A LINGUISTIC INTRODUCTION TO GERMAN FOR THE NON-LINGUIST: AN ACCOMPANYING GUIDE TO ANY FIRST-YEAR GERMAN COURSE

By JONATHAN C. BUSEY

A THESIS PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2001 For Julia, my soon-to-be wife ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank Chris Overstreet and Prof. Keith Bullivant for patiently teaching me German and putting up with questions, and Prof. Franz Futterknecht for the motivation necessary to conceptualize and design yet another introduction to German. Motivation came from Prof. David Young’s unpublished introduction to Ancient Greek and Dr. Robert Underhill’s dissertation, Turkish Grammar. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1976.

iii TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...... iii LIST OF TABLES ...... vii LIST OF FIGURES ...... ix ABSTRACT ...... xi INTRODUCTION ...... 1 CHAPTERS ...... 2 1 WORD ORDER AND THE GERMAN CASE SYSTEM ...... 3 1.1 Word order ...... 3 1.2 Nominative ...... 5 1.3 The Accusative ...... 6 1.4 The Dative ...... 8 1.5 The Genitive ...... 11 1.6 Appositions ...... 11 2 NOUN FORMS ...... 15 2.1 Gender ...... 15 2.2 Pronoun Agreement ...... 16 2.3 Word Formation ...... 17 2.3.1 N-nouns ...... 18 2.3.2 Composita ...... 19 3 ARTICLES ...... 21 4 PRONOUNS ...... 24 4.1 Personal Pronouns ...... 24 4.2 Possessive Pronouns ...... 25 4.3 Reflexive Pronouns ...... 26 4.4 Demonstrative Pronouns ...... 27 4.5 Relative and Interrogative Pronouns ...... 28

iv 5 ADJECTIVES ...... 31 5.1 Predicative Adjectives ...... 32 5.2 Attributive Adjectives ...... 32 5.2.1 Comparative and Superlative Forms ...... 33 5.2.2 Possessive Adjectives ...... 35 5.2.3 Ordinal Numbers ...... 35 6 ADVERBS ...... 37 7 VERBS ...... 39 7.1 Verb Forms ...... 39 7.1.1 The Infinitive ...... 39 7.1.2 Conjugation ...... 40 7.1.3 Irregular Verb Endings ...... 41 7.1.4 Verb Prefixes ...... 42 7.1.5 Prefix or Preposition? ...... 45 7.2 Mood ...... 46 7.2.1 Indicative ...... 46 7.2.2 Imperatives ...... 46 7.2.3 Subjunctive ...... 51 7.3 Modal Verbs ...... 54 7.3.1 Conjugation ...... 55 7.4 Tenses ...... 58 7.4.1 Present ...... 61 7.4.2 Perfect ...... 62 7.4.3 Imperfect ...... 65 7.4.4 Future ...... 65 7.4.5 Future Perfect ...... 66 7.4.6 Past Perfect ...... 66 7.5 Verb Types ...... 67 7.5.1 Full Verbs ...... 67 7.5.2 Auxiliary Verbs ...... 67 7.5.3 Reflexive Verbs ...... 67 7.5.4 Phrasal Verbs ...... 68 7.6 Voice ...... 72 7.6.1 Active ...... 72 7.6.2 Passive ...... 72 8 PREPOSITIONS ...... 74 8.1 A Visual Overview of the Prepositions ...... 76 8.1.1 Prepositions of Movement and Motion ...... 76 8.1.2 Prepositions Exhibiting a Static State ...... 76 8.2 Prepositions Governing Case ...... 81 8.2.1 Accusative ...... 81

v 8.2.2 Dative ...... 81 8.2.3 Dative and Accusative ...... 82 8.2.4 Genitive ...... 84 9 CONJUNCTIONS ...... 87 9.1 Coordinating Conjunctions ...... 87 9.2 Subordinating Conjunctions ...... 87 9.3 Infinitive Conjunctions ...... 91 9.4 Proportionate Conjunctions ...... 92 10 NEGATION ...... 93 11 QUESTIONS ...... 98 APPENDICIES A PRONUNCIATION ...... 100 A.1 Guide to German Pronunciation ...... 100 A.2 Book Cover Guide ...... 106 B IRREGULAR VERB LIST ...... 108 REFERENCES ...... 110 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ...... 112

vi LIST OF TABLES Table page 1.1 Guidelines for German Word Order ...... 4 1.2 The Nominative Case ...... 6 1.3 The Nominative dummy-es ...... 7 1.4 Man ...... 8 1.5 Uses of the Accusative Case ...... 9 1.6 The Accusative Case ...... 10 1.7 Possessive and Personal Prounouns ...... 12 1.8 The Dative Case ...... 13 1.9 The Genitive Case ...... 14 1.10 The Genitive Declension ...... 14 2.1 Endings Which Give Away the Gender ...... 16 2.2 Sounds That Join Words in Composita ...... 20 3.1 Differences in German and English Articles ...... 22 3.2 The German Article ...... 23 4.1 Personal Pronouns ...... 25 4.2 Pronoun Word Order Guidelines ...... 29 4.3 The Possessive Pronouns ...... 30 4.4 Reflexive Pronouns ...... 30 4.5 Demonstrative Pronouns ...... 30 5.1 Primary Adjectival Endings ...... 31 5.2 Secondary Adjectival Endings ...... 32 5.3 The Ordinal Numbers ...... 36

vii 6.1 Adverbs ...... 38 7.1 Conjugation of Regular Verbs ...... 40 7.2 Conjugation of Some Irregular Verbs ...... 43 7.3 Inseparable Prefixes ...... 44 7.4 Formation of Imperatives ...... 48 7.5 The Main Irregular Verbs ...... 48 7.6 The Two Types of Subjunctive in German ...... 53 7.7 Conjugation of Modal Verbs and m¨ochten ...... 56 7.8 When One Can Leave Out the Infinitive ...... 57 7.9 Imperfect Forms of sein and haben ...... 65 7.10 Phrasal Verbs ...... 68 8.1 An Overview of the Prepositions ...... 74 8.2 The ‘Two Way Verbs’ ...... 82 8.3 Some Two-way Prepositions ...... 83 8.4 Some Genitive Prepositions ...... 85 9.1 The Coordinating Conjunctions ...... 88 9.2 Subordinating Conjunctions ...... 90 9.3 Uses of the Infinitive ...... 92 10.1 Kein ...... 95 10.2 Nicht ...... 96 A.1 German Pronunciation Guide ...... 100 A.2 Short Pronunciation Guide for German ...... 106

viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure page 3.1 For an Indefinite Article ...... 22 3.2 For a Definite Article ...... 22 7.1 A Visual Representation of German Tense ...... 59 8.1 an with Accusative ...... 77 8.2 auf with Accusative ...... 77 8.3 bis ...... 77 8.4 durch ...... 77 8.5 gegen ...... 78 8.6 hinter with Accusative ...... 78 8.7 in with Accusative ...... 78 8.8 neben with Accusative ...... 78 8.9 ¨uber with Accusative ...... 78 8.10 um ...... 78 8.11 unter (i.e. beneath) with Accusative ...... 79 8.12 unter (i.e. among) with Accusative ...... 79 8.13 vor with Accusative ...... 79 8.14 zwischen with Accusative ...... 79 8.15 an with Dative ...... 79 8.16 auf with Dative ...... 79 8.17 in with Dative ...... 79 8.18 neben with Dative ...... 79 8.19 ¨uber with Dative ...... 80

ix 8.20 von ...... 80 8.21 unter (i.e. beneath) with Dative ...... 80 8.22 unter (i.e. among) with Dative ...... 80 8.23 vor/hinter with Dative ...... 86 8.24 zwischen with Dative ...... 86 A.1 ich ...... 105 A.2 Radfahren ...... 105

x Abstract of Thesis Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts

A LINGUISTIC INTRODUCTION TO GERMAN FOR THE NON-LINGUIST: AN ACCOMPANYING GUIDE TO ANY FIRST-YEAR GERMAN COURSE

By Jonathan C. Busey December 2001 Chair: Keith Bullivant Major Department: Germanic and Slavic Studies This papers aims to complement other beginning German language courses at different levels: it is setup both for students searching for easier ways to remember the basics and successfully complete what is required of them in the initial introductory sequence and for the curious student who seeks a deeper explanation of grammar, thereby making a stronger foundation and long-term success possible. The target students range from beginners with no experience, to those who are at more ad- vanced levels and search for a reference documenting the basics, to those have had an introductory course and desire a refresher. The grammar is organized in a non-cumulative fashion so that it is not necessary to read from beginning to end. Rather, it is meant to be used to look up the desired information one wants from each topic. This is enhanced by copious hyperlinks in the electronic version and cross-references in the printed version.

xi Reading the thesis through from beginning to end is designed to be beneficial to the students who have taken German before, but is suggested to the beginning learner only in conjunction with another course which includes dialogues and exercises. The main goal of this paper is to provide an additional resource to students interested in learning German at a deeper level than is required in a college level introductory sequence.

xii INTRODUCTION

There is no universal perfect system for learning any language or even any one language, but by deciding what one wants from the experience, one can be more successful. Only a few will truly master a new language in their adult life; most want either to be able to read German, speak enough for travel, or merely pronounce the words (such as radio announcers or music historians). One goal this paper attempts to achieve is to enable the student to be more successful learning German by making her/him define what s/he wants from the knowledge. The flexibility an instructional text requires for this is achieved in a number of ways: the summary in the table in each section should meet the needs of most looking for a quick refresher or the general guidelines for a specific point. In addition, the list of tables and list of figures are more specific tables of contents which the student can use to locate information quickly. Within each section, the information becomes increasingly more specific, so that the general, most relevant information is presented first, and the more specific comes afterwards. The benefit of this scheme is twofold: the most important points are stressed as one sees them most often, and the student is able to stop reading whenever s/he has gone far enough into detail. This is written for the curious and thorough student who wishes to start with a good foundation. No linguistic knowledge is required. The concepts are based on linguistic fun- damentals, but this will not burden an inexperienced student since no attention is drawn to this. 2

As units such as counting, telling time, describing the weather, answering Wie geht’s? are covered in the first days of every course, they are beyond the scope of this document. Furthermore, there are no dialogues or exercises, but copious examples. The somewhat unconventional approach to the basic word categories is an attempt to make the material as relevant and comprehensible as possible. For example, word order with dative and accusative pronouns are only referenced with word order and handled in detail under Section 4.1. CHAPTER 1 WORD ORDER AND THE GERMAN CASE SYSTEM

1.1 Word order

German word order is more flexible than English word order. Since every word has some sort of identifying marker that identifies its function in a given sentence, (the case endings reflect the gender, number, and whether the nouns are subjects or objects), most of the words can be rearranged according to what needs to be stressed. For example, the following sentences all have the same meaning, but different connotations: 1. Jochen hat dem Fahrradh¨andler die 15 DM gegeben. (both the default for “Jochen gave the bike salesman fifteen marks” and a pos- sibility to stress the fact that it was Jochen and not someone else) 2. Dem Fahrradh¨andler hat Jochen die 15 DM gegeben. (for example in answer to the question: “To whom did Jochen give money?”) 3. 15 DM hat Jochen dem Fahrradh¨andler gegeben. (when doubt about the amount exists and is being clarified, for example in answer to the question: “How much money did he pay for the bike?”) 4. and, in spoken: Gegeben hat Jochen dem Fahrradh¨andler die 15 DM. (gave as opposed to loaned) Not only does this freedom of placement make it easier to stress certain aspects of a sentence in written German (where intonation is not possible), it also calls for a more strict adherence to word endings since they are what carry the grammatical meaning of each word in the sentence. Word order in German principally conforms

3 4

Table 1.1: Guidelines for German Word Order

For the impatient: 1. the verb is always in second position in declarative sentences 2. coordinating conjunctions do not count as first po- sition words (aber, denn, oder, und = Position ∅) 3. verb in second position in questions with interrog- atives (i.e. wer wen wo etc.) 4. verb in first position in questions without interrog- atives 5. ‘second’ refers to position and not number–a clause can count as one position (i.e. in a subordinate clause), in which case the verb comes next. to one basic pattern: In an indicative declarative sentence the verb always takes second position. The verb is underlined in each sentence below. Katrin geht nach M¨unchen. [Katrin is going to Munich.] Ubrigens¨ besucht sie auch den Thomas. [ By the way, she is also visiting Thomas.] Note that questions are different (inversion is used–see Chapter 11) and that second position is different from being the second word in a sentence. Words that are not placed at the beginning for emphasis, for instance coordinating conjunctions, do not count – that is, they take position ∅. Aber ich arbeite gar nicht so viel. [But I don’t work all that much.] Oder vielleicht f¨ahrt sie in die Schweiz. [ Or maybe she’ll be going to Switzerland.] 5

Also, a clause can be in position 1 all by itself, in which case the next word after the clause will be the predicate in the main clause, as is the case in subordinate clauses. For example: Wenn du es ihr nicht sagst, muss ich ihr es wohl sagen. [ If you don’t tell her, I’ll have to.] There are also guidelines for imperative sentences (see Section 7.2.2), negation (see Chapter 10), and interrogative sentences (see Chapter 11). There are tricks for word order when replacing nouns with pronouns in sentences containing both direct and indirect objects in Section 4.1. An examination of the cases follows one by one Sections 1.2–1.5. Another important difference from English that German sentences follow is the time before place concept. In German one says: Sie geht um 8 nach Hause; Er fliegt n¨achsteWoche nach M¨unchen; etc. for the English: She’s going home at eight and He’s flying to Munich next week.

