"luftmensch" meaning in All languages combined

See luftmensch on Wiktionary

Noun [English]

Forms: luftmenschen [plural]
Etymology: From Yiddish לופֿטמענטש (luftmentsh), from לופֿט (luft, “air”) + מענטש (mentsh, “man”). Compare German von Luft und Liebe leben (“to disregard the practical matters of life”, literally “to live on air and love”), German Luftikus (“impractical, quixotic, or careless person”). The word first appeared in Yiddish literature in 1860s (Nicolas Vallois, "The Luftmentsh as an economic metaphor for Jewish poverty: a rhetorical analysis"). Etymology templates: {{bor|en|yi|לופֿטמענטש}} Yiddish לופֿטמענטש (luftmentsh), {{m|yi|לופֿט||air}} לופֿט (luft, “air”), {{m|yi|מענטש||man}} מענטש (mentsh, “man”), {{cog|de|von Luft und Liebe leben|lit=to live on air and love|t=to disregard the practical matters of life}} German von Luft und Liebe leben (“to disregard the practical matters of life”, literally “to live on air and love”), {{cog|de|Luftikus|t=impractical, quixotic, or careless person}} German Luftikus (“impractical, quixotic, or careless person”) Head templates: {{en-noun|luftmenschen}} luftmensch (plural luftmenschen)
  1. One more concerned with airy intellectual pursuits than practical matters like earning an income.
    Sense id: en-luftmensch-en-noun-axJ30Odu
  2. (Yiddish usage) a beggar, petty trader, peddler, and various types of paupers
    Sense id: en-luftmensch-en-noun-lYyXB-7G Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 43 57

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for luftmensch meaning in All languages combined (2.5kB)

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  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "yi",
        "3": "לופֿטמענטש"
      },
      "expansion": "Yiddish לופֿטמענטש (luftmentsh)",
      "name": "bor"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "yi",
        "2": "לופֿט",
        "3": "",
        "4": "air"
      },
      "expansion": "לופֿט (luft, “air”)",
      "name": "m"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "yi",
        "2": "מענטש",
        "3": "",
        "4": "man"
      },
      "expansion": "מענטש (mentsh, “man”)",
      "name": "m"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "de",
        "2": "von Luft und Liebe leben",
        "lit": "to live on air and love",
        "t": "to disregard the practical matters of life"
      },
      "expansion": "German von Luft und Liebe leben (“to disregard the practical matters of life”, literally “to live on air and love”)",
      "name": "cog"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "de",
        "2": "Luftikus",
        "t": "impractical, quixotic, or careless person"
      },
      "expansion": "German Luftikus (“impractical, quixotic, or careless person”)",
      "name": "cog"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "From Yiddish לופֿטמענטש (luftmentsh), from לופֿט (luft, “air”) + מענטש (mentsh, “man”). Compare German von Luft und Liebe leben (“to disregard the practical matters of life”, literally “to live on air and love”), German Luftikus (“impractical, quixotic, or careless person”).\nThe word first appeared in Yiddish literature in 1860s (Nicolas Vallois, \"The Luftmentsh as an economic metaphor for Jewish poverty: a rhetorical analysis\").",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "luftmenschen",
      "tags": [
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  "head_templates": [
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      "args": {
        "1": "luftmenschen"
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      "expansion": "luftmensch (plural luftmenschen)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "My wife is such a luftmensch she missed our anniversary dinner because she was too busy reading her books!"
        },
        {
          "ref": "March 24, 2007, Helen McLean, “Marc of Distinction”, in The Globe and Mail, Books, page D6",
          "text": "Chagall was a luftmensch, he says, a man of the air...",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "One more concerned with airy intellectual pursuits than practical matters like earning an income."
      ],
      "id": "en-luftmensch-en-noun-axJ30Odu"
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "43 57",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "a beggar, petty trader, peddler, and various types of paupers"
      ],
      "id": "en-luftmensch-en-noun-lYyXB-7G",
      "qualifier": "Yiddish usage",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(Yiddish usage) a beggar, petty trader, peddler, and various types of paupers"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "luftmensch"
}
{
  "categories": [
    "English countable nouns",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
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    "English nouns with irregular plurals",
    "English terms borrowed from Yiddish",
    "English terms derived from Yiddish"
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
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      "args": {
        "1": "en",
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      "name": "bor"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "yi",
        "2": "לופֿט",
        "3": "",
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      },
      "expansion": "לופֿט (luft, “air”)",
      "name": "m"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "yi",
        "2": "מענטש",
        "3": "",
        "4": "man"
      },
      "expansion": "מענטש (mentsh, “man”)",
      "name": "m"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "de",
        "2": "von Luft und Liebe leben",
        "lit": "to live on air and love",
        "t": "to disregard the practical matters of life"
      },
      "expansion": "German von Luft und Liebe leben (“to disregard the practical matters of life”, literally “to live on air and love”)",
      "name": "cog"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "de",
        "2": "Luftikus",
        "t": "impractical, quixotic, or careless person"
      },
      "expansion": "German Luftikus (“impractical, quixotic, or careless person”)",
      "name": "cog"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "From Yiddish לופֿטמענטש (luftmentsh), from לופֿט (luft, “air”) + מענטש (mentsh, “man”). Compare German von Luft und Liebe leben (“to disregard the practical matters of life”, literally “to live on air and love”), German Luftikus (“impractical, quixotic, or careless person”).\nThe word first appeared in Yiddish literature in 1860s (Nicolas Vallois, \"The Luftmentsh as an economic metaphor for Jewish poverty: a rhetorical analysis\").",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "luftmenschen",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "luftmenschen"
      },
      "expansion": "luftmensch (plural luftmenschen)",
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  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
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        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "My wife is such a luftmensch she missed our anniversary dinner because she was too busy reading her books!"
        },
        {
          "ref": "March 24, 2007, Helen McLean, “Marc of Distinction”, in The Globe and Mail, Books, page D6",
          "text": "Chagall was a luftmensch, he says, a man of the air...",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "One more concerned with airy intellectual pursuits than practical matters like earning an income."
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "a beggar, petty trader, peddler, and various types of paupers"
      ],
      "qualifier": "Yiddish usage",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(Yiddish usage) a beggar, petty trader, peddler, and various types of paupers"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "luftmensch"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-20 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (1d5a7d1 and 304864d). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.