Every German noun has a gender: masculine (der; ein), feminine (die; eine) or neuter (das; ein). It’s good to learn nouns with their corresponding noun gender right away to avoid later mistakes.

There aren’t rules that you can rely on really. But there are some hints that may help you to guess the right gender when you’re unsure. But please remember: There are ALWAYS exeptions to the rule! ;)

Today: MASCULINE NOUNS - DER

1.) days of the week, months and the four seasons (e.g. der Montag = Monday; der April = April; der Winter = winter)

2.) most nouns with the suffix -ist; -ich; -ling (e.g. der RettICH = radish)

3.) most nouns with the suffix -ner (e.g. der GärtNER = gardener)

4.) most nouns with the suffix -ismus (e.g. der JournalISMUS= journalism)

5.) most jobs and nationalities unless there’s a feminine form! (e.g. der Schüler, die Schülerin = student male, student female; der Arzt, die Ärztin = doctor male, doctor female; der Mexikaner, die Mexikanerin = Mexican male, Mexican female)

Prepositions of place:

auf = on

aus = out of

bei = at; near

durch = through

hinter = behind

in = in; inside

in der Nähe von = near / close to

neben = next to

vor = in front of

über = over

unter = under; below

zwischen = between

Relative pronouns in English are who, whom, which, that and whose. Example: The CD that I bought yesterday is great.
In German relative pronouns change depending on the gender, case and number of the noun that they substitute. This is a chart for you as an overview.

CASE            MASK.         FEM.          NEUT.       PL.

Nominative —- der           die          das            die

Genitive ——- dessen      deren      dessen       deren

Dative ———- dem          der          dem            denen

Accusative —- den          die           das             die

Examples:

Die CD, die ich gestern gekauft habe, ist super. The CD which I bought yesterday is great.

Der Typ, dem ich ein Geschenk gekauft habe, ist mein Bruder. The guy whom I bought a gift is my brother.

raksha-deactivated20100716 asked: given the sentence,
Es kommen nur wenig__ Fremd__ in diese Stadt.

how do you add the appropriate endings (I think it's wenige Fremde?) and more importantly, why?

thanks!
<3 raksha

Es kommen nur wenige Fremde in diese Stadt.

“wenig” is an irregular adjective, which means you only adjust it when it describes a noun that has both a singular and a plural form. For example, things like milk, love etc. don’t have a plural form. Things like apples, dogs and strangers (FREMDE) do.

Compare: wenig Wasser (little water; not countable) and wenige Flaschen Wasser (few bottles of water; countable).

The reason it’s “Fremde” and not “Fremden” is that your strangers aren’t defined. In your example you talk about strangers in general (strangers = Fremde) rather than a defined group of strangers (the strangers = die Fremden).

Compare: Die Fremden betraten den Raum (THE strangers entered the room; defined). Fremde betraten den Raum (strangers entered the room; undefined).

We have already learned how to count from 0 up to 100.

audio counting from 0 - 10

audio counting from 11 - 20

audio counting up to 100

German numbers above 100 are combined in the same way as numbers above 20. All you do is add the word for 100, 200 etc in front of the two-figure number as in the example:
7 + 60 = siebenundsechzig; 400 + 7 + 60 = vierhundertsiebenundsechzig.

Note that Germans normally say hundertzwei for “one hundred and two”, and tausend where we would say “one thousand”. However, “Ein” is normally inserted in complex numbers such as tausendeinhundert (=1100).

It is possible to insert “und” between “hundert” and “eins” in the German for 101, and also between “tausend” and tens or units, e.g. tausend(und)eins, siebentausend(und)elf. But you don’t have to – it’s optional.

I suppose some of you are having a similar problem, so maybe this helps!

“wenn” is used in the sense of both “when(ever)” (a) and “if” (b) as well as for expressing something that happens in the future (c).

a) Wenn es regnet, bleibe ich zu Hause.

b) Wenn ich im Lotto gewinne, werde ich reich sein.

c) Wenn wir morgen aufwachen, wird die Sonne scheinen.

naaak:

johncabrera:

“wenn” auf englisch ist beides “if” und “when”, oder? Also wenn ich sage…

“Wenn ich ein fließender Sprecher auf deutsch werde, werde ich ‘Planet Erde’ auf deutsch sehen”

…, wie kann man wissen, dass ich “when” gemeint habe?