1.2 Nominative

The nominative is the case one usually learns first because it occurs in nearly every sentence. The noun in the nominative case is what determines the declension of the verb, since it is the subject. When one says Ich heiße, the ending -e matches the first person singular of the nominative case, because ich is the subject. When the subject changes to sie (singular), the verb ending becomes heißt to match the person and number of the subject, which is always in the nominative case. This is exactly the same in German as in English.

Man

Something one sees and hears very often both in spoken and written German is the pronoun man. It is always the subject of the sentence and is most often translated 6

Table 1.2: The Nominative Case

For the impatient: The nominative case has 2 uses: 1. as the subject of a sentence 2. as the complement of subject when using the verbs sein, werden, heißen Other noteworthy characteristics: • The form is similar to the accusative case (Sec- tion 1.3) for the neuter, feminine, and plural forms. • It is never the object of a preposition. • A pattern worth noting is the -er ending of the masculine forms: er dieser also, the strong adjecti- der welcher val endings (Table 5.1): wer einer as “one, people, or they. In English when one says things such as They say. . . , People do that all the time, it would be man in German.

1.3 The Accusative

There are only three different declensions one has to know in order to master the accusative case in German. One is for der, die, das, a second is for the ein- words, which includes all the demonstratives (this, that, these, those), interrogatives (which), negatives (none, not any, no), adjectival endings (there are none in English), possessives (mine, yours, his, hers, its, theirs, our), and, of course, the indefinite article a, an. The third set is the set of pronouns (I, you, he, she, it, we, you, they). These three declensions are in Table 1.6. Notice that there are no plurals for the indefinite articles, just as in English (which uses some), and that the same endings are used for all of the word classes 7

Table 1.3: The Nominative dummy-es

Aside from the uses of the nominative as a subject, there is also the dummy-es just as in English: Es regnet/schneit/donnert. It is raining/snowing/thundering. Es gibt . . . . [There are . . . ] Es ist Zeit, . . . . It is time (to) . . . listed above. One only needs the word stems to form them, for example, the possessive pronouns are in Table 1.7.

Accusative with Infinitives

One of the instances in which the infinitive (see Section 7.1.1) occurs without zu is with the accusative. This occurs only in conjunction with a few verbs and exhibits the following characteristics: 1. In the first instance, the accusative object is an agent and the sentence describes how the subject is cognizant of the action of this accusative agent. This is a common occurrence and is limited to the verbs sehen, h¨oren, f¨uhlen, and sp¨uren. This construction is used to describe an instance in which one sees, hears, feels, or senses someone doing some thing. The someone is in the accusative and the thing is the infinitive. Examples: Das habe ich kommen sehen.(I saw that coming.) Sie hat ihren Sohn Salat essen sehen.(She saw her son eating salad.) Man hat mich schnarchen h¨oren.(They/People heard me snoring.) 2. In the second instance the accusative is in its more conventional role, namely as that of an object, and has the same value as it does in modal sentences (see Section 7.3) but can be used with other, non-modal verbs: Sie l¨aßtdie Studenten fr¨uhergehen.(She lets the students go early.) 8

Table 1.4: Man

For the impatient: • man is neither masculine, feminine, or neuter, is only capitalized at the beginning of a sentence, and always takes the masculine forms of reference. Man muss seine Hausaufgaben machen. • When changing active sentences whose subject is man into passive sentences, man drops completely since it cannot become the object of the preposition von. • The accusative form of man is einen, the dative is einem. Man kann einen nicht glauben machen, . . . . Es gibt einem das Gef¨uhl,. . . .

Ich heiße dich willkommen. (roughly: I welcome you.)

1.4 The Dative

The Dative case answers the question “to whom?” and, just like the accusative and nominative, has endings that are added to the ein -words, the definite articles, and personal pronouns. Most of the time, the dative case is just a re-naming of the indirect object. It is used to convey the idea that something is doing something to something else, which is the part of the sentence which will appear in the dative case: Why don’t you buy me a new dictionary? Janice wanted me to loan her my German book. Notice that all verbs of giving, telling, showing, and the like can take indirect objects and, likewise, can have dative objects in German, but not every sentence has to have one–just as in English: I showed my stuff. 9

Table 1.5: Uses of the Accusative Case

For the impatient: The accusative has 3 uses: 1. the direct object of a sentence or complement thereof (apposition–see Section 1.6). 2. the object of preposition. For prepositions that al- ways govern the accusative case see Section 8.2.1, for prepositions that sometimes govern the ac- cusative, sometimes the dative see Section 8.2.3. 3. an adverbial phrase, such as with time and dura- tions of time and length: heute Morgen, den ganzen Tag, einen Meter lang Other noteworthy characteristics: • A pattern worth noting is the -(e)n ending of the masculine forms. For this reason the accusative case is often called the Wen-case: ihn diesen also, the strong adjecti- den welchen val endings (Table 5.1): wen einen

The principle differences in the English indirect objects and German dative ob- jects are: 1. English objects do not have endings which reflect their case and must therefore use prepositions and word order to show their function. German has certain endings, articles, and pronouns to display this: I am giving him my homework OR I am giving my homework to him. Ich gebe ihm meine Hausaufgaben. You can tell the judge your story OR You can tell your story to the judge. 10

Table 1.6: The Accusative Case

Remember: different persons and numbers are designated in the following way:

number

singular plural 1st person 1st person person 2nd person 2nd person 3rd person 3rd person

masc fem neut pl a masc fem neut

nominative der die das die nominative ein eine ein

accusative den die das die accusative einen eine ein

a all genders!

Sie k¨onnenIhre Geschichte dem Richter erz¨ahlen. 2. The English word order is what determines the function of each sentence ele- ment. It is very strict. Since in German nouns can be identified either by their endings, articles, or context, word order is much freer and can be moved around at will to change emphasis. Word order of objects and pronouns are discussed Section 4.1. The following sentences have the same semantic meaning and differ only in emphasis: Er sagt dem Lehrer, wo er sein Buch vergessen hatte. OR Dem Lehrer sagt er, wo er sein Buch vergessen hatte. AND Er erz¨ahltemir die Geschichte von seiner Reise. OR Mir erz¨ahlteer die Geschichte von seiner Reise. OR Die Geschichte von seiner Reise erz¨ahlteer mir. 11

3. Since one can usually tell in which case an object is by its form, there is a differentiation between an accusative, a dative, or a genitive object after a preposition (see Section 8.2.2 for more information about prepositions with the dative.) Additionally, there are several prepositions that can take accusative or dative objects, depending on whether the preposition is stationary (dative) or expresses motion (accusative). This is explained in Section 8.2.3.

1.5 The Genitive

The genitive case is the possessive case. Its use is becoming less and less frequent and is often replaced by a preposition and the dative (usually von). Also, there are many prepositions (listed below) which, strictly speaking, govern the genitive but are used increasingly often with the dative case. The genitive case is slowly dying out.

1.6 Appositions

Appositions are another example of the efficiency and precision of the German case system. An apposition is a noun phrase, usually separated from the rest of the sentence by commas, which serves to modify another noun or phrase. It is in the same case as the noun it modifies. I told Tom, my uncle, that I would be visiting him in June. Ich habe Tom, meinem Onkel erz¨ahlt,dass ich ihn in Juni besuchen w¨urde. Many castles and park facilities were built by Louis the Fourteenth. Viele Schl¨osserund Parkanlagen wurden von Ludwig dem Vierzehnten gebaut. Notice in these examples that it is exactly the same as in English. However, since this is a paradigm which carries over from one sentence to the next, rather than having to clarify questions by adding prepositions or even repeating entire sentences, in German one can answer the question with a noun or noun phrase in the correct case, thus there is a loss of ambiguity in German. 12

Table 1.7: Possessive and Personal Prounouns

1st person 2nd person

masculine feminine neuter masc fem neut

mein meine mein unser unsre unser

dein deine dein Ihr Ihre Ihr

sein, ihr, sein seine, ihre, seine sein, ihr, sein ihr ihre ihr

Add the same endings for singular, plural, nominative, and accusative as with ein. Note that for all words in all three of these tables the feminine, neuter, and plural are the same in the nominative as in the accusative, and that the masculine accusative always ends in ‘n’.

Singular Plural

nominative accusative nominative accusative

ich mich wir uns

du dich ihr euch

Sie Sie

er ihn sie sie sie sie es es 13

Table 1.8: The Dative Case

For the impatient: The dative has 2 uses: 1. the indirect object of a sentence or complement thereof (apposition–see Section 1.6). 2. the object of preposition. For prepositions that always govern the dative case see Section 8.2.2, for prepositions that sometimes govern the dative, sometimes the accusative see Section 8.2.3. ein-words der-words masc fem neut masc fem neut plural

nom ein eine ein nom der die das den

acc einen eine ein acc den die das die

dative einem einer einem dative dem der dem den

Patterns worth noting: Personal pronouns • the masculine and neuter forms end in ‘m’ in

singular plural the singular–this is why the dative is often

mir uns called the Wem-case

dir euch/Ihnen • the feminine form is characterized by ending

ihm, ihr, ihm ihnen in ‘r’ • the accusative forms for the 1st and 2nd per- son familiar in the plural are identical to the dative forms (uns, euch) • the second person formal form is identical to the third person plural form 14

Table 1.9: The Genitive Case

For the impatient: The genitive case has 3 uses: 1. for possession-the word or word phrase in the genitive is the possessor 2. with certain prepositions (see Section 8.2.4) 3. with certain verbs It is recognizable either by its -s suffix for masculine and neuter nouns, pronouns, and adjective; or its -er suffix for feminine (where it looks just like the dative) and nouns, pronouns, and adjectives in the plural.

Table 1.10: The Genitive Declension

masc. fem. neut. pl. masc fem neut

nominative der die das den nominative ein eine ein

accusative den die das die accusative einen eine ein

dative dem der dem den dative einem einer einem

genitive des der des der genitive eines einer eines CHAPTER 2 NOUN FORMS

This chapter covers only the genders and plurals. For information on the case declensions see the section for the respective case beginning with Chapter 1.1. It is difficult to stress how important it is to learn the correct gender of every word one learns. One cannot consider a word to belong to his or her lexicon (vocabulary) without knowing the gender and plural and should therefore learn every word with its article. Without the gender one cannot put the word into context. That being said, the next step is to develop a method for learning the genders and plurals.

