The German word über has found a place in American English. A New Jersey man says he and his colleagues find it to be more versatile than a Swiss Army knife, as in, “He is uber in the middle of that situation,” “That was an uber meeting,” and “You guys are the language ubers.” This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Über”
Hi, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, Martha. Hi, Grant. This is Glenn from Princeton Junction, New Jersey.
What do you do there in Princeton Junction, New Jersey?
Well, I work in a large financial firm, and I am a project leader and a Six Sigma black belt.
Oh, hello, Six Sigma.
Whoa.
That’s a mess of jargon, if I’ve ever heard of a mess of jargon.
Yeah.
Six Sigma is a statistical term, and Six Sigma in this case is a philosophy of continuous improvement, and there’s a set of tools and methodologies to carry that out.
Oh, really?
So I’ve been trained in these, and I’m a black belt.
Improving business, right?
Whoa.
Yes.
So we better…
Oh, it’s not really karate?
No, no, no.
I was going to talk about how all I got was yellow tips.
No, it’s a business management philosophy. It’s usually suitable for big companies like GE, right?
Right. GE is well known for having a Six Sigma program. That’s correct.
Is that what you called us about today?
I work near and around technology. And every once in a while, new words come up. And here’s one that even though I feel older than the rocks that eventually form dirt, I still can pick up a new trick every once in a while. So a group of us geezers at work have latched on to the use of the word Uber as an intensifier. I was just curious about how it’s being used as an intensifier and what about other words that might be formed on Uber or Uber?
Yeah, well, so how are you guys using it around the office?
Well, real common examples, just like having an Uber meeting or somebody’s uber-confused or even I’ve heard things like, he is uber in the middle of this situation.
Oh, that’s nice.
Meaning very much so?
Very much so.
So like uber-meeting would be like a summit meeting, but it’s got more oomph, I think.
Or uber-confused would be totally confused, but sort of more, again, more oomph.
Okay.
The way you described it is consistent with the way that I see it.
I see it used as an adjective. An Uber meeting would be a super great meeting, right?
Or a Uber person would be a great person or a good person or a remarkable person, right?
I’ve seen it as an adverb, which is what you described. If you would say that somebody is, he is Uber good at that, he’s basically saying he’s very good.
And that’s an adverbial use of Uber.
The noun form is a lot rarer, and I’m hesitant to say that it’s widespread yet, but I could see how it could occur.
It would seem like a natural thing for this word.
Well, Glenn, thank you for pointing out the ubiquity of Uber.
Well, thank you.
I am overjoyed to have this chat with you.
Super intelligent Uber scholars.
We are the Ur-scholars.
The language Ubers.
I like it.
I like it, Glenn.
We may have to borrow that from you.
Well, thank you for your great shows.
I’ve enjoyed them for a very long time now.
Oh, thank you.
Oh, super.
Thank you so much.
Best of luck to you.
Super.
Uber.
Super.
Uber.
Bye-bye.
All right.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye, Grant.
Bye-bye, Martha.
Bye.
Get to the phone schnell.
1-877-929-WORD.