I guess it’s a matter of interpreting this sentence. It depends on the context. Germans could read both out of this sentence.

There are different ways of arranging the phrases:

(1) “Ich werde mir ‘Planet Erde’ auf deutsch ansehen, wenn ich fließend Deutsch spreche.”
(2) “Wenn ich fließend Deutsch spreche, werde ich mir ‘Planet Erde’ ansehen.”

In the first sentence there is more emphasis on “wenn” and the moment of time (when). In the second possible sentence is more emphasis on “werde ich ‘Planet Erde’ ansehen”. So in this case it’s not so important if you meant “when” or “if”…

The “wenn” would be more interpreted as an “if” if you were saying “Wenn ich fließend Deutsch sprechen könnte, würde ich mir ‘Planet Erde’ auf deutsch ansehen.”

Hope I could help you a little bit. Still think it’s a way of interpreting what you meant in the context. Perhaps other Germans would say it differently.. ;)

The nominative case is one of four grammatical cases for a noun in the German language. Basically it’s the noun that is doing something / the active part of the sentence, so it usually marks the subject of the verb.

Example:

Das Kind spielt Fußball. -> “Das Kind” nominative case.

Die Blume ist schön. -> “Die Blume” nominative case.

To find out what’s the subject of the sentence you can ask the question “Wer oder was tut etwas?” “Who or what is doing something?”

Example:

Das Kind spielt Fußball. -> Wer spielt Fußball? -> Das Kind.

Die Blume ist schön. -> Was ist schön? -> Die Blume.

1.) Nominativ (Werfall) - nominative

2.) Genitiv (Wessenfall) - genitive

3.) Dativ (Wemfall) - dative

4.) Akkusativ (Wenfall) - accusative

These are the four German cases - die vier Fälle. They are important for you to understand, since they affect both nouns and pronouns in our language depending on their function in a sentence. In addition certain verbs and prepositions trigger certain cases. The English language also has cases, but they are only apparent with pronouns (e.g. he - his - him).

Since the topic is a little more complex, I will dedicate a bunch of grammar posts to it (tagging them as both grammar and cases). You also might wanna read through the posts about grammatical terms again (especially #1 and #2) to make sure you understand the terminology.

Grammatical terms 1 words

Grammatical terms 2 sentence elements

Grammatical terms 3 clauses

Grammatical terms 4 about verbs

Grammatical terms 5 about nouns

Your answers to “Sie” versus “du” part 1 were really good! :) So let’s summarize when to use Sie (formal) versus du (informal):

You use Sie when…:

- you’re talking to colleagues at work

- you’re talking to adults you’ve just met or complete strangers

- you’re in a business situations

- you use “Herr…/Frau…” to address to someone

- you weren’t invited to say “du”

- you’re not sure which one to use (it’s always better to stay on the safe side)

You use du when…:

- you’re talking to friends

- you’re talking to family members

- you’re talking to children

- you’re talking to your pet

- you’re talking to God (e.g. in a prayer)

- you are invited to say “du” instead of “Sie”

“Wie geht es dir/euch (plural)? / Wie geht es Ihnen?” … both translate to “How are you?”. So what’s the difference and is it important to know?

The answer is YES, because Germans tend to be uncomfortable when the “du” / “Sie” rules are broken.

du / ihr (plural) = addresses to someone in a familiar way

Sie / Sie (plural) = addresses to someone in the formal way

Except for English, all Indo-European languages have those two forms for “you”. English has just lost it for some reason - the eqivalent of “du” used to be “thou” a long time ago.

Apart from grammatical problems that will occur if you don’t use “du” and “Sie” correctly (different verb conjugation), it’s also a cultural problem which I will explain in another post.

But now it’s your turn - when do Germans say “du” and when “Sie”? Any guesses?