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Glossary entry

Dutch term or phrase:

Overal heerscht de kastegeest en domperij!

English translation:

caste mentality and intolerance prevails everywhere

Added to glossary by W Schouten
Apr 10, 2012 09:41
12 yrs ago
Dutch term

Overal heerscht de kastegeest en domperij!

Dutch to English Other Poetry & Literature Domperij
Artist (Van Doesburg) raving against established society at the beginning of the 20st century, all help very much appreciated!
Proposed translations (English)
3 +3 caste mentality and intolerance prevails everywhere
3 arrogance and blindness
3 The ghost of the elite and his narrow-mindedness (still) rules everywhere.
3 There's elitism and religious obscurantism everywhere

Discussion

Terry Costin Apr 12, 2012:
There are two, common, historical and intellectual, denotations: 1) restricting knowledge—opposition to the spread of knowledge, a policy of withholding knowledge from the public, and, 2) deliberate obscurity—an abstruse style (as in literature and art) characterized by deliberate vagueness
Terry Costin Apr 12, 2012:
Author said... Spoke to the author Paul Bordewijk (by e-mailing him) who wrote in his book: In dat verband noemt hij aan de ene kant tolerantie en vrijheid, en daartegenover voorzichtigheid en domperij

Asked what he meant by domperij, he said;

De term 'domperij' komt uit het boekje van Jos Palm. Het is geen erg gebruikelijke term. Hij is denk ik afgeleid van 'domper'. De uitdrukking 'hij zet er een domper op' betekent 'hij maakt een eind aan het enthousiasme'. Het komt dus in de buurt van onderdrukking, wat u noemt (oppressed).

Thus not intolerance or else the writers using this little-used word would have simply written intolerantie but the DUTCH word 'intolerantie' does not convey the same sense/message/content that domperij does.


Obscurantism (French: obscurantisme, from the Latin obscurans, “darkening”) is the practice of deliberately preventing the facts or the full details of some matter from becoming known.

CONTINUED
Peter van der Hoek Apr 11, 2012:
"Domperij is not intolerance". This might shed some light: http://www.wnt.inl.nl/iWDB/search?actie=article_content&wdb=...
Terry Costin Apr 11, 2012:
Dutch words 1/ If intolerance was meant, then why did the author not simply use that word in Dutch, as the English and Dutch versions are almost identical and mean exactly the same thing?

2/ If mentality was meant then why not use the Dutch word mentaliteit in the original?
Terry Costin Apr 10, 2012:
Keep em down - dumbing down Friedrich Nietzsche said:

“The essential element in the black art of obscurantism is not that it wants to darken individual understanding, but that it wants to blacken our picture of the world, and darken our idea of existence.”
freekfluweel Apr 10, 2012:
@ASKER Well, there's absolutely nothing positive about that sentence. Van Doesburg was raged because the public wasn't open to new, abstract, experimental art (non-figurative), they were stuck in old habits. "Domperij" here, is more like the public sticking to oldness, muffyness, mouldness, clamminess, not necessarily intolerance. Although mainly autodidact, V.D. started out as a figurative painter (Amsterdam School).

Proposed translations

+3
34 mins
Selected

caste mentality and intolerance prevails everywhere

my suggestion

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Note added at 35 mins (2012-04-10 10:16:39 GMT)
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sorry - prevail!
Note from asker:
Thank you Madeleine that is brilliant I could only think of 'negativity'(-;
Peer comment(s):
agree Dr Lofthouse
2 hrs
agree Verginia Ophof
8 hrs
agree F Scott Ophof (X) : 'Blinders' might fit better than 'intolerance' (see discussion by FreekFluweel).)
10 hrs
neutral freekfluweel : "prevail" is too positive; "kastegeest" en "domperij" is not exactly a prevailing wind
1 day 5 hrs
neutral Terry Costin : if intolerance was meant, why was the Dutch word intolerantie not used in the original?
1 day 7 hrs
Something went wrong...
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Thank you very much for your help(-:"
7 hrs

arrogance and blindness

'Wherever one turns, one finds only arrogance and blindness"

I think you have to look at the totality of the sentence here, instead of translating individual words.

"Arrogance and blindness" is a religious concept, always mentioned together to avoid the heavier definition of 'religious obscurantism"
the same as in the posted sentence, I suppose.
Something went wrong...
1 day 6 hrs

The ghost of the elite and his narrow-mindedness (still) rules everywhere.

V.D. felt helpless and yearned for a new (possibilty) of artistic perception. He felt that the existing art was already dead.



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Note added at 1 dag6 uren (2012-04-11 16:10:21 GMT)
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"domper" in the meaning of to kill any intiative immediately

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Note added at 1 dag6 uren (2012-04-11 16:25:05 GMT)
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"heerscht" here is: to rule, not "there is"

"narrow-minded" as opposite to "open-minded" V.D. wanted the public to have AT LEAST a look at new ideas.

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Note added at 1 dag7 uren (2012-04-11 16:47:18 GMT)
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the ghost of elitism
Peer comment(s):
agree Peter van der Hoek : This probably comes closest.
7 hrs
Danks!
disagree Terry Costin : The intro was or is Overal heerst (as in that was 'the case' at the time (in that sentence no person and ghost is not the same as spirit)
13 hrs
I'm sorry, he was speaking in the PRESENT tense! 'Heerscht' really is: to RULE. 'Overal' here is being adressed as a person! It's the ghost that's preventing new art although he represents something already dead. (no more char. left)
Something went wrong...
3 hrs

There's elitism and religious obscurantism everywhere

Caste in British English, I think, would tend to make people think almost exclusively of India.

Where class is not the concept being expressed, then 'kaste' would mean, I think, elitism, which is far clearer than what the Van Dale says with its 'caste spirit'.

I doubt that many British English speakers would get what someone meant by caste spirit (especially because caste is pronounced in exactly the same as cast is) not immediately and not through listening.

Elitism is very clear.
Those in a closed (to others) social orders.

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Note added at 3 hrs (2012-04-10 13:26:09 GMT)
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Corrections
1/ Caste is pronounced in exactly the same way as cast is

2/ Those in closed social orders

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Note added at 6 hrs (2012-04-10 16:09:04 GMT)
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@ ASKER:

Friedrich Nietzsche said:

“The essential element in the black art of obscurantism is not that it wants to darken individual understanding, but that it wants to blacken our picture of the world, and darken our idea of existence.”

You could use obscurantism with the word religious

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Note added at 1 day8 hrs (2012-04-11 17:49:51 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

oops, correction: you could use the word obscurantism 'without''using the word relgious
Note from asker:
I like the 'elitism' suggestion but not sure about the 'religious obcurantism' though...
Something went wrong...
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