Débrouillard: A Resourceful Person Who Can Cope with Any Situation - French
On a vital human trait and the preference of being a specialist vs generalist, or... being a jack of all trades?
Etymology: de + brouiller, coming from Latin brodiculāre (to pollute) and brodium (mixture)
Débrouillard, in French, refers to a well-equipped person who can handle any difficulty in some way, with ease. At first glance, it appears to have a strong and positive connotation, which it does. Being resourceful is a desired personality trait regardless of the issue; I’m fully convinced now, after I read in The New York Times with misty eyes Anthony Bourdain’s article, one of the world's most envied and attractive chefs, talking about being a débrouillard.
“Whether familiar with the term or not, I have always assigned great value to débrouillards, and at various times in my career, particularly when I was a line cook, I have taken great pride in being one. The ability to think fast, to adapt, to improvise when in danger of falling "in the weeds" or dans la merde, even if a little corner-cutting is required, has been a point of pride with me for years. My previous sous-chef, Steven, a very talented cook with a criminal mind, was a Grandmaster Débrouillard, a Sergeant Bilko-like character who, in addition to being a superb saucier, was fully versed in the manly arts of scrounging, refrigeration repair, surreptitious entry, intelligence collection, subornation, and the effortless acquisition of objects which did not rightly belong to him. He was a very useful person to have around. If I ran out of calves' liver or shell steaks in the middle of a busy Saturday night, Steven could be counted on to slip out the kitchen door and return a few moments later with whatever I needed. Where he got the stuff I never knew. I only knew not to ask. System D, to work right, requires a certain level of plausible deniability.”
If I have to be honest, and I certainly am, I'm not what you would call a débrouillard, especially in practical matters. I can't tinker; I've never liked building Legos or puzzles. I'm better at theoretical things; I think the fact that I studied mathematics at university proves that a bit, or my tendency to literature and abstract subjects.
On the other hand, being a débrouillard seems to be one of the vital human qualities today, in a world where everything is changing at the speed of light and where we are expected to have the skills of a driver on the F1 track.
A tiny reminder: We need to keep up with artificial intelligence when it appears unexpectedly in the middle of our lives, like a mole suddenly poking its head out of the ground. Or when a virus makes us unable to leave the house, unable to see another human being, we are expected to survive, to keep making money, continue being sane.
Maybe we are expected to be jacks of all trades.
We have the right to be specialists in some invisible subjects, but more often than not, we are expected to be generalists. Those who are curious about the depths of the intellectual soils of earth are given the utmost respect, while the general public is expected to be the kind of people who sneak around and learn a little bit about everything.
It sounds like what I'm doing right now, doesn’t it?
What else would you call it when I write a text that touches a little bit on philosophy but never goes deeper, winking at psychology, even gastronomy? Moreover, given that the newsletter’s general concept is linguistic. If I go on any longer, I will have to delete everything I have written, so I stop here and greet all my readers with compassion and beg some for myself as well.
I wish you a life in which you have at least one débrouillard, if you are not one for them yourself, and besides, a wonderful weekend.
Till next week,
— Gulsun
Thank you for taking the time to accompany me in the story of a new word. Every word of the world’s languages is also ours, belonging to humanity while giving us an essence of the culture in which it was rooted.
We are made of stories—that is, of words.