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Around the World Cup in Qatar, football becomes a ubiquitous topic. Listening closely is not only interesting for fans, but also for science. “Football linguist” Simon Meier-Vieracker knows why.
SRF: Why does a linguist deal with football language?
Simon Meier-Vieracker: On the one hand, the amount of what is said and written about football is unbelievably large. Around 10 percent of the text material in German daily newspapers deals with the subject of football. So we can’t avoid it if we want to research contemporary language.
On the other hand, I’m interested in the tension between routine and creativity: football is always the same in one way: 22 people chasing a ball for 90 minutes. But in order to keep telling this in an exciting way, new ways of describing it are always being found.
What makes the language of football special?
It is a special language that manages with surprisingly few real technical terms. There are expressions like «counterpressing». But other than that, the language of football is primarily visual.
The images come from a wide variety of areas. This begins with war metaphors such as “attack” or “defense”, continues with theatrical metaphors such as the “director” and ends with culinary delights. For example, there is talk of the “icing on the cake”.
Lots of phrases are thrown around in football.
It is mainly phrasemongering, one often hears. What does the researcher say?
Yes, a lot of phrases are thrown around in football. On the one hand, this has to do with the routine that I mentioned at the beginning. On the other hand, rhetoric in football is almost a cultural asset. It’s annoying, but it’s also kind of fun.
How is it in other languages?
There is a shared treasure trove of phrases in football across cultures. The metaphors of war, for example, can be found in many languages. Or phrases such as “one-way street football” can be found in English, among other things.
But there are also cultural differences: we say a team pulls out all the stops, a metaphor from organ playing. In Spanish, the equivalent is “poner toda la carne en el asador” (to put all the meat on the grill), a culinary metaphor.
There are also nuances in the individual languages, small but fine details: if German means “let the butter be taken from the bread”, Dutch means “let the cheese be taken from the bread”.
Legend:
Keystone/Gian Ehrenzeller
The phrases in football language come from a wide variety of areas. Conversely, umpteen expressions from football have also crept into everyday language: If you need to calm down, you should keep the ball low, and if you treat someone else unfairly, you commit a serious foul.
Examples of the SRF dialect editors here.
How has the language of football changed in recent decades?
Because playing styles have changed, new terms have emerged or old ones have disappeared: people didn’t talk about “counterpressing” in the past.
On the other hand, surprisingly little has changed. Many phrases that thresh like today were threshed decades ago. The radio report on the “Miracle of Bern” in 1954 is recommended. For example, there is the phrase “someone turns on the turbo”. That sounds very modern.
There are examples of male-dominated talk about football at all levels.
Football was dominated by men for a long time – and often still is today. How does that show up when you talk about football?
“Women’s football” as a term is already telling. “Football” as a standard means men’s football. In other sports, such as tennis or skiing, this does not exist.
There are also phrases like “real men’s football” for a particularly combative style of play. Such examples of the fact that talking about football is also male-dominated can be found at all levels.
Vera Büchi conducted the interview.