schoonheid

I don't claim to be a linguist -- and I always welcome the perspective of those countless men and women who know Dutch better than I do -- but every now and then, I notice something interesting with the ways that Dutch and English match up (or fail to match up) with each other... Recently, I've been intrigued by the translations of the word schoonheid.

Beauty. Cleanliness. In-laws... As far as I can tell, the Dutch language makes no verbal distinction between these concepts which, to an English-speaker, are so apart.

A woman or a city or a jewel can be noted for its beauty -- its schoonheid. The place where one goes to have her hair styled and nails manicured is often marked by the title schoonheid salon above the door... Simultaneously, a dining establishment or someone's home can be admired for its cleanliness -- its schoonheid. When you spend a lot of time dusting and vacuuming and scrubbing a house, your actions are described as schoonmaken... And well, although it's a bit of a stretch, I guess I can make some sense out of the link between these two concepts -- especially when you've seen how high a cultural value is placed on cleanliness (I know of no other people who clean as thoroughly and as well as the Dutch)...

But "in-laws"? I'm not exactly sure how this usage of the Dutch word matches up with the others. Yet the word for the family into which you marry is schoonfamilie. Your mother-in-law would be your schoonmoeder. Your brother's wife would be called your schoonzus... The prefix is the same, but as far as I'm aware there's no expectation for one's in-laws to be exceptionally clean, or exceptionally beautiful.

I love stumbling across such little quirks of language and social study. Such cultural relics may be meaningless and confusing, but at least they're interesting.