2.1 Gender

There are absolutely no concrete rules about which objects have which gender. There are however a few endings which can give you clues listed in Table 2.1. All other plurals must be basically learned with the vocabulary entry, although some other patterns appear. German has natural and grammatical genders. The natural gender is determined by what it is, i.e. der Mann or die Tochter, and the grammatical gender is usually based on historical usage and does not reflect in any way what the natural gender of the object is. Examples include both die Sonne and der Stuhl–which do not have any sort of inherent feminine or masculine characteristics in the minds of German speakers–as well das Fr¨aulein and das M¨adchen, which are neuter because of the dimunitive endings (the come from die Frau and the antiquated die Magd). In contrast to the Romance and Slavic languages, the gender of German sub- stantives are not marked by their ending. The genders must be learned with each

15 16

Table 2.1: Endings Which Give Away the Gender

1. All nouns ending in -t¨at,-schaft, -heit, -keit, -ion, and -unga are feminine and have plurals formed by adding the prefix -en. 2. All nouns ending in -chen, -lein, and -tum are neuter. The plural looks and is pronounced exactly the same as the singular. 3. All nouns ending in -ismus, -ist, -ant and many ending in -er are masculine. Their plurals are: -ismen, -isten, -anten, and ∅ respectively. Additionally, the plurals of many feminine substantives ending in -e in the singular are formed by adding the suffix -n.

a except for words which have it as a part of the stem and not as a suffix, such as Sprung and its derivates word as a vocabulary entry. This cannot be overemphasized. A more complete list would include: masculine -ich, -ig, -ling, -s, -and, -¨ar, -ast, -eur/¨or,-ent, -ier, -iker, -ikus, -or feminine -ei, -a, -ade, -age, -aille, -aise/-¨ase,-ance, -¨ane, -anz, -elle, -ette, -euse, -ie, -enz, -ere, -ik, -ille, -ine, -isse, -itis, -ive, -ose, -sis/se, -ur, -¨ure neuter -le, -cht, -tel, -eau, -ett, -ing, -(i)um, -ma, -ment

2.2 Pronoun Agreement

The definite articles (Eng.: the) are der, die, das in the nominative. The indefi- nite articles are ein, eine, ein in the nominative. The pronouns are er, sie, es in the nominative. These three groups apply to every substantive and are interchangeable, 17 depending on the intended meaning. This is why it is important to know the gender: the pronoun will often take the place of the subject: • Meine Tante wohnt in der N¨ahe. → Sie wohnt in der N¨ahe. • Friederike muss einen Computerkurs machen. → Sie muss einen Computerkurs machen. • Das Fenster ist offen. → Es ist offen. In the same manner, wir, ihr and Sie can replace plural subjects: Laura und ich = wir, du und Thomas = ihr, Sie und Ihre Frau = Sie Likewise, direct objects, indirect objects, and the objects of prepositions can be replaced by pronouns, just as in English: • Julia und Friederike m¨usseneinen Computerkurs machen. → Sie m¨ussenihn machen. • Du und Thomas sollt mit dem Auto fahren. Ihr seid mit ihm in zwei Stunden dort. • Ich habe von diesem Autor noch nichts gelesen. Er soll aber sehr gut sein. • Kannst du mir mein Deutschbuch morgen mitbringen? Ich brauche es jeden Tag.

2.3 Word Formation

The main classes of substantives usually defined are concrete nouns concreta – these words describe objects abstract nouns abstracta – these words are used to describe concepts, thoughts, ideas, etc. (everything else) Since the concept of each is the same as in English nothing more will be said about these two general categories. The focus will instead lie on the forms of two groups of words which are composed of members from both categories: the masculine N-nouns and compound words (composita). 18

2.3.1 N-nouns

There is a group of masculine nouns that ends in ‘-(e)n’ in the plural and every case but the nominative:

der Mensch die Menschen den Menschen die Menschen dem Menschen den Menschen des Menschen der Menschen

A very simple phenomenon, however many language learners seem to forget it exists, especially in the genitive (which is described in Section 1.5). Also note that some books calls these Studenten-nouns. One can recognize these words as the ones that are followed by -en, -en or -n -n in any dictionary. There are also certain endings that fall into this category: -and: Doktorand-en, Habilitand-en, Konfirmand-en -ant: Demonstrant-en, Fabrikant-en, Musikant-en, -Praktikant-en -(k)at: Demokrat-en, Kandidat-en, Soldat-en -ent: Absolvent-en, Delinquent-en, Student-en -et: Athlet-en, Poet-en, Prophet-en -ist: Artist-en, Faschist-en, Jurist-en, Kommunist-en -oge: Geolog-en, P¨adagog-en -nom: Agronom-en, Astronom-en -soph: Anthroposoph-en, Philosoph-en One that does not fall into the category but appears to except in the genitive singular is der Name, die Namen: 19

der Name die Namen den Namen die Namen dem Namen den Namen des Namens der Namen Also note that one word der Herr, die Herren has a different singular and plural: den Herrn die Herren dem Herrn den Herren des Herrn der Herren

2.3.2 Composita

Note that this is above and beyond what any first year course should require of students. Nonetheless, for the curious, Table 2.2 contains some guidelines for the patterns. There are so many different instances that one cannot speak of “rules” (the list of “exceptions” would be much longer than Table 2.2), but the tendencies are worth noting. Although it is not a very hard concept to master, many learners do not make the effort necessary, and it is therefore often an easy way to distinguish a very good non-native speaker from a true native. There are very few words in German compared with English, but the word formation is much more active than in English. This is also what makes German such a production language–speakers have the ability to be very creative. Sonntagsnachmittagsspazierfahrtstunde (the hour during which one takes a walk on a Sunday afternoon), Donaudampfschifffahrtskapit¨an (the captain of a steam ship on the Donau), and the like. 20

Table 2.2: Sounds That Join Words in Composita possible word jointsa : –(e)n-, –(e)s-, -e-, -er-, -ens-, ∅ • The first element in the word is the determining element. Do not confuse this with the element which determines the gender, which is always the last element. • Indeclinable words (such as prepositions and adverbs) and adjectives take -∅-. Adjectives ending in -e drop the -e. (e.g. Bl¨odsinn). • When the first member is a substantive: 1. -∅- follows the suffixes -bold, -chen, -en, -ei, -ler, -ner, ge-. . . -e, -i, -ich(t), -ig, -lein, -nis, -rich, and all nouns whose plural end in -s 2. -s- follows -en, -heit, -keit, -ling, -sal, -schaft, -tum, -ung, -ion, -it¨at 3. -en- follows -in, masculine nouns and most feminine ending in -e 4. -en- follows the nouns with -en- in the genitive singular and plural; feminine and neuter nouns ending in -a, and the neuter nouns ending in -it, -on, the plural forms of all three groups of which end in -en. • When the first member is a verb: 1. -∅- follows verbs that end in a vowel sound and after the sounds [p], [pf], [s], [r], [x] b , usually [m], [l], [S], and [ts] consonants + [s] 2. -e- follows almost exclusively the voiced consonants b, d, g and the sounds [z], [t], but there are many instances in which -∅- follows these sounds

a this information is condensed exclusively from [Fleischer, 136-145]

b the sound at the end of ach CHAPTER 3 ARTICLES

German articles and their use are very similar to English articles, so this should not pose American students too much trouble. The main differences are listed in Table 3.1. When talking about articles in this section, the two forms definite (der, die, das) and indefinite (ein, eine, ein) are meant, and not the entire spectrum of words belonging to or sometime belonging to both this class and others. They are discussed in Chapter 4 on Pronouns. The complete forms for the two words in this class are listed in Table 3.2. Note that most words declined this way–see Chapter 5 on Adjectives for more details. For negation, see Chapter 10 on page 93. Note that the indefinite forms are the same but preceded by a k, and that there is a plural. The uses are generally the same as in English; that is: one uses definite articles to specify something and distinguish it from others and indefinite articles to point out one of many (that is why there is no plural). Notice that the negative does has a plural because one is talking about none or zero, which is plural in German as well as in English. Many books introduce the indefinite article as the article to use when something is introduced for the first time and the definite article hereafter. This may work when on analyzes children’s stories, but take a look at the example in Figure 3.1. There is only one viable choice between the commands: Zeig auf einen/den Kreis! [Point to a/the circle.] Likewise, there is only one possibility for the same command for the Figure 3.2.

21 22

Table 3.1: Differences in German and English Articles

1. there is no plural indefinite article except when negated (English: some/any) 2. articles are not mentioned with professions (this in- cludes students) or nationalitiesa . 3. sometimes the article is not present when an En- glish speaker would expect it to be or is present when an English speaker wants to omit it. This is due to the difference in number and the character- istic ‘mass’ or ‘count’ in some words. 4. often articles are added to names of people. This usually has a positive meaning.

a surely by now everyone has heard of the famous Kennedy blunder: Ich bin ein Berliner.

Figure 3.1: For an Indefinite Article

Figure 3.2: For a Definite Article 23

Table 3.2: The German Article Indefinite article:

Singular Plural masculine feminine neuter nominative ein eine ein accusative einen eine ein ∅ dative einem einer einem genitive eines einer eines

Definite article:

Singular Plural masculine feminine neuter nominative der die das die accusative den die das die dative dem der dem den genitive des der des der CHAPTER 4 PRONOUNS

4.1 Personal Pronouns

Pronouns are used in the place of nouns. They conform to the same patterns as nouns in regards to agreement and case. Table 4.1 is an exhaustive list–notice that the gentive are in parentheses because they are uncommon. For more information about pronouns and agreement, see Section 2.2 Strictly speaking, pronouns do not replace nouns since they can of course be used before the nouns are even mentioned, depending on context. Essentially, pronouns have the following function:

Since people want to save time whenever possible, they shorten everything con- text allows. One thing one needs to remember is that pronouns can replace long noun phrases or even entire clauses since many modifiers need not be repeated. For example:

1. Ich m¨ochtemit deiner Schwester in die Schweiz fahren. . . Sie weiß, wo man gut essen kann. I would like to go to Switzerland with your sister. . . She knows good places to eat. 2. Der Mann mit dem roten Pulli neben der Treppe. . . Er... The man with the red sweater next to the stairs. . . He. . . 3. Weisst du noch, als wir dieses Sofa gesehen haben, das so lang war, dass es nicht in meiner Eltern Wohnzimmer gepasst h¨atte? Meine Tante hat es gekauft!

24 25

Table 4.1: Personal Pronouns

1st Person 2nd Person 3rd Person

familiar formal masc. fem. neut. Singular Nom. ich du Sie er sie es Acc. mich dich Sie ihn sie es Dat. mir dir Ihnen ihm ihr ihm Gen. (meiner) (deiner) (Ihrer) (seiner) (ihrer) (seiner)

Plural Nom. wir ihr Sie sie Acc. uns euch Sie sie Dat. uns euch Ihnen ihnen Gen. (unser) (euer) (Ihrer) (ihrer)

Do you still remember when we saw that couch that was so long that it wouldn’t have fit in my parents’ living room? My aunt bought it!

Word order in sentences with more than one object

The only inconsistency in Table 4.2 is the third item, in which two noun phrases appear and the dative comes before the accustive. This sentence illustrates why: Andreas gibt seiner Schwester einen Teller.[Andreas gives his sister a plate.] Notice that since the feminine dative and genitive forms are the same, the incorrect order would be confusing and leave the listener expecting the sentence to continue: ∗Andreas gibt einen Teller seiner Schwester. [Andreas is giving the plate of his sister. . . ]

4.2 Possessive Pronouns

The possessive adjectives in Table 4.3 are used just like they are in English. Forgetting about gender and cases for now, think about the actual forms themselves (i.e. the roots) and how they correspond to the people whose “possessions” they 26 describe: Tommy told his grandmother that her new car was a lemon. He said its paint was bubbling up. Regardless of the gender and case of grandmother, the root of the German possesive adjective used will be sein , which refers back to the antecedent, Tommy. The same will be true with ihr and grandmother and sein and car (das Auto). The difference then lies only in the endings, which English does not have.

