its relatives
The origin of raffen is an old Germanic root *hreps- and we can capture the essence of this with one mental image:
a person raking together leaves
I mean, it’s well known just how meticulous the Germanic tribes were about this. The Teutoburger Wald wasn’t always a mountain range, you know. It’s dry leaves, piled up over centuries.
Seriously though… of course raking together leaves is not exactly the original meaning. It was a more general sense of scraping something together, and it’s the origin of the English verb to rasp, which has focused more on the scraping. And also to raffle. Which probably got its current meaning from the idea of sort “raking in” the jackpot after winning in a game of cards or dice. Like, when just think of a movie where someone shoves all the casino chips toward themselves with their arms.
And this brings us right over to the German raffen. Or better the related words like raffgierig (the greedy for possession), der Raffzahn (the money-grubber) or die Raffsucht (the pathological greed) and the regional Berlin term der Raffke (greedy capitalist).
- Der neue Barbesitzer ist ein echter Raffzahn/Raffke. 2 Euro für ein Schälchen Salzstangen.
- The new bar owner is a real greedhead. 2 Euros for a small bowl of salty sticks.
- Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
Now, none of these are really all that common. But you might see them in newspapers or books, so it’s good to have them in your passive vocabulary.
And what about raffen itself?
Well, that has kind of fallen out of use by itself EXCEPT as a very colloquial verb for… understanding. In the sense of understanding something logically.
- Ich raff’s einfach nicht – warum ist eine 10 kg Hantel teurer als eine Jeans.
- I just don’t get it – why is a 20 pound dumbbell more expensive than a pair of jeans.
- Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
- Thomas ist so ein Idiot. Er rafft einfach nicht, was mich stört.
- Thomas is such an idiot. He simply doesn’t understand what bothers me.
- Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
This is VERY colloquial though, almost a bit slangy, so please please don’t overuse it, and not with strangers. It sounds best if you’re legit agitated by something you don’t understand.
Cool.
So, that’s raffen and its core theme of scraping something together and maybe you’re already able to guess the meaning of aufraffen.
Actually, let’s do a little poll real quick. And maybe try to think back to what I said in the very beginning what aufraffen is useful for :)
And now, let’s see what it really means.
The meaning of “aufraffen”
Find out more
All lessons, tools and premium features (and there’s a LOT of them :).
Already a member?
Audio Speed
Dark Mode
In English, aufraffen works best with, get off your/my ass. I know I have to clean the bathroom but I just can’t get off my ass! Great word.
I really enjoyed getting 100% in the quiz today because I rarely get 100%., It made me feel quite clever because of getting the question What’s the preposition that goes with “sich aufraffen“? correct, the right answer being zu.
I find these quizes really reinforce one’s understanding.
Yeah, congratulations and thanks for the nice feedback.
Sometimes, for shorter articles like this, I low-key ponder not adding a quiz because the software for doing it is kind of annoying, but then I push myself. So this kind of feedback is really motivating and rewarding :)
I haven’t encountered aufraffen yet, at least not that I can recall. Thank you for this article.
The book I have been reading today cited this Spiegel cover as a historical example of media scares around the idea of the decline of the language. Was interested to spot raffen there.
https://images.app.goo.gl/JgH99eudHzfvYuDP9
This was the first “raffen” i’ve encountered since reading this article, so that took only around a week!
These senses of schnallen and blicken were new to me too…
Spiegel be like “Mimimimimi”.
What I find most interesting is to see “too much” in there. I thought that import was WAY more recent.
Spiegel be like “Mimimimimi” lol
Small correction – it should be “you should get yourself to *do* more sports”.
I could talk/push myself *into doing* more sport, but I would make myself/get myself to *do* more sport.
Re: sports Vs sport. I would say “to do more sport” means to do more activity/exercise in general, but “to do more sports” is to take up a wider variety of sports.
“To do sport” is something i hear a lot from german people speaking english. It always sounds wrong to me. Does it not sound wrong to you?
Often I think people are also referring to going to the gym, which i don’t consider a form of sport. “To do exercise” is much better for this.
