abwürgen

See also: Abwürgen

German

Etymology

From Middle High German abewürgen. Equivalent to ab- (off) +‎ würgen (to choke).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈapˌvʏrɡən/, [ˈʔäpˌʋʏɐ̯ɡŋ̍]
  • Audio (Germany):(file)
  • Hyphenation: ab‧wür‧gen

Verb

abwürgen (weak, third-person singular present würgt ab, past tense würgte ab, past participle abgewürgt, auxiliary haben) (informal, transitive)

  1. to silence; to cut off (brusquely prevent someone from finishing an utterance or inquiry)
  2. to stall (cause a manual-transmission engine to turn off by going too slowly for the selected gear)
  3. (figurative) to stall, to kneecap (cause to stop making progress, especially catastrophically so)
    • 2023 February 16, Christoph Giesen, Claus Hecking, “Wie China den deutschen Solartraum torpediert”, in Der Spiegel[1], →ISSN:
      Europas Solarbranche ist nahezu vollständig abhängig von Lieferungen aus China. Nun droht Peking implizit mit Exportbeschränkungen – und könnte damit die deutsche Energiewende abwürgen.
      Europe's solar industry is almost completely dependent on shipments from China. Now Beijing is implicitly threatening to limit its exports - which could kneecap German's energy transition.

Conjugation

Derived terms

Further reading

  • abwürgen” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
  • abwürgen” in Duden online
  • abwürgen” in Uni Leipzig: Wortschatz-Lexikon