4.3 Reflexive Pronouns

Reflexive pronouns are used in a reciprocal fashion, such as with reflexive verbs (see Section 7.5.3), and illustrate a reference from the subject to the accusative or da- tive object. The forms are identical to those of the personal pronouns (see Table 4.1) except for the obviously missing nominative forms. In addition, the 2nd person formal all 3rd person forms, singular and plural, are sich, as illustrated in Table 4.4. The English equivalent is myself, yourself, himself, itself, herself, ourselves, them- selves respectively. The two notable differences from English are: 1. sich is usually used for each other, such as in They congratulated each other. [Sie haben sich gratuliert.] 2. The dative reflexive pronoun is used to show possession instead of the possessive pronoun in reflexive sentences. Examples: • Er putzt sich die Z¨ahne.[He is brushing his teeth.] • Sie waschen sich die H¨ande.] [They are washing their hands.] Also note that this avoids the confusion that often arises in English with regards to the possessor: Justin was playing soccer together with Ian. He pushed Ian and then broke his arm. Whose arm did Justin break? 27

In German: Er hat sich das Bein gebrochen means he broke his own leg, while Er hat sein Bein gebrochen means he broke the leg of someone else.

4.4 Demonstrative Pronouns

Demonstratives are the pronouns used to demonstrate, or point out something. English examples are this, that, these, those. At the beginning of Chapter 3, Ta- ble 3.2 shows how the definite and indefinite articles are declined. These are also the declensions for the ein - and der-words respectively. The notation in the parentheses next to each of the following word groups in this section and the next refers to the declension as depicted in Table 3.2 concerning indefinite and definite articles. der, die, das1 (der–see Table 4.5) Similarly to the personal pronouns, these are used in place of the substantive + article. Das kann man nicht. Das weiss ich nicht. Das wirst du morgen erfahren. Den brauche ich. Der konnte ich nicht helfen. etc. Notice that the demonstrative (and relative–see Section 4.5) pronouns der, die, das have their own conjugation, as depicted in Table 4.5. dieser, diese, dieses2 (der) Similar to articles, these are used with and preceeding the substantive. One might say that dies is used instead of the article in order to more clearly emphasize that particular substantive’s importance. Diesen Tisch finde ich am sch¨onsten.Sehen Sie dieses Haus dort. . . ? Diesem Mann konnte ich doch nicht helfen. selbst, selber (not declined) Selbst and selber are used as appositions (see Sec- tion 1.6) in order to exclude any other object which might have come into question. Ich habe das Buch selbst gelesen. Mein Neffe kann sich jetzt selber

1 also derjenige, diejenige, dasjenige, derselbe, dieselbe, dasselbe

2 also jener, jene, jenes 28

waschen. Der Pr¨asidentselbst hat es zugegeben. Do not confuse this usage selbst with the one used at the beginning of sentences to mean even such as in: Selbst der Fahrer hat ihn gesehn. Selbst wenn ich nicht gekommen w¨are. . . . [Even the driver saw it. Even if I had not come. . . ].

4.5 Relative and Interrogative Pronouns

Relative pronouns are pronouns which introduce relative clauses, such as the underlined which in this sentence. Because they are pronouns, they must replace a noun or noun phrase, and because they govern relative clauses, they are found in dependent clauses only. Interrogative pronouns are question words used to elicit a specific piece of information. For more information on interrogative pronouns and questions see Chapter 11. der, die, das (der–see Table 4.5) These represent the relative counterpart to the demonstrative pronouns der, die, das above. The conjugation is the same as in Table 4.5. These are used only relatively and not interrogatively. welcher, welche, welches (der) These can be used both relatively and inter- rogatively. As a relative pronoun they are used identically as der, die, das (above), but are more formal. As interrogative pronouns they correspond to the English: which. was f¨urein (not declined) Used interchangeably with welch but less formal; note that f¨ur is not a preposition here and that ein is therefore not necessarily in the accusative case. Was f¨urein Vater w¨urde seine Kinder im Einkaufzentrum vergessen! wer, was (not declined) correspond to English who and what. 29

Table 4.2: Pronoun Word Order Guidelines

For the impatient: 1. In sentences with 2 noun phrases, the dative pro- noun comes first. 2. In sentences with one pronoun and one noun phrase, the pronoun comes first. 3. In sentences with 2 pronouns, the accusative pro- noun comes first.a Examples: 1. Horst erz¨ahltden Kindern eine Geschichte. 2. Horst erz¨ahltsie den Kindern. / Horst erz¨ahltih- nen die Geschichte. 3. Horst erz¨ahltsie ihnen.

a In shorter terms: Where P is pronoun, N is noun phrase, A is accusative, D is dative and < means “comes first in sentence” (a) 2P < D (b) 1P < P (c) 2N < A 30

Table 4.3: The Possessive Pronouns

mein, dein, etc. 1st pers 2nd pers masc fem neut masc fem neut mein meine mein unser unsre unser dein deine dein Ihr Ihre Ihr sein, ihr, sein seine, ihre, seine sein, ihr, sein ihr ihre ihr

Table 4.4: Reflexive Pronouns

1st Person 2nd Person 3rd Person

familiar formal masc. fem. neut. Singular Acc. mich dich sich sich Dat. mir dir sich sich

Plural Acc. uns euch sich sich Dat. uns euch sich sich

Table 4.5: Demonstrative Pronouns

Singular Plural

masc fem neut die Nom der die das

Acc den die das die

Dat dem der dem denen

Gen dessen deren dessen deren CHAPTER 5 ADJECTIVES

Adjectives are used to describe nouns. They can be used in two ways: pred- icatively and attributively, as described in Sections 5.1 and 5.2 respectively. The endings are only for attribute adjectives. The strong endings are there to signify the gender, number, and case, and the weak endings are there for all subsequent modifiers. There are two sets of endings for two different contexts: 1. strong or primary endings-adjectives following indefinite articles (ein , kein ) or no article at all 2. weak or secondary endings-adjectives following definite articles (der, die, das), demonstrative and interrogative pronouns (dies /jen , welch ) Remember: ein guter Mann, der gute Mann

Table 5.1: Primary Adjectival Endings

Primary endings: Singular Plural masculine feminine neuter

nominative -er -e -es -e

accusative -en -e -es -e

dative -em -er -em -en

genitive -en -er -en -en

31 32

Table 5.2: Secondary Adjectival Endings

Secondary endings: Singular Plural masculine feminine neuter

nominative -e -e -e -en

accusative -en -e -e -en

dative -en -en -en -en

genitive -en -en -en -en

Note: the primary endings are the same as the definite article except in the genitive singular masculine and neuter: Juni letzten Jahres (June of last year). Many books seem to forget this point.

5.1 Predicative Adjectives

These are not the type that usually cause students problems. Used predicatively, an adjective is not declined (i.e. just as in English) and appears in the form as one finds it in a dictionary. Predicate adjectives generally come after the verb. Unlike in English, where most adverbs end in -ly and thus have different forms from their adjectival counterparts, predicate adjectives in German look exactly as their adverbial counterparts and can be differentiated only by their context. One basic difference between adjectives and adverbs is that adjectives can be compared (see Section 5.2.1). Der Kaffe schmeckt gut. Deine Hose sieht rot aus. Der Hund ist braun. 5.2 Attributive Adjectives

Attributive adjectives are declined. They modify nouns and must agree in case, number, and gender. One can tell to which noun the adjective belongs by its ending, 33 since adjectives are declined. Apart from the case, number, and gender, there are two different categories of endings an adjective takes, as indicated above: primary and secondary. The primary endings indicate the case, number, and/or gender of the noun wherever possible. If the case of the noun is clear through an article or other modifier (anything which is declined and describes something else), the secondary or weak endings are used on all subsequent modifiers. Examples: ein sch¨onesHaus, dieser grosse Mann Notice that since ein is the same form for both the masculine and neuter in the nominative, the following adjective must have a strong ending in order to show that the following noun is neuter. In other words, if an article is missing or does not clarify what the case and gender of a noun is, the adjective takes on this responsibility in the form of primary endings, and whenever the primary endings begin the noun phrase, all other modifiers take the secondary endings. If an indefinite article introduces the noun phrase (such as in ein guter Vater), all subsequent adjectives take the primary endings: ein guter, hilfsbereiter, liebenswerter Vater. The gender, number, and case of a noun can almost always be ascertained from its modifiers. Likewise, it is almost always apparent whenever one uses any type of modifier without knowing the gender or case. Also note that participles are really just adjectives directly derived from verbs and follow all of the patterns above. See Section 7.4.2 for more information.

5.2.1 Comparative and Superlative Forms

The basic form of an attributive adjective is called the positive. In comparisons, one must use the comparative form, which is formed in in English either by adding -er to the adjective or preceeding it with more, depending on how many syllables it has. In German, most adjectives take the -er ending and add an umlaut to the first 34 vowel where possible. For the superlative form, which in English is characterized by most or the ending -est, German takes the umlaut as in the comparative and adds -st- instead of -er. The endings come after the -er in the comparative and after the -st in the superlative forms. Examples: • lang, l¨anger,l¨angste • schnell, schneller, schnellste • weit, weiter, weiteste • groß, gr¨oßer,gr¨oßte • modern, moderner, modernste Here are some examples of declined adjectives in context. Notice that with positves one often uses the expression so wie (English: as as), in comparison the expres- sion als. . . (English: -er than. . . or more than. . . ), and with superlatives der -ste (English: the -est or the most ). • Dieses Auto ist schneller als das andere. Aber das blaue ist das schnellste. • Euer Haus ist gr¨oßer als unseres. • Die l¨angsteStunde meines Lebens war meine m¨undliche Pr¨ufungin Deutsch. Naja, manchmal ist Klavierunterricht l¨anger. • Es gibt eine sehr moderne Grundschule neben dem noch modereren Apartmen- thaus. • Das h¨aßlichsteHaus in unserem Wohnviertel liegt s¨udlich von dem Stadthaus. Sometimes one might see a superlative form when no comparison is being drawn. This is called the elative form and can usually be tranlated as very . E.g.: Besten Dank, h¨ochstintelligent, gr¨oßtesLob etc. Another use of the superlative is with am -sten, which means the of all: am l¨angsten,am besten, am ¨uberraschendsten etc. Some irregularities: 35

1. • hoch, h¨oher,h¨ochste • gut, besser, beste • nahe, n¨aher,n¨achste • viel, mehr, meiste • wenig, minder, mindeste or: wenig, weniger, wenigste (but regular in the latter form) 2. beide acts as a definite article, so the secondary endings follow: beide alten Computer 3. viel- and wenig- appear alternately declined and undeclined, depending on whether the noun is a mass or a count noun viel Geld - viele Leute wenig Geduld - wenige Menschen 4. adjectives ending in -en and -er often omit the comparative and superlative -e- in order to ease pronunciation: • ungeheuer - ein ungeheurer Zufall • teuer - ein teures Spiel • vorhanden - ein vorhand(e)nes Problem • sauer - eine saure Miene 5. adjectives ending with -el omit the vowel when an ending is added: dunkel - ein dunkler Wald

5.2.2 Possessive Adjectives

Possessive adjectives is another name for possessive pronouns (see Section 4.2). They are often called ‘adjectives’ because they are declined as adjectives are.

5.2.3 Ordinal Numbers

Ordinal numbers are attribute adjectives, hence they are declined. 36

Table 5.3: The Ordinal Numbers

erst- first siebt- seventh dreizehnt- thirteenth f¨unfzigst- fiftieth zweit- second acht- eighth vierzehnt- fourteenth siebzigst- seventieth dritt- third neunt- ninth f¨unfzehnt- fifteenth sechzigst- sixtieth viert- fourth zehnt- tenth zwanzigst- twentieth hunderts- hundredth f¨unft- fifth elft- eleventh dreißigst- thirtieth tausentst- thousandth sechst- sixth zw¨olft- twelfth vierzigst- fortieth millionst- millionth

The pattern is fairly simple compared with English. One need only remember: The root is the cardinal number with -(s)t + the ending, except in the cases of eins, zwei and drei. This is just as in English (and most Indo-European languages). The -s is only necessary when the word would otherwise be unpronounceable. CHAPTER 6 ADVERBS

Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs. They can answer one of the the questions How? When? How much? In what way? Where? and often have the ending -ly in English, although this must not always be the case. In German, many adverbs look exactly like predicate adjectives (see Section 5.1), since they remain uninflected. A good examples of the difference between adjectives and adverbs can be illus- trated with the often misused adjective good and the adverb well. • *I’m doing good. This happens in English often: • *You are driving too slow. Sch¨on can be an adverb or an adjective, depending on how it is used: • Das Wetter ist sch¨on. • Dein Wagen f¨ahrtsich sch¨on. Adverbs are written in the lower case unless they begin a sentence–the convention is what differentiates them from many substantives: Abend/abends, Morgen/morgens, etc. Aside from the wo-, da- compounds mentioned in Table 6.1, some common end- ings are: -s, -eise, -w¨arts,-fach, -mal.

