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German: Welchen/Was Dahin/dorthin | ||
Tags: Meaning of words | German | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4083 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes  Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 1 of 7 16 March 2014 at 12:16am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Dear HTLAL, some German questions.
What is the difference between welch/was? 1. Welchen Druck hat der Reifen? Can one put "Was" in here instead of Welchen? 2. What is the difference between dahin and dorthin? 3. In Hugo German, I came across a rule that Possessive pronouns can sometimes acts as nouns. And in this case, they take on some endings. Eg, for mein, in Nominative+masculine it is Meiner. For Nominative and Akkusative+Neutrum it is Meins. Question: So Akkusative+Masculine is no specific ending? Its stays Mein? 4. Sie benutzen als Erste unsere neue Maschine. Sie benutzen unsere Erste neue Maschine. The first sentence says "You are the first to use...". Does the second one say "You use our first new machine"? Edited by Gemuse on 16 March 2014 at 4:20pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4708 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 7 16 March 2014 at 10:23am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
No. Was in German means exclusively "what" as in "what is this". The English use of "what" as a replacement for "which kind" is unknown in German. That is trying turn German into English, and it doesn't work that way. As far as I know, English is one of the few languages that can even do that.
Yes. The other two I am not sure about, although the first seems to be a difference between "there" and "over there". If you use a possessive as a noun, you do the same as in English: "That is mine!". You can't use that in a sentence with a dative I think. Or you would have to use a very weirdly constructed sentence. But no, the dative would probably adapt and become "Meinem". A native will have to correct me on this. Edited by tarvos on 16 March 2014 at 10:25am 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 3 of 7 16 March 2014 at 12:39pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
tarvos has already answered some questions correctly, so I'll only comment on the rest. There is no concrete difference between "dahin" and "dorthin", except that "dort" sounds a bit more emphatic and specific than "da". With "dort" you always point to a specific place while "da" is more general. Concerning possessive pronouns: Dative masculine would be "meinem". 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| josepablo Tetraglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 3991 days ago 123 posts - 141 votes Speaks: German, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese Studies: Russian, Mandarin, Turkish | Message 4 of 7 16 March 2014 at 12:48pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
"welch" is an adjective, "was" is an interrogative pronoun (direct or indirect): Was ist das? - Ich weiβ nicht, was das ist. [English "what" can be both adjective or pronoun.] So, no, in German you can't say "Was Druck"
Heikle Frage. "dorthin" is more like "to over there". I can't remember ever using "dahin", I just use the short form "hin". It sounds a little literary, like in Goethe's Gedicht: Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn, Im dunkeln Laub die Gold-Orangen glühn, Ein sanfter Wind vom blauen Himmel weht, Die Myrte still und hoch der Lorbeer steht? Kennst du es wohl? Dahin! dahin Möcht ich mit dir, o mein Geliebter, ziehn. Kennst du das Haus? Auf Säulen ruht sein Dach. Es glänzt der Saal, es schimmert das Gemach, Und Marmorbilder stehn und sehn mich an: Was hat man dir, du armes Kind, getan? Kennst du es wohl? Dahin! dahin Möcht ich mit dir, o mein Beschützer, ziehn. Kennst du den Berg und seinen Wolkensteg? Das Maultier sucht im Nebel seinen Weg; In Höhlen wohnt der Drachen alte Brut; Es stürzt der Fels und über ihn die Flut! Kennst du ihn wohl? Dahin! dahin Geht unser Weg! O Vater, laß uns ziehn!
Possessive pronouns always stand in for nouns, that's why they're called pro-nouns.: Das hier ist mein Buch. Deins liegt drüben. (nominative) Es ist schön warm in meinem Haus. Und in deinem? (dative, neuter) Ich spreche mit meiner Schwester, nicht mit deiner. (dative, feminine) Ich sage es meinem Freund, sag du es deinem. (dative, masculine) Ich arbeite während meines Urlaubes. Was tust du während deines. (Klingt etwas doof, ist aber richtig.]
Übersetzung ganz richtig. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5321 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 5 of 7 16 March 2014 at 12:52pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
You can use "was für ein/eine." For example: Was für ein Auto hast Du? = What kind of car do you drive?
No. There are different case endings for each case. For example: Nominativ: Das ist meiner (mein Computer). Genitiv: Das ist der Monitor des meinigen* (meines Computers). Dativ: Er schrieb mit meinem (Computer). Akkusativ: Ich verkaufe meinen (Computer). * archaic, not used anymore
Theoretically, "dorthin" points to something further away from the speaker than "dahin," but both words are often used interchangeably. However, there are some subtle differences in usage: bis dahin = by/until then bis dorthin = until there Edited by Doitsujin on 16 March 2014 at 2:44pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4708 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 6 of 7 16 March 2014 at 1:05pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
That you can do in Dutch too, but in English you can say "What car do you drive?" and that you can't translate directly (which was the question). In English "what kind of..." often turns into "what" and that does not exist in German. But yes, there are alternatives to "welch". Was für is something I use constantly of course ;) Edited by tarvos on 16 March 2014 at 1:12pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4083 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 7 of 7 16 March 2014 at 4:27pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Thank you everyone! I appreciate the detailed explanations, the subtle nuances (thanks
Doitsujin) and the sample German sentences (which are all going into my database of sample sentences). I also have a confession to make: I parsed the Hugo book wrong. Actually it says, when possessive pronouns act as nouns, the endings remain the same *except* in Masculine+Nom, and Neutrum+Nom/Akk; which is consistent for what you all have said here. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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