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In English, the first sentence can be rendered as "I sent the book to the man" and as "I sent the man the book", where the indirect object is identified in English by standing in front of the direct object. The normal word order in German is to put the dative in front of the accusative (as in the example above).
German sentence structure is the structure to which the German language adheres. The basic sentence in German follows SVO word order. [1] Additionally, German, like all west Germanic languages except English, [note 1] uses V2 word order, though only in independent clauses. In dependent clauses, the finite verb is placed last.
For example, Hund (dog) is a masculine (der) word, so the article changes when used in the accusative case: Ich habe einen Hund. (lit., I have a dog.) In the sentence, "a dog" is in the accusative case as it is the second idea (the object) of the sentence. Some German pronouns also change in the accusative case.
The grammar of the German language is quite similar to that of the other Germanic languages.Although some features of German grammar, such as the formation of some of the verb forms, resemble those of English, German grammar differs from that of English in that it has, among other things, cases and gender in nouns and a strict verb-second word order in main clauses.
Case Indicates Sample case words Sample sentence Interrogative Notes Nominative: Subject of a finite verb: we We went to the store. Who or what? Corresponds to English's subject pronouns. Accusative: Direct object of a transitive verb: us, for us, the (object) The clerk remembered us. John waited for us at the bus stop. Obey the law. Whom or what?
To some English – and German – speakers, Reich in English strongly connotes Nazism and is sometimes used to suggest fascism or authoritarianism, e.g. "Herr Reichsminister" used as a title for a disliked politician. Ja – yes; Jawohl – a German term that connotes an emphatic yes – "Yes, indeed!" in English.
This sentence is an example of how cases are used in German (and in every other language with grammatical case). This differs from English, where the word order in a sentence has more meaning. In German, because the function of each noun is not marked by its position within the sentence but by the declined articles — and in case of genitive ...
The gender matches the receiver's gender (not the object's gender) for the dative case, and the owner's gender for the genitive. Dative: Ich gebe die Karten dem Mann – I give the cards to the man. Genitive: Die Entwicklung unseres Dorfes – The growth of our village. For further details as to the usage of German cases, see German grammar.