By using our site, you acknowledge that you have read and understand our German Language Stack Exchange is a bilingual question and answer site for speakers of all levels who want to share and increase their knowledge of the German language. To which I'd like to expand, suppose the name of a male is Looks awfully redundant, but no part can be left out without changing the meaning quite significantly.And since "Jawohl" attracts so much attention here, another example illustrating a strictly non-military, but hierarchical context:Jawohl, Herr Unterkammerherr. "Jawohl" does not indicate military context, and definitely not "strongly" - waiters or hotel person staff and sometimes even sales people also would use this.I think outside of the military context, an unironic "Jawohl" is only used out of habit by (former) soldiers.

Another example is Kaufmann, in English this compares e.g. There is no real logic for the horses' neighing since most of the time there is no way they could even see or hear Frau Blucher or the people saying her name. But I am not going to debate you because it would just lead to a boring off-topic discussion about semantics.

Featured on Meta So wird die "Frau Hauptmann" ebenso normal sein wie die "Frau Bootsmann", die es bei den Sanitäterinnen schon seit 25 Jahren gibt.So a woman would be called "Frau Hauptmann" if she was the captain of a company.Anyway, I still think that your friend wanted to call you "captain" and tried to be politically correct by using what he thought was the female form of the word.I believe this to be a variant of the somewhat more common ‘Jawohl, Herr Hauptmann!’ It is a phrase associated with accepting the order of your superior in the military. German Language Stack Exchange works best with JavaScript enabled Somehow an explanation for this running gag arose, claiming the hidden reason for the horses' reaction was that Frau Blucher's name sounds like the German word for glue, and implying that the horses fear ending up in a glue factory. )"Hauptfrau" seems to be a feminized version of "Hauptmann", a rank in the German army equivalent to a Captain in the US Army. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top However, the term "Hauptfrau" is incorrect. Stack Exchange network consists of 177 Q&A communities including Detailed answers to any questions you might have Discuss the workings and policies of this site

(As I have never been in the military, I cannot tell you how high up a In the combination of both, we have the title (which happens to be It does seem a little comical even to German speakers but it is undoubtedly grammatically correct.Thanks for contributing an answer to German Language Stack Exchange!

It's not quite clear what you mean saying lower case? Military ranks do not get gendered. Neither "Mr." nor "-man" are redundant. @PaŭloEbermann I knew that sooner or later someone would claim that. Recent Examples on the Web Harry's alter ego is a dull breadwinner who, like most male suburbanites, bores his hausfrau (Jamie Lee Curtis) with the minutiae of his drab job. Next time your friend writes this, I recommend to establish your military authority by responding with: "Es heißt 'Jawohl Frau HauptSource: I used to be a soldier in the German army and got scolded for making this mistake once.Normally when I hear the word "Hauptfrau" I would translate it as "first wife" or "head wife". (Yes sir, Mr under chamberlain. Turns out that director Mel Brooks was just having some fun with a classic cinematic "villain" gag from old melodramas. "Jawohl" is the preferred way to affirm an order in the German army.So the military correct way to respond to an order from a female Hauptmann and/or to mock a woman who is acting like one would be "Jawohl, Frau Hauptmann". Because "Herr" is Mr., his spouse would be Mrs.: Frau. For women, this Herr becomes Frau in all contexts: Frau Müller, Frau Schaffnerin, Frau Bundeskanzlerin. Neither "Mr." nor "-man" are redundant.In my opinion, "Jawohl" is strongly indicating military context. Learn more about Stack Overflow the company "Frau", the German word equivalent of "Mrs." in English.