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Lack of information in dictionaries | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Kugel Senior Member United States Joined 6546 days ago 497 posts - 555 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 5 26 August 2009 at 9:43pm | IP Logged |
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Why is there a lack of information in dictionaries when it comes to nouns? Take der Name for instance; all the dictionary says is this: Name der; ns, n
Okay, so I now know how to say des Namens(genitive) or die Namen(plural). This isn't very helpful, however, if I want to know the accusative and dative declensions. Sure, under the entry there are a few example sentences, and incidentally, there was an example for the dative, thus I was able to gather that Name turns into dem Namen. This still leaves accusative mysterious, and only after googling could one find out that it's den Namen. So what's the deal? Feminine nouns, thank god, don't decline. But these weak nouns for masculine and neuter are a pain, especially when the dictionary only lists the endings of genitive s. and pl. Suggestions? Edited by Kugel on 27 August 2009 at 6:03am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Lizzern Diglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5917 days ago 791 posts - 1053 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Japanese | Message 2 of 5 26 August 2009 at 9:52pm | IP Logged |
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I've never used a dictionary that didn't have some sort of system for this. Usually they just tell you somewhere that if the noun is regular they won't list everything. It would take too much space to list every form of every noun. I've forgotten all my German so I don't know if nouns work like that, that unless you hear otherwise then the forms are such and such. Have you read the introduction to see if they say anything about this?
Liz 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6280 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 3 of 5 26 August 2009 at 10:23pm | IP Logged |
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The smaller the dictionary, the less informative. Before buying one, I look for little details like that.
Mind you, if you have Internet access, Wiktionary can be helpful. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Kugel Senior Member United States Joined 6546 days ago 497 posts - 555 votes Speaks: English* | Message 4 of 5 27 August 2009 at 4:55am | IP Logged |
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I meant to say that the dictionary only lists the genitive and plural forms of the noun. This isn't very helpful because the dative and accusative for weak nouns simply have different forms than the genitive and pl.
Why couldn't German copy Dutch and get rid of all these nasty noun declensions? Edited by Kugel on 27 August 2009 at 6:04am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6280 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 5 of 5 27 August 2009 at 12:56pm | IP Logged |
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Languages are not static. Perhaps some future version of German will.
Anglo-Saxon had lots of inflexions, like German. Modern English has lost most of it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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