Unheimlich

The German word unheimlich can be reasonably translated by the English word uncanny but is nonetheless used in English, particularly in psychology or philosophy and academia. This adoption is perhaps due to the well-known essay Das Unheimliche by psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, which looks at experiences that evoke uncanny feelings and why this may occur.  Unheimlich means literally “unhomely” and describes a feeling that arises when something is both familiar and strange at the same time, giving rise to discomfort and uncertainty and even spookiness.

The root word heimlich originally meant familiar or belonging to the home, although in modern use it means hidden or secret, so something that is unheimlich can also be something that has been revealed that would not normally be, as in the repressed memories that Freud postulated. Unheimlich, and uncanny, have often been used to describe the unease created in humans by robots, androids and automata which closely but imprecisely and disturbingly mimic humans, and in the modern day they and AI simulations are described as belonging to the Uncanny Valley, which is perhaps their home. ETA Hoffmann’s 1816 short story The Sandman introduced such an automaton, and Freud referred to that story in his essay.

Interestingly the English word uncanny commonly hints at the supernatural or miraculous and is not actually the opposite of the English word canny. Canny today means astute, shrewd, or quick-thinking, from a root word ken, meaning knowledge or understanding, so the uncanny is in a sense that which is outside one’s normal knowledge or perception, and therefore unsettling.