37 38

Table 6.1: Adverbs

Type Question word Examples place wo, woher dort, hin, draußen, irgendwo time wann morgens, gestern, jetzt, manchmal, heute, fr¨uher quantity wieviel viel conjunctional notfalls, dennoch, trotzdem, somit, deshalb, deswegen interrogative – wo, woher/wohin/wann, wie, wieviel, warum, weswegen, we- shalb, wieso pronominal or wor¨uber, wonach darin, dar¨uber, danach, hiermit, hi- prepositional erzu CHAPTER 7 VERBS

7.1 Verb Forms

7.1.1 The Infinitive

An Infinitive is the word or group of words which is built from the predicate and contains the full meaning of the predicate. The present infinitive is the unconjugated form of the verb as one finds it in a dictionary. This corresponds to the English to . The particle zu (to) is also used in German in specific instances as illustrated below. The commonest use of the infinitive in German is with modal verbs (see Section 7.3), where the particle zu is not used. When zu is used with an infinitive, one will find it directly in front the infinitive. If it is in front of an adjective it is in adverb (such as zu teuer) and in front of a noun or pronoun in the dative it is a preposition (zu ihm, zum Mitnehmen, zu der Frau. Also, the infinitive has other tenses: future perfect, present perfect. The present perfect infinitive formed with the present infinitive of the correct helping verb (haben or sein) with the past participle of the main verb: bezahlt haben for bezahlen, gefahren sein for fahren. The future perfect infinitive is formed with the present infinitive of werden + the past participle of the main verb + the present infinitive of the helping verb (haben or sein): werden gefahren sein for fahren, werden gegessen haben for essen. Note that all three forms of infinitives mentioned also have passive forms. The uses of the infinitive are covered under each appropriate section, such as Section 9.3 for infinitive conjunctions and Section 7.3 for modal verbs.

39 40

7.1.2 Conjugation

Almost all verbs are conjugated as in Table 7.1. Where the [e] in the 2nd and 3rd sing, 2nd informal Plural is only present when the stem ends in a hard consonant (such as d or t, as in the example). One basically hears about starke/schwache/gemischte Verben (strong/weak/mixed verbs), besondere Verben (special verbs), and verbs with a stem vowel change (Ablaut). Additionally, there are prefix verbs, which may have a separable or inseparable prefix. Here is how one can recognize them: 1. Strong verbs – past participle ends in -en 2. weak verbs – these are the regular verbs; they comprise most of the German verbs. Their past participles end in -t and they have no stem vowel change (Ablaut) 3. mixed verbs – neither strong nor weak, their past participles end in -t but they have a vowel stem change in the past participle. 4. ‘special’ verbs (-eln, -ten, -zen, -s/ßen, -ien, -ern) They are only special because the endings are not pronounceable without chang- ing the order or adding/removing an ‘e’ 5. Ablaut – This is a change in the vowel of the stem of the verb. It may occur in the present tense (as in laufen-l¨auft) or in the past tense (denken-hat gedacht – see item ‘mixed verbs’ above).

Table 7.1: Conjugation of Regular Verbs

For the impatient:

-e -en ich arbeite wir arbeiten -[e]st -[e]t, -en du arbeitest ihr arbeitet, Sie arbeiten -[e]t -en er/sie/es arbeitet sie/Sie arbeiten 41

6. inseparable prefixed verbs (see Section 7.1.4) 7. separable prefixed verbs (see Section 7.1.4) 8. outright irregular (see Appendix B) verbs such as sein, werden, and sometimes haben, all of which must be examined individually Note that the only categories which are mutually exclusive are strong, weak, or mixed verbs and inseparable or separable verbs–i.e. a verb must be strong, weak, or mixed but cannot be any two of those, and a verb can be inseparable or separable, but cannot be both and must not be either. There are, of course, other groups and forms of verbs, such as modal verbs and imperatives, but these are not conjugations and handled separately in their respective sections. For mood see Section 7.2; for imperatives see Section 7.2.2. There are no traditional conjugations (as in Latin, French, or Greek), but one can define German verbs in terms of one or more of the eight aforementioned categories.

7.1.3 Irregular Verb Endings

As mentioned above, there are two types of verbs in German: weak and strong (schwach and stark). They both take the same endings–being strong or weak only has to do with the form of the verb, not with the endings. An irregular or strong verb takes the same endings as the weak or regular verbs, but either the other verb forms (i.e. the different tenses–see Section 7.4) are different or the stem has an ablaut. There are, however, verbs that have special endings because of the stem. The endings of these verbs differ because otherwise they would not be pronounceable. • infinitives with stems ending in ‘t’, ‘d’, and ‘ß’ arbeiten, scheiden, heißen • a few other (much rarer) letters combinations occurring in the infinitive stem such as ‘z’, ‘gn’, ‘r’, and ‘l’ beizen, regnen, hetzen, tanzen, ¨andern, rudern, sammeln, segeln are examples • haben and the irregular (strong) verbs sein and werden. 42

7.1.4 Verb Prefixes

The fact that not every verb in German is unique and made of similar parts that many other words use should not be surprising. In English there are many prefixes common to dozens of words. One need only think about how many words are built with prefixes. Notice that the meanings the prefixes denote are relative and not absolute. Thus teaching a non-native speaker the morpheme -tract would not ensure that s/he could deduce the meanings of attract, detract, subtract, extract. Unfortunately, the same is true of German. But luckily, there are not nearly as many affixes as there are in English (there are just as many suffixes). Just as in English, there are inseparable prefixes and separable prefixes (cf. English phrasal verbs such as to go/put/eat/work out, to beat/think/look up, to work/think through etc.). in-separable prefix verbs

These are the commonest ones. be- emp- ent- er- ge- ver- zer- Two important things to know about inseparable prefixes are: 1. the syllable directly after the prefix receives the stress, never the prefix itself 2. in the strictly inseparable prefix category there are no prefixes that are words in and of themselves Table 7.3 summarizes the separable prefixes and meanings which beginning learners need to know. sep-arable prefix verbs

The other type of prefixes are separable. They have three important character- istics: 1. they are independent words and have a meaning when they stand by themselves 2. they always come at the end of the clause; sometimes the body of the verb remains at the head and they are therefore separated, sometimes, as in modal sentences and subordinate clauses, the rest of the verb also must go to the end 43

Table 7.2: Conjugation of Some Irregular Verbs

For the impatient: a regular verb:

lieben

ich lieb-e wir lieb-en

du lieb-st ihr lieb-t/Sie lieb-en

er,sie,es lieb-t sie lieb-en

examples of irregular endings: beizen

arbeiten ich reiz-e wir reiz-en

ich arbeit-e wir arbeit-en du reiz-t ihr reiz-t

du arbeit-est ihr arbeit-et er,sie,es reiz-t sie reiz-en

er,sie,es arbeit-et sie arbeit-en 44

Table 7.3: Inseparable Prefixes be- transitive marker, it changes a beschreiben, befahren, befinden, verbs meaning from to do some- etc. thing to to do something to X emp- internalizes the verb, makes it per- empfangen, empfinden, empfehlen sonal ent- gives the sense of away from entfernen, entleeren, entnehmen, etc. er- to do something for the first time erlernen, erdenken, er¨offnen, erfinden, etc. ge- as inseparable prefix idiomatic; no gedenken, gefallen, gebrauchen, pattern geb¨uhren, etc. ver- 1. connecting, opposite of ent- 1. verheiraten, verbinden, etc. 2. to change or use up some- 2. verarbeiten, verspeisen, thing verspielen, ver¨andern, ver- 3. to do something incorrectly brauchen, etc. 4. a type of intensifier 3. verschlucken, verf¨arben, etc. 4. verhelfen, verbleiben, etc.

zer- 1. to divide up 1. zerteilen, zergliedern, etc. 2. to harm or destroy 2. zerst¨oren,zerreden, etc. 45

of the clause and they are reunited again Example: Ich stehe dir bei. → Ich m¨ochtedir beistehen. 3. the prefix takes the stress some of the commonest separable prefixes are: an- ab- auf- ¨uber- weg- and many more! The concept is so prevalent and the examples so numerous that one should not have any trouble picking up the flow of sentences with verbs that “break apart” Geh doch mal weg! Warum willst du denn nicht einfach weggehen? Ich stehe gew¨ohnlichum 2 Uhr mittags auf, weil ich abends arbeiten muss. Ich muss doch so fr¨uhaufstehen! Ich kaufe Ihnen gerne die ganzen Apfel¨ ab. Ich m¨ochtealle Ihre Apfel¨ abkaufen.

7.1.5 Telling the difference between a separable prefix and a preposition

Since the separable prefixes are also words with another grammatical function whose meanings vary greatly from prepositional uses, it is important to know which is meant. Luckily, it is not difficult to differentiate and there are not many cases which pose problems. The rules of thumb are: 1. Separable verbs are separated in the present and past tense, in indicative and imperative mood but not in subordinate clauses. 2. They are not separated in the infinitive, such as when an auxiliary verb is used and the infinitive appears at the end of the sentence (as is the case with modals–see Section 7.1.1), or when used as participles (Section 7.4.2). 3. Prepositions have objects, and must therefore be followed by a noun in the re- spective case (see Section 8.2). Separable prefixes are not followed by anything. Examples: • Sie sprach mir Mut zu. [prefix] • Ich habe lange zwischen den B¨aumen gesessen. [preposition] 46

• Ich m¨ochtedas aufschreiben. [prefix] • K¨onntenSie das auf die Karte schreiben? [preposition] • Legen Sie die Lebensmittel auf den Tisch. [preposition] • Meine Mutter war heute echt gut aufgelegt. [prefix in adjectival participle] • BUT: H¨orauf mit der Fragerei! [prefix] (Section 7.2.2)

7.2 Mood

Mood is a variant of the word mode and denotes the manner or way in which a verb expresses its action. As in English, German has three moods: indicative, imperative, and subjunctive. Each mood is divided into tenses, but most books present the tenses of the indicative mood, then mention the other moods without even presenting their tenses.

7.2.1 Indicative

This is the mood of regular speech and writing. Nearly every sentence in this paper, including this one, is written in the indicative mood. If one is not telling someone else what to do or supposing what may or might be but is not, chances are he or she is speaking in the indicative mood.

7.2.2 Imperatives

The imperative, sometimes also called the hortative mood, is used for giving commands. For the most part, one encounters only 4 types of imperatives: 1. 1st Person Plural 2. 2nd Person Singular familiar 3. 2nd Person Singular polite 4. 2nd Person Plural 47

In proper written German an imperative sentence is always ended with an excla- mation point. This is why the instructions in some German tests written by native speakers seem harsh for American students. Remember that!

Formation

Tables 7.4 and 7.5 explain the formation of imperatives and the forms of the imperatives for the irregular forms of sein, werden and haben.

Use and history

Argued to be the first appearances of real language, imperatives are verbal thoughts believed to be the original forms of each verb. Some examples might be: look out! help! leave!. Since these forms were at one point the commonest and were undoubtedly the first to originate, it should be no surprise commands both greatly resemble the verbs which sprang forth from them and are the most “stubborn”–that is, they do not always correspond to the conjugated indicative forms with respect to stem changes (Ablaut). Sage doch, was du wirklich willst! Lies dein Buch f¨urMorgen! Schlaf gut! The basic verb form in even the most dissimilar of the imperatives, namely the 2nd person singular, can easily be recognized. In foreign language learning we usually become familiar with the indicative mood first, as those are the forms used in declar- ative sentences such as Wie geht es dir? and Mein Name ist G¨otzGeorge. Hence the imperative forms are said to be built from the indicative present. Since these are the forms one usually learns first and the ones with which you are already most familiar, we are following this tradition. While the English imperative has only two forms, the German has four: one for the 1st person plural (cf. Let’s go swimming)–Gehen wir schwimmen, and one for each of the 2nd person forms, du, ihr, and Sie. The 2nd person singular imperative 48

Table 7.4: Formation of Imperatives

• In the first person plural and 2nd Person formal forms the pro- noun is not dropped but the order is changed in comparison with the indicative form. The imperatives look exactly as questions do. In the 2nd person familiar forms the pronoun is dropped. • The first person plural looks exactly as it does in the infinitive: essen → Wir essen. → Essen wir! • The 2nd person singular familiar is formed by dropping the ‘t’ from the stem (the 3rd Person singular form) and removing any umlaut that do not occur in the infinitivea : lesen → Er liest. → Lies! • The 2nd person plural familiar form is identical to the indicative present: Lest! Esst! Glaubt!

a such as in schlafen or laufen; Er schl¨aft → Schlaf!; Sie l¨auft → Lauf!

