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German Subjunctive Help | ||
Tags: Verbs/Conjugation | German | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| SuburbanGinger Newbie United States Joined 5246 days ago 15 posts - 15 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Russian | Message 1 of 21 20 June 2012 at 12:54am | IP Logged |
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Is it possible to say er sagte, dass er ihm ein Geschenk gibt or must I use gebe/gäbe? And would the
subjunctive be used if it started with er sagt, dass...? Thanks 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6660 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes  Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 2 of 21 20 June 2012 at 12:59am | IP Logged |
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Indirect speech, as far as I know, use the present tense subjunctive. Thus, it should be gebe and not gäbe or gibt, I
think. But I could be wrong. Er sagt and er sagte is basically the same thing, only different tenses. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Umin Triglot Newbie Germany despairedreading.worRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4548 days ago 37 posts - 52 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Japanese Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 3 of 21 20 June 2012 at 2:43am | IP Logged |
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Basically what Hampie says.
To me as a native speaker (that might just be my persnal style though), using subjunctive/Konjunktiv in a sentence with "dass" sounds a bit odd though. I'd probably favor the wrong grammar with "würde" ("Er sagte, dass er ihm ein Geschenk geben würde") or indirect speech without "dass" (Er sagte, er gebe ihm ein Geschenk") over the sentence like you wrote it. But basically, it is correct to say "Er sagte, dass er ihm ein Geschenk gebe." Indirect speech should use subjunctive, although you will probably see the sentence as you originally wrote it (with "gibt"). That's not grammatically correct though and rather colloquial. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Bakunin Diglot Senior Member Switzerland outerkhmer.blogspot. Joined 5131 days ago 531 posts - 1126 votes Speaks: German*, Thai Studies: Khmer | Message 4 of 21 20 June 2012 at 7:36am | IP Logged |
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To me, this question demonstrates again how confusing/useless/irrelevant grammar study can be. I am a native
speaker of German, but I would say neither "gebe" nor "er sagte". I would say "Er hat gesagt, er gibt ihm ein Geschenk" or "Er hat gesagt, er würde ihm ein Geschenk geben". Umin, my understanding of grammar is that it describes how people use the language, and not that it prescribes how people should use the language. As soon as a large enough number of native speakers start to use a certain construction, it becomes grammatical, and constructions that are not used anymore become ungrammatical. I wonder what percentage of German native speakers still use that "gebe"-thing. My guess is: a very small minority. I would even posit that "gebe" is already grammatically wrong (or at least archaic). 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 5 of 21 20 June 2012 at 11:02am | IP Logged |
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As a non-native speaker I would also say that spoken German has a tendency to move away from the construction with just the subjunctive (Konjunktiv) "gebe" or the speakers will use constructions with some form of "werden". However the construction is still in use in formal language and in writing so you can't just ignore it. If you do use it then "gebe" is the unmarked or positive form, while "gäbe" stresses that the the situation is hypothetical and probably won't arise (this would almost certainly only occur with "er sagte" because then you open up for all kinds of reservations).
Edited by Iversen on 20 June 2012 at 2:00pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6086 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 6 of 21 20 June 2012 at 2:20pm | IP Logged |
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A lot of German speakers wouldn't be able to catch the subjunctive if a foreign speaker were to use it. They just wouldn't expect to hear it and some might even think it's wrong because they're not used to it.
The only verbs a foreign speaker might need to practice are "sei", "wäre" , "hätte" and "würde"(last three Konjunktiv2). The Konjunktiv 2 is used mostly as a replacement and is a bit more common käme, möge, müsse, solle, dürfe, etc... -- you can study these and others for recognition only, but even journalists want to avoid sounding too stiff and will often use "dass + indicative mood" instead of the subjunctive. However, sometimes if the "dass" sentence is too long or complicated then the subjunctive helps make it "cleaner" and more efficient. I'm sure everybody has an opinion on its usefulness, but I think it's rather elegant when used appropriately. Edited by Sunja on 20 June 2012 at 2:32pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Umin Triglot Newbie Germany despairedreading.worRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4548 days ago 37 posts - 52 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Japanese Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 7 of 21 20 June 2012 at 5:56pm | IP Logged |
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I don't think most speakers would regard a subjunctive as wrong, but they would think it's odd if you used it in speech.
The use of subjunctive and Konjunktiv is (or at least was when I still went to school) a big issue in German class at school, so most people are quite familiar with it - that is, for use in written language. As with every other language, German has some differences between written and spoken languages, and not using subjunctive and Konjunktiv in spoken language is one of them. Bakunin: I know what you mean and I agree. I should have put more in "". There are (still) certain conventions under which the use of subjunctive etc. forms is regarded as right. However, this refers to written language only and it would sound pretty weird if somebody really was to speak like that. Edited by Umin on 20 June 2012 at 5:57pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4829 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 8 of 21 21 June 2012 at 12:35am | IP Logged |
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May I ask native speakers: is this partly a generational thing? I mean, do you tend to
get elderly educated people using the subjunctive/Konjunktiv more in speech than younger people? The way I have been taught it in the case of indirect speech, the person quoting uses the Konjunktiv I in order to distance himself slightly from what is being said, and the example typically given is that of a journalist quoting someone in a news article, i.e. the written language. I also agree with Sunja's point about elegance. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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