I think also “playing” a sport sounds better than “doing” e.g. “I play football” rather than “i do football”
From a German perspective, I’d say this refers to gyms but also going for a run or even stuff like snowboarding or playing soccer or doing MMA
– Machst du Sport?
This question is basically about whether someone does any sort of physical activity that elevates heart rate and is not work or sex :)
I’m used to the fact its normal in german to refer to going to the gym as “sport machen” but my point was that german speakers often carry over this wider sense when they speak in english. I feel like this in some contexts this is kinda false-friends territory. At least in my opinion, you can’t describe going to the gym in english as “doing sport” . It sounds really weird to me. Starbucks comment however is interesting as it shows that this isn’t true across the board. Its always interesting to learn something new about how your first language gets spoken by others: )
Maybe my usage has changed since living in Austria and speaking to a lot of native German speakers… O.O
Exercise, not do exercise!
er, actually doing exercise is also fine
I would say “I do a lot of sport” or “I play a lot of sports”. For me, “sport” and “exercise” are interchangeable in this context.
“A sport” is a competitive physical game or activity with an agreed set of rules. Whereas “sport” as a non-countable noun refers to any physical workout/cardio/strength/training type activity except work or sex, as described by Emanuel.
By this definition, if I play darts I could say I’m “playing a sport”, but I wouldn’t say I’m “doing sport” because it doesn’t involve any kind of workout.
And now the word sport has lost all meaning to me due to excessive repetition lol
Interesting. I’m wondering now if this is something that gets used differently in different english speaking regions.
Vielen Dank Emanuel! Btw, check your mail when you have time, I had sent a suggestion/a new topic you would probably check. Thanks in advance!
*could not would
Will do. But please send language related things as a comment next time, even topic suggestions.
It’s very likely that I forget about it when it’s by mail.
Alright, will do! Thanks in advance…
Great article Emanuel!
Danke Emanuel!
How about “sich aufrappeln”? Does it have a similar meaning?
Oh, nice one!!
Yeah, it’s really similar. I think, I’d use “aufrappeln” primarily in the context of literally getting the body moving. Like getting off the couch to go for a walk. I wouldn’t use it in the context of finally tackling my tax returns, but I wouldn’t really say that it’s wrong either.
Actually, I just realized that “aufrappeln” is also used in the context of getting back up after some sort of failure, mainly in a factual physical sense. Like, you try to do a cartwheel for example and you completely fail.
Raffen reminds me of the English word “grasp”. We refer to a greedy or miserly person as “grasping” and we “grasp” the meaning of something.
Excellent!
Actually yeah, “grab” might be even better because of how “colloquial” it sounds.
Nope – never heard it before – now of course I will listen for it.
So, “sich aufraffen” is on the same wavelength of motivate yourself, push yourself or bring yourself to do something you simply don’t want to.
Ich bin so müde, dass ich mich zu nichts mehr aufraffen kann.
“Aufraffen” alone works to pick up or collect something, like laundry or maybe scattered toys.
Jeden Tag raffe ich die Spielzeuge auf, die die Kinder überall hinwerfen.
Sie raffte in einer Minute die Dreckwäsche auf.
“Verrafen” is screwing up something, like forgetting about a metting as you wrote or getting wrong the sales numbers. Right?
Ich habe den Bericht dieses Monats verrafft.
“Dahinraffen” is totally figurative right? Or is it literal?
Sie wurde durch Krankheit dahingerafft.
Leider raffen sie ihr Leben dahin…
“Zusammenraffen” is also gathering:
Sie rafften ihre Habseligkeiten zusammen.
I wonder if it can be figuratively used as “put yourself together.”
No, this does not work. Where did you get this from?
Maybe in some old books, but you should not use the verb that way.
“verraffen” has an element about forgetting an obligation. So just screwing up sales numbers in a presentation wouldn’t be the best context for it, though some people might use it. The example with the monthly report sounds like you forgot it.
The first example for “dahinraffen” is spot on, but the second one makes no sense to me. I don’t know what you’re trying to express there.