Table 7.5: The Main Irregular Verbs

sein werdena habenb

sei seien wir werde werden wir habe haben wir

seid werdet habt

seien Sie werden Sie haben Sie

a a very uncommon imperative

b Notice that haben follows the regular pattern of verbs. 49 is formed by dropping the ‘t’ from the 3rd person singular form and removing any umlaut that doesn’t occur in the infinitive:

Trink[e]! Wasch[e]! Geh[e]! Lies! Iss! Sprich! Lern[e]! Whether or not the ‘e’ is added depends on the last consonant: 1. if the stems ends in ‘d’ or ‘t’ the ‘e’ must be there: Warte mal! Arbeite fleißiger! Binde deine Schuhe zu! 2. if the stem ends in ‘m’ or ‘n’, the ‘e’ must be there, unless the ‘m’ or ‘n’ is preceded by m,n,r,l or ‘h’, in which case it is optional: Atme langsam! Widme mir ein Buch! Rechne es doch mal aus! BUT: K¨amm[e]dich! Qualm[e] nicht so! Lern[e] fleißig! R¨uhm[e]dich nicht selbst! 3. verbs whose infinitives end in -eln or -ern do take an ‘e’ on the end but may lose the one before the l/r, depending on style: Hand[e]le! Samm[e]le! F¨ord[e]re! With the ‘e’ is more formal and almost always used in written German. 4. verbs whose 2nd person singular form changes the central vowel to an ‘i’ do not have the final ‘e’: Lies! Wirf! Stirb! Verdirb! Iss! Miss! Friss! Sprich!Vergiss! Nimm! Hilf! Quill! Gib! Schilt! Wirb! Sieh!

Word Order

1. when used with a subordinate clause–just as in English: Pass auf, wenn du etwas ¨uber Radfahren lernen willst! 2. regarding flavoring particles – see next Section 3. negation – nothing unusual here. Follows patterns described in Chapter 10 More comparable to English that French: Passt nicht auf! Schaut nicht her. . . ! Mach keine Ausreden! etc. 50

4. anomaly: aufh¨oren: h¨orauf mit. . . ! instead of h¨ormit . . . auf!

Flavoring particles in imperative sentences

In normal speech there are many words which nearly every native speakers uses but which students do not usually learn. In most books they are called “flavoring particles” for lack of a more descriptive term. Examples of a similar English phe- nomenon are like, sort of, you know, you see. In German they are much more common and occur not only in speech, but also to some extent in formal writing. One must remember that people rarely give straight commands, as they are much too harsh and usually do not result in the speaker obtaining what s/he wants. Take a look at the following sentences: Bob, clean your room. Alice, try harder this time. Just wait! Most would agree, these commands would sound a lot gentler if they were a little less direct. Alice and Bob be more compliant if one said something like: Bob, why don’t you clean your room? Alice, try just a little harder this time. Wait just a second! Naturally, the intonation also plays a big role here. One should not be surprised to hear that German has the same tendencies. Luckily the imperative form does not change at all, rather, two words (the so-called “flavoring particles”) are added, usually right after the imperative form (i.e. including the pronoun in the plural forms): doch and mal. This gives a very similar effect to the Why don’t. . . : R¨aumedoch dein Zimmer auf! Bem¨uhedich doch! Warte mal kurz! 51

Although some instructors tell their students to avoid using such particles in the beginning stages, one will rarely hear real German commands without them, and it is therefore the opinion of the author that even beginning learners try to use them.

7.2.3 Subjunctive

The subjunctive mood (Konjuntiv) belongs to the more advanced topics and may be only briefly mentioned in some first year courses. Nonetheless, it may be in the first sentence one hears when one arrives in a German-speaking country and is of utmost importance for an introductory German course. Uses: 1. when something did not happen or is not going to happen, or is not true (con- trary to fact): as if, almost, I wish. . . 2. politeness: m¨ochte(gern), h¨atte(gern), w¨urde (also in questions) 3. if, when clauses 4. when reporting something that may or not be true–her the speaker/author is distancing him/herself from the content of the statement and withholding a judgment concerning its factuality (indirect speech) Formation: 1. for weak verbs, it is the same as the imperfect (praeteritum) form 2. for strong verbs, one takes the praeteritum form changes the first vowel to an umlaut where possible. The first person singular also adds an -e as a suffix. There are many common verbs that are particularly old and therefore particu- larly stubborn, such as helfen (h¨ulfe),sterben (st¨urbe) 3. the auxiliary verb w¨urden (Eng.: would) is often used with the main verb as an infinitive instead of forming the subjunctive of the main verb. This is particu- larly common in polite forms. 52

4. many verbs have two subjunctive forms for the two different types of subjunctive (see Table 7.6) one is always not built from the praeteritum and must be learned separately For the subjunctive forms of modal verbs, see page 57. 53

Table 7.6: The Two Types of Subjunctive in German

There are actually two types of subjunctive in German: • one for commands and indirect speech • one for politeness and one for conditions that are contrary to fact or that could be true but are not They are usually called Subjunctive or Konjunctive I and II. One can tell them apart by: • their usage: see above • their form: subjunctive II is the form described above or w¨urden + in- finitive; subjunctive I is characterized by the fact that the 3rd person singular form looks like the indicative 1st person singular (habe, verstehe, sehe, mache, etc.)–if the form cannot be differentiated from the indicative form (such as with haben), the form for subjunctive II is used or w¨urden + infinitive • no book should call these rules, as one can, at best, speak of tendencies in usagea involving the varying forms

a [Duden, 163] 54

Examples: Indirect speech: 1. Er sagt, ich sei sein Bruder. 2. Er sagt, ich soll sein Bruder sein. 3. In der Zeitung steht es, er habe sie nicht gekannt. 4. Man behauptet, sie h¨attensich fr¨uhergekannt. Commands: 1. Man m¨ogedich herzlich willkommen heissen. 2. Es lebe der K¨onig. 3. Man nehme 2 Eier. . . Polite forms: 1. K¨onntenSie mir helfen? 2. W¨urdet ihr die T¨uroffen lassen? 3. D¨urfteich ein bißchen bleiben? Conditions contrary to fact: 1. Fast h¨atteer es geschafft! 2. Wenn ich nur mehr Geld h¨atte. . . 3. Wenn du nicht so laut w¨arest, k¨onntestdu in der K¨uchespielen. 4. Am Telefon h¨orstdu dich so an, als st¨undestdu im n¨achstenZimmer!

7.3 Modal Verbs

A modal verb is a sort of helping verb that expresses a wish, intention, or–on a more basic level–a relation to the action in the sentence. This action is shown by another verb in the sentence, which must be in the infinitive. In German, this infinitive comes at the end of the sentence in main clauses (but not in subordinate clauses). There are, however, many cases where the intent is so obvious that the infinitive can be omitted-some examples are below in Table 7.8. 55

7.3.1 Conjugation

The 1st and 3rd singular forms are always the same in modal verbs; there is an ablaut in the singular in all but sollen (and m¨ochten); and the plural forms of 1st, 2nd formal, and 3rd always identical to the infinitive. Notice that patterns: all the 1st and 3rd person singular forms are identical and the infinitive is identical to the 1st, 3rd persons plural and the 2nd person formal. No vowel changes occur in the plural but in every person in the singular in all verbs but sollen. There is another verb, m¨ogen, whose subjunctive form is very similar to and often used as as modal verb. As sollen, it too has no Ablaut (stem vowel change). Modal verbs are auxiliary verbs which are usually accompanied by an infinitive. They are sollen, wollen, m¨ochten (special case), d¨urfen,m¨ussen,k¨onnen.

things to look out for. • verbs or subjunctive forms of verbs that usually act like modals: m¨ochten, lassen • verbs that have the meanings similar to modal verbs: m¨ogen (see m¨ochten above), gern haben, verm¨ogen.

Past tenses of modal verbs. There are two ways to indicate modal actions in the past: 1. with the present perfect tense–in this case the past participle of the modal verb is only used when the infinitive can be ellided (see Table 7.8), otherwise the auxiliary form of haben is used and the modal auxiliary is moved to the end of the clause, i.e. after the infinitive complement: Das habe ich nicht machen d¨urfen. 2. with the imperfect–the shorter and more common way is to use the imper- fect form of the modal auxiliary (sollten, durften, konnten, mussten, wollten, mochten) and leave the rest of the sentence as it is: Das durfte ich nicht machen. 56

Table 7.7: Conjugation of Modal Verbs and m¨ochten

For the impatient:

d¨urfen k¨onnen

ich darf wir d¨urfen ich kann wir k¨onnen

du darfst ihr d¨urft/Sie d¨urfen du kannst ihr k¨onnt/Sie k¨onnen

er,sie,es darf sie d¨urfen er,sie,es kann sie k¨onnen

m¨ussen wollen

ich muss wir m¨ussen ich will wir wollen

du musst ihr m¨usst/Sie m¨ussen du willst ihr wollt/Sie wollen

er,sie,es muss sie m¨ussen er,sie,es will sie wollen

sollen m¨ochten

ich soll wir sollen ich m¨ochte wir m¨ochten

du sollst ihr sollt/Sie sollen du m¨ochtest ihr m¨ochtet/Sie m¨ochten

er,sie,es soll sie sollen er,sie,es m¨ochte sie m¨ochten 57

Table 7.8: When One Can Leave Out the Infinitive direction When the intended infinitive expresses move- ment, such as is the case with laufen, fahren, fliegen, etc. it may be omitted: Ich m¨ochte nach Frankreich. Ich muss in die Schweiz. Morgen wollen wir zu dir. ellipses When the intended infinitive is clear enough without being stated, it is usually omitted: Ich will das aber nicht [machen]. Er kann gut Deutsch [sprechen].

Note that the present perfect with main verbs (i.e. when the infinitive cannot be ellided) is used infrequently with the indicative mood, and that the construction is mostly used with subjunctive forms. A careful student of German will not mistake the imperfect use of modals with the irreal use of the subjunctive: 1. Das durfte ich nicht machen. 2. Das h¨atteich nicht machen d¨urfen. In sentence one, the speaker was not allowed to do whatever is being spoken about, and in sentence two the speaker did do it but should not have. See Section 7.2.3 for more information.

subjunctive forms. There are two main uses for the subjunctive forms of modal verbs: contrary to fact and forms of politeness. 1. As mentioned above in the previous section, the present perfect subjunctive is just the present perfect indicative with the subjunctive form of haben. Thus: (a) Das habe ich nicht tun sollen. (b) Das hat sie nicht sagen k¨onnen. (c) Man hat mir nicht helfen k¨onnen. 58

2. In order to make requests more polite, German uses the subjunctive forms of the modal verbs. This is consistent both with the tendency to use w¨urden with other verbs as well as with the English practice: would, can/could, may/might. Note that, as mentioned above, m¨ochten is not a true modal verb but the subjunctive form of m¨ogen. It is already a polite form.

