# objectify



## trigel

What is the closest equivalent to "objectify" (as in seeing a woman as an object of sexual desire/tool of sexual gratification) in Hebrew?


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## arielipi

להחפיץ
מלשון חפץ.


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## tFighterPilot

להחפיץ from the root ח.פ.ץ with the הפעיל binyan.

edit: damn, too late


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## ystab

The Hebrew Academy came up in 2005 with the word הַחְפָּצָה as an eqivalent term for objectivation (comes from חֵפֶץ, which is the Hebrew word for _object_), thus _to objectify_ would be translated as לְהַחְפִּיץ. Nevertheless, this term is not widely accepted. I think I've also heard חִפְצוּן (v. לְחַפְצֵן) as an alternative for _objectivation_. Have in mind that these neologisms might sound awkward, so, as usual, it's better to post a full sentence, and according to context we will be able to help you better.


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## trigel

"Objectify/objectification" in English is in the vast majority of cases used in that sense, viewing/portraying women as sexual objects. 
An example of "objectify": "Many television shows and works of fiction objectify female characters by making them sexually attractive, ironically at the same time that they strengthen them."


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## ystab

I am in favor of "pure" Hebrew terms, so I would use לְהַחְפִּיץ, but if you find it peculiar you can use הפך [מישהו] לאובייקט )מיני( or הציג [מישהו] כאובייקט )מיני(, etc., since the phrase אובייקט מיני is quite common.


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## origumi

החפצה exists, yet be careful when using it. Sounds unnatural, as an attempt to Englishize Hebrew (or follow extreme feminist views, or enlist pseudo-intellectual terminology, and alike). Also, many Hebrew speakers are likely to say hakh*f*atza instead of hakh*p*atza, which makes it even more synthetic.


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## airelibre

origumi said:


> החפצה exists, yet be careful when using it. Sounds unnatural, as an attempt to Englishize Hebrew (or follow extreme feminist views, or enlist pseudo-intellectual terminology, and alike). Also, many Hebrew speakers are likely to say hakh*f*atza instead of hakh*p*atza, which makes it even more synthetic.



Just out of curiosity, why do you say that the use of החפצה is English, when the term is invented from a Hebrew root? 
Also, why would people say hakhfatza? That sounds very strange to me.


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## trigel

The term is essentially a calque of what was originally English (object.ific.ation: ח.פ.צ+hif'il+gerund) and represents a concept that is unfamiliar/not used in Hebrew. And hif'il is not a very productive binyan in the first place in contemporary Hebrew; the vast majority of new verbs are piel and hitpael. So when you use it it might come across as forcing Hebrew to derive English concepts.

I'm not sure but I guess the vowel on ח is originally supposed to be a "xataf" vowel, which lenites the following פ into f. Most speakers don't pronounce the xataf vowels on xet, yielding "haxfatza". If the first radical was kaf then haxpatza would be correct.
Or a bit more uncharitably the Hebrew speakers in question just take the root x.f.tz from "xofetz".


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## hadronic

Conversely, you have examples of xataf which does not lenite the following consonant, which I find weird : מהפכה mahapekha.


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## amikama

When a new verb is derived from an existing noun with בכ"פ _rafot_, these letters sometimes do not become _degushot_ in some (all?) of the conjugations of the new verb, going against the rules of the _binyan_​ (apparently to preserve the "original" sound of בכ"פ of the noun).

Examples:
כּוכֿב > לְכּכֿב, כּיכֿב (_binyan pi'el_)
חבֿר > להתחבֿר (to befriend, probably to distinguish it from להתחבּר which means "to become joined/connected")
חפֿץ > החפֿצה

To my best knowledge, this phenomenon is relatively new (recent decades?) and considered colloquial and non-standard Hebrew. The "correct" forms are לְכֿכּב, כּיכּב, להתחבּר, החפּצה.


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## ystab

hadronic said:


> Conversely, you have examples of xataf which does not lenite the following consonant, which I find weird : מהפכה mahapekha.



That is not quite the case. Sometimes, for a reason I haven't figured out yet, the letters: ה, ח, ע do tolerate _schwa nach_. This is the case with מַהְפֵּכָה (but נֶהֱפַך) and מַעְבָּרָה (but מַעֲבָר) and מַעֲתָּק (but הֶעֱתִיק).


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## hadronic

But do you pronounce _maapekha _or _mapekha _​? (Provided that you talk the h-dropping dialect)


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## arielipi

mahapecha is what we say


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## C_J

This also happens with "old" nouns and verbs.
One example that comes  to mind is "תֶּפֶר > הוא תָּפַר" where the פ pronounced as rafah in  virtually all derrived words from this stem even when it's explicitly פ  degusha (נִתְפַּר).

I assume that people use the pronunciation that they remember from the more popular words derrived from the stem and not as it supposed to be by the rules.
This can also be seen in the systematic mispronunciation of prefixes (אותיות השמוש) like בכל"ם when proper pronunciation occurs only at some frequently occuring forms such as "בַּבַּיִת" but more rare ones such as "בְּבֵיתִי" will be commonly mispronounced as "בְּבְּיתִי" (and even more commonly will be replaced by "בבית שלי").

I guess this is the result of the gradual loss of alophony in the בכ"פ pairs.

BTW mahapecha will be "maapecha" with h-dropping


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## hadronic

I went across another similar phenomenon : מרבד in the meaning of carpet, is pronounced _marvad _with soft b.
The only instances I knew of soft letters after shva nakh, was construct plural of segholate nouns ( מלכי malkhei) and the CaCCan pattern (חסכן khaskhan).


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## trigel

hadronic said:


> I went across another similar phenomenon : מרבד in the meaning of carpet, is pronounced _marvad _with soft b.
> The only instances I knew of soft letters after shva nakh, was construct plural of segholate nouns ( מלכי malkhei) and the CaCCan pattern (חסכן khaskhan).



Shva meraxef, which is vocal shva following a "short" vowel, unlike shva na` which follows a long vowel. Shva na` is a _strict subset_ of vocal shva.


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## hadronic

This is what I was refering to. But here is a very unique instance of it. Do you have other examples (which are not already accounted for, like malkhei, malkhut, khaskhan..) ?


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