“zusammenraffen” is for hastily scraping together something. I think you can use it figuratively, but better only in writing.
This is literally an example from a German grammar website:
“Da Michaels Freundin überraschend zu Besuch kam, raffte er in ein paar Sekunden die ganze Dreckwäsche im Schlafzimmer auf und versteckte sie erst mal im Kleiderschrank.”
I thought I could tweak it a little.
With the second example of “Dahinraffen” I tried to write something like: “They waste their lives away with vices”.
So I thought “Leider raffen sie ihr Leben mit Untugenden dahin” could fit.
Interesting.
It’s not “wrong”, but I NEVER use the verb that way and I never hear it either. If I read it in a book, I’d immediately understand it and file it as “old school”.
As for dahinraffen… think of the plague ravaging Europe. That’s what it is. It’s pretty much always used in passive or a disease is the subject. People don’t dahinraffen anything or anyone.
Oh, it might be that this “aufraffen” is used in Bavaria or Austria, but it’s not standard.
Ok, I get now what the context for Dahinraffen is.
Regarding the regions, I believe you can spend half your life in Köln and then not being able to get what they’re saying in Stuttgart. Here in Düsseldorf I’ve heard things like “Unkaputtbar”, which never happened in Leipzig. German is infinite. Ich raffe mich auf, um mehr zu wissen.
Oh I know unkaputtbar. I think German is actually fairly unified, at least compared to Italy or the UK, but the thick version of local dialects does have usages and words that are exclusive to the respective region :)
Nice word choice.
I’m impressed: in Italian we have the verb “arraffare” and now I’m discovering that it has the same root as “raffen”, and also the meaning is similar.
See
https://etimo.it/?term=Arraffare+&find=Cerca
I love this sort of things :)
Wow, that’s una vera sorpresa :)
I was just reading Rafzahn can also be a tooth. Obviously the context would help clarify if you were talking about a greedy person or a tooth but would everyone know what kind of tooth this word is referring too? What do you call the kind of teeth dracula has?
Uh, nope, or at least not in my world. I do not know what tooth it’s referring to.
The corner tooth of a vampire or a tiger is called “Reißzahn”.
Cool, then that meaning is not important to know. Reißzahn is kind of a cool one to know however…. Danke!
I just rediscovered the word “Naschkatze” cus i was wondering what someone with a sweet tooth was… thats a nice word too…
Yup, I like it :)
As usual, your article is pertinent and well done.
A suggestion…or maybe just send a good reference. I’ve hunted and hunted, to no avail. I did finally find the correct German grammar term: Korrelate. It is so unclear to me when these are required or are optional. Like, I gather you HAVE to say “ich bestehe DARAUF, dass…. but other verbs with prepositions are optional (denken an e.g.). Thanks in advance and I hope you feel better soon. Then, Raff dich auf!
Cheers.
Bob Bull
completely new to me, but great, and almost onomatopaeic
“Verraffen” is new to me. Does it sound OK to you in present tense? “Ich verraffe es oft zu antworten”.
“Dahinraffen” is something I see in online discussions sometimes.
“verraffen” is better for “singular” things that you forgot.
It works best with past or with stuff like “I hope I won’t verraff it”.
dahinraffen – wow, I’m really happy you added that!
I did leave out “zusammenraffen” on purpose, but I completely forgot about dahinraffen.
The two examples you gave that are with passive (wurde) are how I’d use it.
The last example threw me of majorly in that I wasn’t able to make out who’s subject :). I just now understood it and yes, the sentence works.
In such an example, I think it’s preferable to put the subject (das) first:
Still not pretty but at least you get a hunch that “sie” might not be the subject.
Oh and “etwas/ein bisschen dahingerafft” is not something you’ll find a lot.
weil sie aktuell zu viel arbeitet und sie das am Wochenende etwas dahingerafft hat.
Just wanted to check i understood this – basically her job is “killing her” and by the time the weekend arrived she was kind of destroyed by all the work during the week?