7.4 Tenses

The time in which an action takes place is defined by the tense of the verb. Since tense is within the verb itself, forms using auxiliary verbs put together are not tense. Thus English does not have a future tense, since the auxiliary verb will rather than word endings is used to signify actions which take place in the future. Although German has its own set of tenses and expresses things in a much different way than English, this is one thing they have in common. When we speak of tense here, as is done in most books and courses, we will be focusing on the time expressed and not on the strict rules of form; therefore “future” is handled in its own section just as the other tenses. This section explains the meanings and uses of the concept of tense, while some more in depth remarks and the formation of each tense is handled individually in Sections 7.4.1–7.4.6. It must also be pointed out that tense is not influenced by nor directly related to mood or voice, and that each tense has different forms for the different moods and voices. The two important pieces of information in regards to analyzing tense are the spoken time and point of reference. The spoken time is now, or whenever the sentence is uttered, and the point of reference is the time at which the said event takes place. Examples of when to use which tense. • It is 3:00 pm, and our speaker is going to eat dinner tonight at 6:00 pm. Ich esse heute Abend um 18 Uhr. or Ich werde (heute Abend) um 18 Uhr essen. 59

past perfect imperfect present present/future I future II

present perfect

Figure 7.1: A Visual Representation of German Tense

Without the adverbial phrase heute Abend, the first sentence has a habitual as opposed to a one-time meaning. The second sentence is in any event more resolute or unwavering than the first. Likewise, if one were to be asked When are you going to be finished? two possible answers are Ich bin um 19 Uhr fertig and Ich werde um 19 Uhr fertig sein, where the second gives the impression that the speaker wants to dispell any doubts that s/he might not be finished by then. • If someone were to invite the speaker to make plans for a time after this sched- uled dinner, the answer might be: Ich werde um 19 Uhr (schon) gegessen haben. A sample sentence in which the spoken time is 4:00 pm, the planned time to eat is 6:00 pm, and the point of reference (underlined in this sentence) is 8:00 pm: Bis ich dich wiedersehe, werde ich schon gegessen haben. • Ich stehe (gew¨ohnlich)um 7 Uhr auf. displays habitual behavior which is strengthened by gew¨ohnlich, whereas the sentence: Ich bin um 7 Uhr aufgestanden means the speaker got up one time at 7:00 am. Without a point of reference, it will be assumed that this morning is meant. • The following sentence illustrates how the time was longer in the past: Ich mußte um 10 Uhr nach Wien, also bin ich um 7 aufgestanden. • The sentence: Ich stand um 7 Uhr auf most likely refers to a general action in the past, such as While in college, I got up at 10:00, [but after I began working. . . ] 60

• At 3:00 pm, one describes what he did this morning–he will use the present perfect, except with the few verbs which almost always are used in the imperfect form (see Section 7.4.3). • Ich bin um 7 Uhr aufgestanden und habe mir die Z¨ahne geputzt. Dann habe ich gefr¨uhst¨ucktund Nachrichten geh¨ort.. . Using imperfect is more appropriate when telling a story (the historical past) which took place this morning but is told as a story with a removed point of reference: • Ich sah den Polizisten, und er sah mich. Er konnte nicht glauben, dass ich vor der gebrochenen Fensterscheibe stand, und er sagte “Halt!”. . . Note that the imperfect is not used with a concrete point of reference in the future–it must always be a completed action or a habitual action in the past which no longer takes place. However, the present perfect tense is used to describe completed actions, even if they have not taken place yet: • Bis. . . [By the time. . . ] and nach. . . [after. . . ] • Bis wir uns wieder sehen, habe ich die Karten schon gekauft. • Nach 19 Uhr habe ich schon gegessen. In these sentences, the point of reference is in the future (Bis wir uns wieder sehen, Nach 19 Uhr), but the action will be completed by then. Note that both of these sentences are impossible with the imperfect: • *Bis wir uns wieder sehen, kaufte ich die Karten schon. • *Nach 19 Uhr aß ich schon. This is what the past perfect (or plusquamperfect) is used for. For example: • Nachdem du aus dem Kino gekommen warst, sah ich dich gleich. For simultaneous actions in the past, als is used. • Als du aus dem Kino kamst, sah ich dich gleich. 61

Note that this sentence would be impossible with the present perfect because it does not refer to an exact point in time, but rather to the fact that the action is completed: • *Als du aus dem Kino gekommen bist, habe ich dich gleich gesehen. On the order of tenses in German: • in present - present the events take place at the same time • in imperfect - imperfect the events take place at the same time • in past perfect - past perfect the events take place at the same time • in past perfect - imperfect the imperfect event took place after the past perfect event, and both are in the past Ich sah dich erst, nachdem du schon gewunken hattest. (winken=to wave) • in present perfect - present the present event took place after the present perfect event, and the present perfect event is completed • in present - future the event in the future has not yet happened • in present perfect - future perfect the event in future perfect will be completed after the event in the present perfect has been completed, but exactly when that is in reference to the spoken time depends up the context or the point of reference.

7.4.1 Present

The present tense is the tense used in this sentence and any sentence in which the verb is in the present tense form and the point of reference is the same as the spoken time. Examples are below: English German I am eating, I eat, I do eat Ich esse Notice that in addition to tense, I sleep, I do sleep, I am sleeping Ich schlafe

English verbs also have aspect, which is used to determine if something is habitual, 62 a one time action, or is happening at this moment right now. German uses adverbs and context to achieve this. For example, The English sentences: I am sleeping, I do sleep, and I sleep would all be translated into German as Ich schlafe without context, but within a conversation an effort should be made to make sure that every nuance possible is translated as well. In order to illustrate that the event is happening right now, such as the case is with the English present progressive (I am sleeping), German uses the adverb gerade: Ich schlafe gerade. In order to convey that an action is habitual, the present tense often uses the adverb gew¨ohnlich: • I get up at six. → Ich stehe (gew¨ohnlich)um sechs auf. Because German does not have aspect, the “present tense” refers to a broader possible time span than the English “present tense” does (which is broken down into aspect). In German, the present tense is the tense used most often to refer to actions in the future. See Section 7.4.4.

7.4.2 Perfect

Formation of the Perfect

The present perfect tense in German looks a lot like the English present perfect but usually has a different meaning. It is formed with an auxiliary (either haben or sein, depending on the verb–see page 64) and the past participle of the verb. Just as with modal verbs (which are also auxiliaries), the conjugated form of haben or sein appears in its expected position in the sentence, and the participle appears at the end, just like the infinitive in a modal predicate. For example: Ich habe meine Hausaufgaben schon gemacht. Notice the prefix on the past participle and ‘t’ ending of this regular (German schwach or ‘weak’) verb. This is the default form, but there are several reasons why many of the verbs you encounter do not match this pattern: 1. the verb has a prefix, either separable or inseparable 63

2. the verb is stark (‘strong’), i.e. it just does not follow the pattern Also, combinations of the two possibilities above are not uncommon. The reason why most of the first verbs one learns in a foreign language are irregular is because they are usually the oldest and most stubborn. Instead of resembling the patterns words fell into when the language originated (i.e. became different enough to be called a language and no longer just a dialect), the common words were so deep-rooted in the speakers’ minds that a replacement would have been impossible. Compare the past participle of English words such as sleep, drink, think, see, go, etc. to newer and more common ones such as transpire, type, configure, etc.

Learning past participles

There are two keys guidelines for learning all the past participles of all the verbs: For weak verbs take the infinitive of the verb, drop the ‘-en’ ending and add a ‘-t’; add a ‘ge-’ to the beginning of the non-prefixed verbs or between the prefix and the root to the verbs with sep-arable prefixes. Verbs with insep-arable prefixes as well as those ending in -ieren take no prefix whatsoever. stellen → gestellt aufstellen → aufgestellt verstellen → verstellt For strong verbs and the so-called mixed verbs there are several patterns which can help you remember the forms but to make ‘rules’ of these would be sim- ply too abstract at this point. For now it is best to simply memorize them. Note that the rules for the absence of ‘ge-’ still apply. What makes them strong/mixed is the fact that the vowel changes (Ablaut). The final ‘-en’ is not dropped and replaced by a ‘-t’ in the strong verbs but is in the mixed. ausziehen → ausgezogen [stark] versehen → versehen [stark] 64

denken → gedacht [gemischt] bringen → gebracht [gemischt] sein or haben?

As mentioned above, the auxiliary verb for the present perfect can be either haben or sein, depending on the verb in question–or better: depending on whether the verb indicates a change in motion or condition or does not. If the verb is a motion verb–such as to run, to go–or a verb indicating a change in condition–such as to become, to die, to happen, to break–the auxiliary is the form of sein that agrees with the subject (i.e. bin, bist, etc., depending on number and person of the subject). If not, it is conjugated with the correct form of haben. There are almost no verbs that do not conform to this pattern (other than sein itself. Note also that all transitive verbs are conjugated with haben.

Meaning

As mentioned above, there is a difference in meaning between the English and German present perfect tenses. There are several uses in German for this tense, but all but one are relatively obscure and unimportant for beginners: Its commonest use is to signify that the action has taken place and has already been completed at the time the sentence is uttered. The time the act was completed can be given by adverbs: Ich habe gestern ein Fahrrad gekauft Ich habe schon gegessen. Notice that in English this meaning can represented by several different forms (as- pects) of the past tense: • I have bought a bike. • I was buying a bike [when. . . ]. • I bought a bike. • I did buy a bike. 65

7.4.3 Imperfect

Often referred to as the ‘simple past,’ the ‘praeteritum,’ or the ‘historic past,’ the imperfect tense consists either of a different verb form (strong and mixed verbs) or an inserted -t- and refers to events that took place in the past tense. It is used both for habitual and one time actions in the past, but not for actions which began in the past and are still continuing. It is more often used in written than spoken except with the verbs in Table 7.9, for which it is also used in spoken German because the verbs occur so often and are shorter than the present perfect forms. In addition the the verbs sein and haben, the following verbs are used in the imperfect more often than the present perfect in spoken German because of their short forms: denken, finden, einsehen

7.4.4 Future

As mentioned in Sections 7.4 and 7.4.1, there is no “future tense” in German just as there is none in English, and the present tense with adverbs of time is often used to express the sense of future actions. Examples: I’ll meet you at 8 tonight. Ich treffe dich um 8 heute Abend. I think I’ll go to the concert with you Ich glaube, ich gehe n¨achsteWoche mit next week. dir aufs Konzert.

Table 7.9: Imperfect Forms of sein and haben

sein haben

singular plural singular plural

ich war wir waren ich hatte wir hatten

du warst ihr wart/Sie waren du hattest ihr hattet/Sie hatten

er,sie,es waren sie waren er,sie,es hatte sie hatten 66

In addition to the present tense with adverbs of time, the verb werden + infinitive is used to express events in the future. It is not used interchangeably with the present tense to express the future tense because it is less dependent on context or time adverbs to exhibit its futurity. In addition, it has a more resolute tone than the present tense + a time adverb. In addition to the futurity werden + infinitive, it can also exhibit an assumption on the part of the speaker. In this case, the said even may still be happening or not have even happened yet. Der Thomas wird krank sein. Thomas is probably sick. Often, adverbs such as wohl, vermutlich, wahrscheinlich, vielleicht are used to enhance the fact that the speaker sees this only as a possibility and not as fact or that the speaker casts doubt on the statement: • Das wirst du wohl am besten k¨onnen,nicht wahr? • Mein Vater wird vermutlich das Essen bezahlen.

7.4.5 Future Perfect

The future perfect, also known as ‘future II,’ is the future counterpart to the present perfect. It not only exhibits all the characteristics of the present perfect in relation to when it takes place, it also has the possibility aspect the future tense has as explained above. In this case, the event is complete, and the speaker is speculating about the outcome or another aspect of the event: • Mein Vater wird f¨urdas Auto bezahlt haben. • Ich werde dich wohl gewarnt haben?! It is formed with werden + present perfect infinitive (see Section 7.1.1).

7.4.6 Past Perfect

The past perfect, or ‘plusquamperfect,’ is used to refer to events that were com- pleted before an event in the past took place. For example, if it is now 3:00 pm and 67

Herr Schmidt called his wife at 11:30 am and then ate lunch at 12:00 pm, one might say: Er hatte seine Frau schon angerufen, bevor er Mittag gegessen hat. Notice that it looks exactly as the present perfect, but the auxiliary verb haben, which would be sein if the verb exhibited motion or a change of condition, is in the perfect. The same is true for all verbs: 1. Man war schon gegangen, als Sie gekommen sind. 2. Wir hatten ihn schon sehen k¨onnen,ehe er die Fahne trug. 3. Ihr seid erst zu Hause gewesen, nachdem wir angerufen hatten.

