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Ignoring du/ihr forms in German learning? | ||
Tags: Polite/Informal Forms | German | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4027 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes  Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 1 of 31 23 December 2013 at 12:15am | IP Logged | |||||
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In learning various verb/pronoun forms, I am planning to ignore the du/ihr forms; just
to simplify the problem. My reasoning is that if I do not know someone, i should use the Sie form anyway; and if I know someone, then that person would know I am learning German, so he/she would be fine with the Sie form. Is there any reason to burden new learners with du/ihr forms? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4478 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 2 of 31 23 December 2013 at 12:27am | IP Logged | |||||
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I would learn the Du form. It's not that much more to learn, and really it's sort of useful.
It depends a bit how old you are and who you are going to talk to, but if for instance you are at university all the students will use the Du form with each other. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4466 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 3 of 31 23 December 2013 at 12:32am | IP Logged | |||||
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As long as you don't talk with kids, you should be fine. You'll learn the rest through
reading. But for most of the verbs, there shouldn't be any learning necessary anyway. There are no different verb classes (except the weak/strong differentiation in the past), you just add the right morpheme (-st, -t respectively) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Via Diva Diglot Senior Member Russian Federation last.fm/user/viadivaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4179 days ago 1109 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German, Italian, French, Swedish, Esperanto, Czech, Greek | Message 4 of 31 23 December 2013 at 2:20am | IP Logged | |||||
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I don't think it's wise to ignore informal forms of verbs.
For some people change of formality could be a sign (I mean, using du instead of Sie). It wouldn't be good if you will be asked to use du whilst you don't know the actual forms, eh? Of course, it's not that clear for English speakers, but for me (native Russian speaker) a man, who learned formal verbs and ignored informal is a special kind of madmen. It's like you're keeping the distance from all speakers of your TL. I'm not sure if you really need to have it. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4027 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 5 of 31 23 December 2013 at 3:36am | IP Logged | |||||
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I put in the wrong question. I should have said can I *postpone* learning du/ihr forms
for when I have completed (or about to complete) the B1 level? The most German I use is in the German class, with the teacher. Outside of class, I use German only at shops for basic things. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5265 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 6 of 31 23 December 2013 at 8:51am | IP Logged | |||||
You'll, of course, be understood, but younger people might look a bit puzzled, because they mostly use Du among themselves regardless of whether they know the person that they're talking to and reserve Sie for people that are significantly older. If you're young enough to be (mistaken for) a university student, I'd strongly recommend learning the Du forms and using them with your peers. Even if you're bit older, you should be familiar with the Du forms for the all important moment, when someone uses a Du form for the first time with you, because they'd certainly look a bit puzzled if you replied using a Sie form.
If you're still in Germany, I'd strongly recommend looking for a language exchange partner on Craigslist Germany or Toytown, because nothing beats immersion. (Some universities also have their own language exchange lists.) If you're a native English speaker (or speak it as well as a native), many Germans will be very interested in doing a language exchange with you, regardless of your German skills. Edited by Doitsujin on 23 December 2013 at 9:14am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4478 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 7 of 31 23 December 2013 at 8:52am | IP Logged | |||||
I have a grammar book from the 1960s that recommends not learning the Du form at first because beginners my use it in inappropriate situations and cause offense. So perhaps it's completely reasonable to postpone learning it, though I think times have changed in the last fifty years. Personally I can't see why it's such an issue though. It's only a question of adding -st or -t to the stem of the verb. Just out of curiosity are you studying in Berlin? I did the Goethe course here a few years ago. Edited by patrickwilken on 23 December 2013 at 8:55am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5510 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 8 of 31 23 December 2013 at 11:08am | IP Logged | |||||
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In my experience you will be corrected very quickly if you cannot use the du form with
people of the same age or with younger people. Worse still, I didn't learn it at first on the same reasoning as your post and so I find myself using the sie form when it is inappropriate. So I do not think it is a good idea. 5 persons have voted this message useful |
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