So I would not use “dahingerafft” in this example, especially not combined with “a little”.
It’s a word that you’d use for the plague “dahinraffen” 30% of Europe. Not for work making you tired.
Ok cool. Danke dir!
sobald ich was neues hier lerne, höre ich es. Ich glaube zwar nicht an Verschwörungstheorien, aber ich bin überzeugt dass hier was merkwürdig geschieht.
Hah… Synchronicity :).
I think this is probably one of many words that are exactly like you described for me: I’m 100% sure I’ve heard it, understood what it meant from context, but definitely didn’t have it anywhere close to active vocabulary. Thanks!
I think I’ve seen zusammenraffen and (in the Bible) wegraffen – those are obviously a lot more literal.
How does sich zusammenreißen compare to this? Is it more about getting yourself under control emotionally? I think the English “pull yourself together” works for either, but is probably more often about the “stop freaking out” scenario.
“Breadhead” was a new one for me XD
Oh, and you’ve got one of your typical typos or mix-ups in there: it’s gotta be a “Monday-Kick-Off-Meeting.”
Great question about zusammenreißen.
sich aufraffen has a clear focus on you being a slouch. We could even say it boils down to “stop procrastinating”.
sich zusammenreißen on the other hand is more about being “complicated” about something. That can be whiny or slightly hysterical or super hesitant or second guessing or whatever.
Think of a someone wanting to ask some other person at the bar for their number, but being shy about it. A friend could say
Which boils down to “Just do it!”
But when the friend were to say
That sounds like the person is just too lazy to get up.
(I’m exaggerating a bit, but that’s roughly the difference).
Or think of your kid throws a tantrum in front of the Quengelzone. That’s also something where “zusammenreißen” works and “aufraffen” absolutely would not.
How would you translate “Raffzahn”, by the way? I took breadhead from the dictionary, but I had a feeling that it’s not actually used all that much.
have you ever thought about doing an article about reißen and its prefix terms? I always thought the slang use of the term aufreißen was really weird – sounds very violent somehow.
Pretty sure I’ve requested this in comments somewhere or other, but in any case I second the request for a special on reißen
I think I even made a draft for it already :)
I’ve never heard anyone say breadhead, but greedhead would work, or greedy-guts, or moneyhound (although I think I just made up that last one…)
Thanks, and feel better!
Danke :)
Oh and I need a mnemonic for off and of. I can’t see a system apart from the obvious prepositional vs adverbial use.
I don’t have a mnemonic (that’s hard to type), but I would say:
Off: the “f” is unvoiced. When you yell “get off” to your cat or something, that extra friction makes it satisfying to say. If you squint a little, you can also think of it as following the German rule “double consonant = short vowel.” Short meaning you hold it for a fraction of a second less than “of.” Sometimes anyway.
Of: the “f” is actually a voiced “v” thanks to the spelling reform English never had. At least in American English, you can hold the vowel a little longer (examples from Forvo). And it has the dreaded strut vowel (“uh”), which makes it do a couple interesting things. The consonant can drop off completely (“insteada”). Or you can draw out the vowel and use it as a sort of filler word when you’re thinking (“instead uhhhv”). At least I do that.
Of: the “f” is actually a voiced “v” thanks to the spelling reform English never had.
I have do disagree with that. I have not put it in to a spectral analysis (yet), but I am 100% sure that the end of the consonant is an unvoiced f sound.
But if you meant that the vowel lasts longer that’s a good hint.
However, that doesn’t help me when writing :D
Hi Emanuel. Maybe you know this already but the phrase “kick off” comes from football. The “kick off” the the first kick of the game. So maybe for the phrase “kick off” if you think of a football player kicking a ball so it goes up in the air (off the ground). Perhaps the football player is fred flintstone or someone else with two f’s in their name, then thats another way you can remember its with double F.
