False friends exist not only between foreign languages, but also between everyday language and academic German:
- The German “Handy” means a mobile phone. The English “handy” means practical, useful, good with one’s hands.
- The German “Home Office” means working from home. In English, the Home Office is the UK ministry of the interior.
- The English “didactic” describes a moralizing, lecturing manner and (hopefully) has nothing to do with our discipline, Fremdsprachendidaktik.
“‘False friends’ appear or sound like words in their own language, but have different meanings in others,” writes the linguist Chi Luu, offering a glimpse into how languages change (daily.jstor.org/friend-or-faux-the-linguistic-trickery-of-false-friends).
When many people hear vorlesungsfreie Zeit (the lecture-free period between semesters), they think of vacation, rest, and letting the soul dangle. Do they also think of grading exams, writing and publishing, reviews, grant proposals and talks, illustrating slides, reading and absorbing primary texts and research literature, drafting lecture and seminar plans for the new semester, updating teaching materials, international trips and conferences, further training, finally taking last year’s leftover vacation, emails-emails-emails… and so, a very intense working phase?
Which academic false friends come to mind for you?
Originally posted (in German) on Mastodon and LinkedIn, March 27, 2026.
