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German accusative? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4623 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes  Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 17 of 22 02 May 2013 at 11:09am | IP Logged | ||
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I learnt a lot of my German by hearing the language being spoken around me. I did some studying on my own but I didn't get stuck into case theory as much as I should have. As a result, I got a natural feel for some aspects of the system but I also made basic errors. But after a few years things started falling into place and I realised, ah that's how it works. Writing my own course also forced me to think about things that I had taken for granted, or had previously eluded me.
For example, I used to say things like Wann kommt den Zug an? - When does the train arrive. I had latched on to the idea that der words changed to den when placed after a verb (apart from sein), but it's not quite as simple as that. In the above example, the train is not "being come", it is doing the coming. This is nominative and in English you would also say when is he coming, not him coming. But "I see the train" is ich sehe den Zug. Here, the train is "being seen", it is not doing the seeing. This is accusative and in English you would say I see him, not see he. But previously I had thought der So I kind of figured it out with references to he and him. Another tricky situation is wer and wen. Wer bezahlt mich? - Who is paying me? Wen bezahlst du? - Who are you paying? In the second example, "who" refers to the person being paid, or acted upon by the verb, so it is accusative. Edited by beano on 02 May 2013 at 11:14am 2 persons have 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 18 of 22 02 May 2013 at 5:03pm | IP Logged | ||
Just to add the dative to the latter: "Von wem hast du Geld bekommen?" - From whom have you received money? (It can be tricky coming from English, because the accusative and dative are represented by the same pronoun - see my other post) 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 19 of 22 02 May 2013 at 5:05pm | IP Logged | ||
Is that part a direct quote from the book? Either way, I don't agree with the 2nd bit. In 'he gives her the book' "he" is nominative "her" is dative (you could have said "to her", as in "he gives the book to her"). "book" is accusative. In English the pronoun in the accusative and the dative is the same (me, him, her, us,them). If there is a pronoun like "to" (or "from") present, then it's more obvious that it's dative, but it can still be dative without the pronoun, as in "he gives her the dog". It doesn't matter in English, but it does if you translate that sentence to German: "Er gibt ihr den Hund" "He gives (to) her the dog". "whom" is also used in the dative, as well as in the accusative. .... .... Actually though, according to Wikipedia, we are both wrong in a way, since grammarians don't actually regard English as having a distinctive accusative or dative case, even in the pronouns: Accusative Case 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4534 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 20 of 22 02 May 2013 at 7:26pm | IP Logged | ||
No you are right I made a mistake with the sentence, because I didn't put the 'to' in. But I don't agree that her is both accusative and dative in English. If the pronoun is dative it's always preceded by 'to' so it's sort of a compound of 'to PLUS pronoun', whatever that is called. So "I gave her to him" or avoid charges of sexism "I gave him to her". "I (nomative) gave him (accusative) to her (dative). While it sounds a bit odd, I think you can also say 'I gave to her (dative) him (accusative)'. I am not sure I fully trust Wikipedia. It's just a bunch of random people on the Internet voicing opinions, nothing like HTLAL! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4845 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 21 of 22 02 May 2013 at 8:44pm | IP Logged | ||
Unfortunately, this is also incorrect. The "to" can often be omitted. In a phrase like "I give her the book", "her" is the indirect object or, if you will, the dative object. You can add the "to" for emphasis, but it's not required. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4623 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 22 of 22 02 May 2013 at 8:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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English seems to have remnants of a dative case floating around with terms like to whom and with whom.
This corresponds to zu wem and mit wem in German. If you think of the German dative case in terms of mir=to me, ihm=to him etc, it is often readily translatable to English. Das ist mir wichtig - That is important to me Ich gebe ihr das Geld - I give the money to her. Where it gets confusing is with the verbs like helfen, which must take a dative form. Ich helfe der Frau - I'm helping the woman Wem hilfst du? - Who are you helping? Basically you just have to learn which verbs are always dative and use the correct pronouns and articles. Edited by beano on 02 May 2013 at 8:58pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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