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Using Der und Die with names | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Tollpatchig Senior Member United States Joined 4007 days ago 161 posts - 210 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, Maltese | Message 1 of 12 02 January 2014 at 8:27pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've been taught that you can (at least in Southern Germany) use the definite artikels Der und Die with people's name. z.B: Ich bin die Courtney. or Das ist der Daniel.
I've also read in other forums that in Nothern and Eastern Germany calling people der und die whatever their name is, is considered rude and offensive. Is this true and if so, why is it considered to be rude and offensive? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4707 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 2 of 12 02 January 2014 at 10:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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When I was in Bavaria this happened all the time. It is normal there. Not sure about the
rest of Germany. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4521 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 3 of 12 02 January 2014 at 10:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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No idea why this would be considered rude, but such are the subtleties of language.
Where I come from, this is the normal way of speaking. But even here in the South, things differ from region to region. I heard people from Tyrol using die + last name + - in instead of Frau + last name (eg. die Hoferin instead of Frau Hofer). Using this construct can be considered rude here in Upper Austria. No idea why though. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5320 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 4 of 12 02 January 2014 at 10:44pm | IP Logged | ||
I don't thinks that they find it rude; they're just not used to it. BTW, Germany's grammar Czar, Bastian Sick, wrote an interesting (German) article about this topic. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| svalbard Diglot Newbie Germany Joined 4278 days ago 5 posts - 10 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 5 of 12 02 January 2014 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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I am from Schleswig-Holstein, northern Germany. It is considered very strange but I have
never seen anyone perceive it as rude. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| BaronBill Triglot Senior Member United States HowToLanguages.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4689 days ago 335 posts - 594 votes Speaks: English*, French, German Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Persian | Message 6 of 12 02 January 2014 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | ||
That is a great article! I had no idea that the Article/Name thing was such a big deal. I had kind of just assumed that it was all personal preference. Thanks for posting that! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4533 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 7 of 12 03 January 2014 at 12:22am | IP Logged | ||
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It was in my German A1 book, but my wife from Nord Rhein Westphalia cracks up if I say "Ich bin der Patrick".
Everybody I know in Berlin would say something like "Ich bin Patrick" or "Mein Name ist Patrick". According to her, you could use the definite article with the "Ich bin..." formulation (but it would be odd) but absolutely never with "Mein Name ist...", which would just be grammatically false. However, she suggested if you were in a travel group or whatever, and there was only one John, say, you could say "Bist du der John?" or "Sind Sie der John?" and you could then reply "Ja, Ich bin der John" or "Nein, Ich bin der Patrick". Edited by patrickwilken on 03 January 2014 at 12:34am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tollpatchig Senior Member United States Joined 4007 days ago 161 posts - 210 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Maltese | Message 8 of 12 03 January 2014 at 4:19am | IP Logged | ||
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Ah, it seems to me like its completely normal for the South a bit of a strange quirk in the other parts of Germany. My German tutor is from Bayern so of course she was the one who taught me about using the definite article with the name, which makes a lot of sense. She often refers to herself as die Mama to her children and of course der Papa.
The definite article also seems to be used as a replacement for a name or for a person. For example, I asked a friend of mine: "Wo ist dein Sohn?" and he answered me "Der ist (an) Judo." (I don't remember the exact prep. but he was at his Judo class.) Is that another grammatical use of the article or is that more of a colloquial thing? 1 person has voted this message useful |
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