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Wann bist du geboren? (German) | ||
Tags: German | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5594 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 1 of 71 10 January 2014 at 6:38pm | IP Logged | ||
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I came across this sentence recently and was surprised: I expected "wann wurdest du geboren?".
Can someone please explain? Edited by Random review on 10 January 2014 at 6:39pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| geoffw Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4499 days ago 1134 posts - 1865 votes Speaks: English*, German, Yiddish Studies: Modern Hebrew, French, Dutch, Italian, Russian | Message 2 of 71 10 January 2014 at 6:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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When were you born? Can you be more specific as to what was surprising? What was the
context? This sounds to me like it's halfway between the standard Hochdeutsch and Yiddish. Or maybe like translating the Yiddish expression literally into German. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4332 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 3 of 71 10 January 2014 at 7:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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Both sentences are correct Standard German. The sentence in the heading seems to be more
common, at least here were I live. The sentence in the heading focuses on the result, the sentence expected by Random review focuses on the act. I guess it's just Zustandspassiv vs. Vorgangspassiv, but I'm not sure. edit: One might expect 'Wann warst du geboren?', but this sounds like the attribute 'being born' doesn't apply to the person any longer. So maybe the participle is used as an adjective/attribute here (ie. in 'bist geboren'), not as a passive form? Just speculating ... Edited by daegga on 10 January 2014 at 7:09pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| geoffw Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4499 days ago 1134 posts - 1865 votes Speaks: English*, German, Yiddish Studies: Modern Hebrew, French, Dutch, Italian, Russian | Message 4 of 71 10 January 2014 at 7:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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Ah, either I misread the question or you changed it. I'll go with whatever daegga says
here. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5594 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 5 of 71 10 January 2014 at 8:18pm | IP Logged | ||
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Daegga, thanks for the answer. I also thought "geboren sein" described the resultant state and "geboren
werden" the action. But I'm still confused by the sentence in the thread title. Let me put it this way: "Die Tür ist geschlossen" describes the door in a closed state and "Die Tür wurde geschlossen" describes it getting closed (similar to "geboren sein" and "geboren werden") and yet AFAIK you wouldn't ask, "Wann ist die Tür geschlossen?" when you want go know when it got closed by somebody, would you? So why does " wann sind Sie geboren?" makes sense? Thanks in advance, mate. Edited by Random review on 10 January 2014 at 8:22pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| geoffw Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4499 days ago 1134 posts - 1865 votes Speaks: English*, German, Yiddish Studies: Modern Hebrew, French, Dutch, Italian, Russian | Message 6 of 71 10 January 2014 at 8:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'm interested in the answer too...as I obliquely noted in my first response, Yiddish
does exactly this, and the conventional expression is (modulo some vowel shifts, etc.) "wann sind Sie (actually seid Ihr, cf. archaic German usage) geboren geworden. Being more used to German, this always sounds bizarre to me, because it's throwing in an extra verb where there isn't one in my experience, but it makes grammatical sense in light of Random review's observation. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5594 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 7 of 71 10 January 2014 at 8:34pm | IP Logged | ||
Huh? I believe the Yiddish structure exists in German too (wann seid Ihr geboren worden) and means essentially the same as "wann wurdet Ihr geboren". The only differences are the loss of the "ge" in these double participle constructions in German (Yiddish is more conservative here, while German has innovated) and the fact that Ihr is no longer used as a "polite you" in Modern German, but only as an "informl plural you" (which function I believe it also has in Yiddish). Edited by Random review on 10 January 2014 at 8:38pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| geoffw Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4499 days ago 1134 posts - 1865 votes Speaks: English*, German, Yiddish Studies: Modern Hebrew, French, Dutch, Italian, Russian | Message 8 of 71 10 January 2014 at 8:47pm | IP Logged | ||
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The plot thickens. I've never heard it that way in German. The Google suggests you are right, but I couldn't
find any examples of this outside of grammar discussions. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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