different between zeitgeist vs geist

English

Alternative forms

• Zeitgeist

Etymology

Borrowed from German Zeitgeist (literally “time-spirit”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?tsa?t?a?st/, /?za?t?a?st/

Noun

zeitgeist (plural zeitgeists or zeitgeister or zeitgeisten)

1. The spirit of the age; the taste, outlook, and spirit characteristic of a period.

   Synonyms: spiritus mundi, temper of the times, tenor of the times

   • 1996, Michael Vanden Heuvel, Elmer Rice: A Research and Production Sourcebook, Greenwood Publishing Group ?ISBN

     After quickly summarizing the zeitgeisten of the Greek, Elizabethan, and early modern periods and their effects on the theatre, Rice turns to the contemporary world.

Usage notes

• The German term, Zeitgeist, is commonly not pluralized. Geist (“ghost, spirit”) however has the plural Geister.

Derived terms

• zeitgeisty

See also

• sign of the times

Translations

Further reading

• zeitgeist on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Danish

Alternative forms

• Zeitgeist

Etymology

From German Zeitgeist.

Noun

zeitgeist c (singular definite zeitgeisten, not used in plural form)

1. zeitgeist
   • 2013, Lars Holger Holm, Kenneth Maximilian Geneser, Gotisk ?ISBN, page 140

     De bliver dermed til et fænomen i tiden, til tidsbilleder, som kan tydes og bruges i en afsøgning af zeitgeisten.

     They thus become a phenomenon of the time, time-images, that may be deciphered and used in an investigation of the zeitgeist.

   • 2010, Henrik List, Sidste nat i kødbyen, Lindhardt og Ringhof ?ISBN

     Og hvem ville så bryde sig om at være lyseslukker til zeitgeistens swingerfest? Hvem ville så sige nej tak til en plads i VIP-afdelingen til den store, subkulturelle love-in?

     And who would then like to be a party-pooper at the swinger's party of the zeitgeist? Who would then refuse a spot in the VIP section at the big, subcultural love-in?

Declension

Synonyms

• tidsånd

Portuguese

Etymology

Borrowed from German Zeitgeist.

Noun

zeitgeist m (plural zeitgeists)

1. (sociology) zeitgeist (the dominant set of ideals and beliefs of an era)

English

Etymology

From German Geist (“spirit, ghost, mind”). Doublet of ghost.

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -a?st

Noun

geist (plural geists)

1. Ghost, apparition.
   • 1877, The spiritual magazine:

     The geists eat and drink, but only as geists — not as spirits. ' We have dined,' they say ' sumptuously.' A vapour- ... If dead men tell no tales, their geists will tell them, if they find opportunity.

   • 1996, Stephen Barker, Excavations and Their Objects:

     [...] it makes no difference whether these figures were real, corporeal beings or not, since each one, in terms of Freud's (auto) aesthetic, is a spirit, a geist, a complex function of Freud's worldview.

2. Spirit (of a group, age, era, etc).
   • 1995, Donald Pizer, The Cambridge Companion to American Realism and Naturalism:

     [...] a term badly applied, as the method is neither a historicism (the belief that each era or period has a geist, principle of identity, or a definable sense of destiny) nor new.

Related terms

• poltergeist
• zeitgeist

References

• OED, geist

Anagrams

• gites, gîtes, tiges

Estonian

Noun

geist

1. elative singular of gei

Old High German

Alternative forms

• gheist, keist

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *gaist, from Proto-Germanic *gaistaz.

Noun

geist m (plural geista)

1. spirit

Declension

Descendants

• Middle High German: geist
  • German: Geist
    • ? English: geist
    • ? Danish: gejst
    • ? Swedish: geist
    • ? Norwegian Bokmål: geist
  • Hunsrik: Geest, Geist
  • Luxembourgish: Geescht
  • Yiddish: ?????? (gayst)