As for breadhead i may have heard this before but I’m not 100% sure… i knew what it meant based on knowing that some people (not me) call money bread (i prefer cash or sometimes dough). I’d probably just add “greedy” onto whatever curse word seemed appropriate e.g. “they are a bunch of greedy arseholes”…
Hmmm, I’ll keep the soccer image in my head and see how far that gets me with off vs of :)
Maybe the Brits or others can weigh in, but the f in “of” is absolutely voiced.
(At least for AE, I should have said. But I’m like 99.97% sure it’s universal, except for maybe some dialect or other.)
Which explains how you sometimes see the mistake “would of, could of” for “would’ve, could’ve.”
I really don’t think “District of Columbia” has a voiced “f”.
I think it only gets voiced when there’s a voiced element following, like “Legend of Zelda”.
I’ve seen the IPA transcript for “of” and it does say “voiced” but regardless… I’m not convinced.
Hmm, *eeenteresting*: I’m not a Brit, but Adelaideans aren’t too far away from the residents of some parts of England, as far as pronunciation is concerned. “Of Mice and Men”, “The Lord of the Rings”, “the city of Adelaide”. It’s most definitely a “v” sound in all those occurrences of “of”, as least when you pronounce things relatively carefully. The “v”-ness certainly softens a lot if you accelerate the pronunciation of these titles, or in expressions such as your “District of Columbia”, but when slowly or carefully pronounced it’s still an “ov” (as in “ovulate” or “hover”).
Running through a few more examples, I think the really key difference is that when it’s pronounced quickly “of” starts with a schwa, but “off” never does, it’s always a relatively clear, short “o”. So then we can pretty much forget the back end of the words ;-)
Yeah, this is exactly right. In front of a non-voiced element, the voicing gets lost a bit in normal speech, but in all other circumstances – voiced consonants and vowels – it’s a “v.” (Unless of course it just gets dropped altogether: “a barrel o’ monkeys” or whatever.)
That’s a good point about the “long” vs. “short” forms of “of,” just like with “the,” not applying to “off.” In AE pronunciation, the vowel long form sounds different from “off” – it sounds like “uvv,” not “ovv” (in IPA, it’d be the upside-down v character) – so I think that’s another factor that makes it really hard for American native speakers to relate to the confusion, even though the spelling is so similar.
Wow, this is a real game changer in how I talk! I’ll have to retrain this word.
I find this fascinating. I’ve been thinking for a while about when the surrounding sounds might affect the voicing of F/V (which I think works a little different than some other consonant pairs). I thought I had it all figured out: F usually stays unvoiced no matter what, and V stays voiced, but might be said a little faster, quieter, or with less pressure. A few examples:
Same when the sounds are right next to each other:
I think that happens because the difference between F and V can change the meaning of the word.
BUT then I realized there’s at least one prominent exception. “Have to” – the V is very often pronounced like an F, especially when “to” is pronounced like a schwa (hafta go).
The only way I can think of to reconcile those two “rules” is that “have to” is basically a function word. It’s one unit. The main piece of info is the thing that comes after (have to finish, have to stay late). And it gets used so much that you start to say it as lazily (or economically) as possible.
“Of” also gets reduced because it’s a function word. That one’s interesting because there are 3 different ways to do that. (1) The sounds are all there, but fast and quiet. (2) Just the vowel is pronounced, a schwa. (3) Basically just the consonant is pronounced. Always a voiced V, and there’s a schwa in there, but barely (“District ‘v Columbia“).
Wow, I think you might hafe just helped me with these verb-noun spelling errors that I keep making, like “half – halve” and so on.
Using pronunciation does help me for those :)
I want to add another confirmation that “of” is voiced and “off” is unvoiced. But, I know at least one native speaker who pronounces them both unvoiced and you just figure out the meaning by the context. It always sounds off to me (pun fully intended), but he’s consistent so who am I to criticise I guess!
And I’m also now realising once again how much of a mess English is…
Noun (f) / verb (v) works until you start thinking about plurals, and then for some reason half and shelf becomes halves and shelves but safe and belief remain safes and beliefs. Why? Who can say honestly.
Oh yeah, good call. When I did a CELTA certification back in the day, I do remember particular bits on teaching “have to” (as well as “used to”).