The Germans have a word for it: fremdschämen

A lot of people see German as an ugly language. It doesn't sound nice - all those throat-clearing 'ch' sounds, for example  "mit Ach und Krach" (by the skin of one's teeth). There's a video on YouTube on the various European words for "butterfly", which are all supposed to sound pretty until you come to the German word for it: "Schmetterling". 

How to pronounce butterfly in five languages

However, German has one major advantage and that is you can slam two words together to make a new one. And it can encapsulate in that one single word a concept that would take several words to explain in English. One of the most famous examples of this is "Schadenfreude" (literally "damage delight"). If you look it up, you'll find a definition along the lines of "taking a malicious delight in the misfortunes of others".

In this little series entitled "The Germans have a word for it", I'd like to share a few German words that I've collected over the years and for which the English-speaking world has no word.

The first in the series is "fremdschämen", a verb. It's relatively recent, having made it into Duden, the famous German dictionary, in 2009. It means that you yourself feel embarrassed on behalf of another person who is behaving in such a way that should make them feel embarrassed - but they're not. One possible translation is "vicarious embarrassment". LEO - an excellent online dictionary, one I often consult on a daily basis - suggests that "zum Fremdschämen" could be translated as "cringeworthy".

                    Die Rede des Politikers war so schlecht und peinlich, dass der gesamte Auftritt zum Fremdschämen war.

                    The politician's speech was so bad and awkward, that the entire performance was cringeworthy.