Organisation

Forms

Organisation f (genitive Organisation, plural Organisationen)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French organisation, borrowed in the second half of the 17th century.^[2][3][4] The Grimms' dictionary traces the French noun further to New Latin organisatio.^[5] It belongs to organiser (“to organize”), a derivative of organe (“organ, tool”) modelled on Medieval Latin organizō (“to shape with tools”), and goes back through Latin organum (“tool, instrument”) to Ancient Greek ὄργανον (órganon, “tool, instrument, organ of sense”), which stands in ablaut with ἔργον (érgon, “work”).^[6][2]

Kluge treats it as the abstract noun of organisieren, borrowed from French in the 18th century.^[6] The same word is English organization.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

At first the word was used in medicine, natural science and philosophy for the build and state of the human body and soul.^[2] Herder and Kant use it for the activity that forms an organism and for the structure of a living being: Herder compares plants and animals with respect to the Organisation of man.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Under the influence of the ideas of the French Revolution the word was transferred in the 18th century to the institutions of the state and to economic and political bodies.^[2] Kant noted that it had recently been used very aptly, during the remaking of a great people into a state, for the arrangement of the magistracies and of the whole body politic, and he also speaks of the Organisation of a university.^[5] In the 19th century it came to mean the systematic preparation of a process or a piece of work, and in the 20th century a union of people such as an association or a party.^[2]

In medicine it also names the conversion of dead tissue into connective tissue.^[7][8] Romanian organizație was borrowed from German.^[1]

Timeline

• Second half of the 17th century – Borrowed from French, at first in medicine and philosophy.^[2][3]
• 18th century – Used of the state and of political and economic bodies.^[2]
• 1803 – A remonstrance at Würzburg protests against the coming Organisation of the university.^[5]
• 19th century – First record of the sense “systematic preparation of a process”.^[2]
• 20th century – First record of the sense “association, party”.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act of organizing something: Die Organisation des Festes lag bei ihr.^[7]
2. The structure or make-up of an institution: die Organisation der Verwaltung.^[7][8]
3. The joining together of people to pursue common interests.^[7]
4. An organization, association or union of people with common aims: eine gemeinnützige Organisation.^[7][1]
5. (biology) The body plan of an organism, the form and arrangement of its organs.^[8]
6. (medicine) The conversion of dead tissue into connective tissue with blood vessels.^[7][8]

Related words

• organisieren
• Organisator
• Organ
• Organismus
• organisch
• English organization

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
3. ^ a b Wiktionary, das freie Wörterbuch (German Wiktionary), de.wiktionary.org
4. ^ Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2007), 4th ed., Duden vol. 7, Mannheim: Dudenverlag
5. ^ a b c d Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 13, 1339
6. ^ a b c Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 673
7. ^ a b c d e f Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
8. ^ a b c d Duden. Das Fremdwörterbuch (2007), 9th ed., Duden vol. 5, Mannheim: Dudenverlag