7.5 Verb Types

7.5.1 Full Verbs

A full verb is a verb that can stand on its own as a predicate in a sentence and has a lexical (as opposed to just a grammatical) worth. These are the normal main verbs one means most of the time when referring the predicate of a sentence. If it is not an auxiliary verb, a reflexive verb, a function verb, a modal verb, or an infinitive, it is a full verb.

7.5.2 Auxiliary Verbs

Auxiliary verbs, also known as helping verbs, are the verbs haben, sein, and werden when they are used in conjunction with main verbs to perform a grammatical function in a sentence. The functions include building the passive, modal construc- tions, and perfect constructions.

7.5.3 Reflexive Verbs

Reflexive verbs are verbs that have reflexive pronouns as their objects (see Sec- tion 4.3). There are few verbs which are truly reflexive, that is, verbs that must be used with reflexive pronouns, although this number is much higher than in English. 68

Usually when one speaks of reflexive verbs in German, one means any predicate that has a reflexive pronoun as an object. The three most important characteristics of reflexive verbs are: 1. they are transitive, which means they form their perfect tenses with haben 2. they are all active, since the object acted upon is acted upon by the subject (itself) 3. as mentioned in Section 4.3, reflexive verbs are often used in German when English would use possessive pronouns to show possession: • Ich putze mir die Z¨ahne. • Er hat sich das Bein gebrochen. • Hast du dir den Finger geschnitten?

7.5.4 Phrasal Verbs

There are many verbs in German which take on a different meaning when they are used together with certain prepositional phrases. These are analogous to the phrasal verbs in English, and although they are not a separate grammatical category, they should be handled as a class of their own. Table 7.10 contains several examples of the commonest and most important function verbs. It is important that one know not only the verb and its conjugation but also the preposition and the case which it governs (see Chapter 8).

Table 7.10: Phrasal Verbs

verb preposition + case English meaning sample sentence [perfect infinitive]

abh¨angen von + dat to depend on someone or Es h¨angt alles von deiner [abgehangen haben] something Einstellung ab. 69

Table 7.10–Continued verb preposition + case English meaning sample sentence [perfect infinitive] anfangen mit + dat to start, to beginn with Der Arzt hat mit der [angefangen haben] someone or something Prozedur noch nicht ange- fangen. aufh¨oren mit + dat to stop with someone or H¨oren Sie mit der Fragerei [aufgeh¨orthaben] something auf! beginnen mit + dat to start, to begin with Mein Bruder hat letztes [begonnen haben] someone or something Jahr mit der Schule be- gonnen. jemanden bitten um + acc to ask someone for some- Man hat mich um [gebeten haben] thing Verst¨andnisgebeten. denken an + acc to think about someone or Man muss oft an seine [gedacht haben] something Kinder denken. nachdenken ¨uber + acc to think about someone or Ich habe lange ¨uber deine [nachgedacht haben] something Erkl¨arung nachgedacht. jemandem danken f¨ur + to thank someone for some- Ich m¨ochte Ihnen ganz her- acc thing zlich f¨urIhre Hilfe. [gedankt haben] jemanden fragen nach + to ask someone about Habt ihr sie nach einer dat someone or something zweiten Serviette gefragt? [gefragt haben] glauben an + acc to believe in someone or Ich glaube an Gott. [geglaubt haben] something 70

Table 7.10–Continued verb preposition + case English meaning sample sentence [perfect infinitive] jemanden halten f¨ur+ acc to take someone for some- Ich habe ihn f¨ur einen [gehalten haben] thing L¨ugner gehalten. hoffen auf + acc to hope for something Sie hoffen auf gutes Wet- [gehofft haben] ter. lachen ¨uber + acc to laugh about someone or Sie lachten alle ¨uber mich. [gelacht haben] something leiden an + acc to suffer from something Sie leidet oft an dem L¨arm [gelitten haben] der Flugzeuge. geraten in + acc to get into something Er geriet oft in Wut, wenn [geraten sein] ich meine wahre Meinung dazu ¨außere. sich entschuldigen bei + to apologize to someone for Ich habe mich bei ihnen f¨ur dat f¨ur+ acc something die Unangenehmlichkeiten [sich entschuldigt haben] to tell someone to be sorry entschuldigt. for something sich f¨urchten vor + dat to be afraid of someone or Ich f¨urchte mich vor Spin- [sich gef¨urchtet haben] something nen. sich freuen ¨uber + acc to be pleased with someone Ich habe mich sehr ¨uber [sich gefreut haben] or something Ihren Anruf gefreut. sich freuen auf + acc to look forward to Sie freut sich auf ein [sich gefreut haben] (+ gerund) baldiges Wiedersehen. sich interessieren f¨ur+ acc to be interested in someone Er interessiert sich nur f¨ur [sich interessiert haben] or something Autos. 71

Table 7.10–Continued verb preposition + case English meaning sample sentence [perfect infinitive] sich k¨ummernum + acc to take care of someone or Sie k¨ummertsich um ihn [sich gek¨ummerthaben] something nicht. sich konzentrieren auf + to focus on someone or Sie konzentriert sich auf acc something ihre Hausaufgaben. [sich konzentriert haben] sich sorgen um + acc to worry about someone or Wir sorgen uns um seine [sich gesorgt haben] something Finanzschwierigkeiten. sich verlieben in + acc to fall in love with someone Sie hat sich in ihn verliebt. [sich verliebt haben] sich vorbereiten auf + acc to prepare for something Ich bereite mich auf die [sich vorbereitet haben] Deutschpr¨ufungvor. sorgen f¨ur+ acc to take care someone or Wir sorgen f¨urihn. [gesorgt haben] something sprechen mit + dat ¨uber + to talk with someone about Ich habe mit ihm ¨uber den acc someone or something Plan gesprochen. [gesprochen haben] sterben an + acc to die from something Er ist an einem gebroch- [gestorben sein] enen Herzen gestorben. teilnehmen an + dat to take part, to participate Ich m¨ochte am Som- [teilgenommen haben] in something merkurs in Mannheim teilnehmen. vertrauen auf + acc to have trust in someone or Ich vertraue auf meine Fre- [vertraut haben] something unde und Familie. 72

Table 7.10–Continued

verb preposition + case English meaning sample sentence [perfect infinitive]

verzichten auf + acc. to do without something Ich habe auf den Preis [verzichtet haben] verzichtet.

warten auf + acc to wait for someone or Er wartet auf euch. something

7.6 Voice

7.6.1 Active

A sentence is in the active voice when the subject of that sentence is the agent. In other words, if the noun in the nominative is committing the action or if the predicate has sein as its main verb, it is an active sentence.

7.6.2 Passive

In passive sentences, the agent is not the subject of the sentence. Sometimes it is the object of the preposition von or durch, but often it is not even mentioned. The subject is acted upon by some named or unnamed force, and the verb werden builds the predicate as an auxiliary verb.

To convert from active to passive. One takes the direct object and makes it the subject, paying attention to the new word order and remembering to conjugate the verb accordingly. The indirect object does not change. If there is an active agent (i.e. not man), it becomes the object of von and declined for the dative case accordingly; if man is the subject of the active sentence, it is simply left out as it is implied. Examples: • Man besucht diesen Tempel oft. → Dieser Tempel wird von Leuten oft besucht. • Man schreit. → Es wird geschrieen. (no agent can be named here) 73

• Andreas schenkt Angelika das Buch. → Buch wird (von Andreas) Angelika geschenkt.

To convert from passive to active. For changing passive sentences into active ones, one need only reverse the process described above: Objects of the prepo- sitions von and durch will usually be the subject unless there is not subject named, in which case it will usually be man. Special attention must be given to tense, number, and mood.

Telling the difference between passive and future. In passive, the par- ticiple is in the past tense (for future in the infinitive), cf. Er wird es machen – Es wird gemacht. Sie wird essen – Sie wird gegessen. Often the passive has the von + agent (in dative).

Telling the difference between passive and future perfect. In future perfect the past participle is present but the infinitive haben must also be present. cf.: Es wird gegessen – Er wird bis dann gegessen haben. The future perfect is a relatively seldom occurrence, so one should not really have much trouble with it. CHAPTER 8 PREPOSITIONS

Table 8.1 is an overview of the most commonly used prepositions.

Table 8.1: An Overview of the Prepositions

Prep. Cases Definitions

(nom) acc dat gen most often: special: an + + - dat.: at, next to (on) see below acc.: towards, at auf + + - dat.: on (top of), at in place of zu, in: acc.: towards e.g. auf die Bank aus - + - out of, from “made of X” außer -1 + - besides, apart from with exception to bei - + - at the house of X while + gerund bis + -2 - temporal: until, by spatial: as far as durch + - - through passive: from, by + agent

1 see Section 8.2.2

2 see Section 8.2.1

74 75

Table 8.1–Continued

Prep. Cases Definitions f¨ur + - - for time limit, compari- son, or substitution gegen + - - against, towards both spatial and comparative hinter + + - behind in + + - (dat/acc:) in, (acc:) into mit - + - with nach - + - to, after according to (person) neben + + - ohne + - - without seit - + - since (temporal) ¨uber + + - over, above um + - - around, at temporal: at spatial: around unter + + - under, beneath von - + - of, from passive + agent: by vor + + - temporal: before, in can be used tempo- front of rally and spatially wegen - +3 + because/on account of zu - + - to see Section 8.2.2 zwischen + + - between

3 see Section 8.2.4 76

Prepositions are very difficult to translate and therefore cause many students problems, mainly because there is never a one to one correspondence in meaning. So many contexts make wrote memorization impossible. The main difficulties arise when the student: 1. does not know which case follows the preposition and therefore has trouble locating the object 2. is not aware of the difference in meaning arising from the difference cases some prepositions can govern 3. forgets the common meaning or encounters a usage new for him/her and cannot surmise the meaning from the context 4. mistakes a separable prefix for a preposition or vice versa The first two problems are easily resolved by studying the sections 8.2.1, 8.2.2, and 8.2.3 and learning the meanings with the proper cases. The third and fourth problems are also resolvable but take a little more effort. Grappling with section 8.1 will help a great deal in conceptualizing the spatial qualities of the prepositions, and with the sections 7.5.4 on function verbs and 7.1.5 on separable verb prefixes one should be well on the way to dealing with most prepositional problems one may encounter.

8.1 A Visual Overview of the Prepositions

A picture is worth a thousand words. The pictures of prepositions on the next five pages are meant to display the spatial meaning of each preposition and and draw attention to what it means rather than how to translate it.

8.1.1 Prepositions of Movement and Motion

See Figures 8.1–8.14.

8.1.2 Prepositions Exhibiting a Static State

See Figures 8.15–8.24.

77

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Figure 8.21: unter (i.e. beneath) with Figure 8.22: unter (i.e. among) with Dative Dative 81

8.2 Prepositions Governing Case

Because English does not have a case system, one normally does not take note of the differences in the nouns in prepositional phrases. But in sentences with predicates such as to give and to tell, the difference becomes obvious: I gave him the book. I told her not to eat any more of my dandelion stems. The him and the her clearly have different functions than the book and the phrasal object not to eat any more of my dandelion stems. We can test this by asking the questions: What did you give him? To whom did you give the book? What did you tell her? Whom did you tell not to eat any more of your dandelion stems? Since German does have four distinct cases and prepositions that are always followed by certain ones, one has to know which ones to use for which preposition.

8.2.1 Prepositions governing the Accusative

The prepositions whose objects are always in the accusative are: bis durch f¨ur gegen ohne um

8.2.2 Prepositions governing the Dative

The following prepositions are followed by dative objects: aus außer bei mit nach seit von zu (nehmen Dativ, das weißt Du!) außer is a special case. Occasionally it fulfills the function of a conjunction, and in rare instances, it can also govern the accusative or genitive case. For now, the author recommends that beginner learners treat it as a dative preposition since the other instances are so rare. 82

8.2.3 Two-way prepositions

Apart from the two groups of prepositions which govern the accusative and dative, there is another group of prepositions which take objects in the accusative or dative depending on the meaning of the sentence. This meaning is described below.

Semantics

The second major function of the dative and accusative cases, next to distin- guishing the direct objects from the indirect objects, is to distinguish between ob- jects showing motion (accusative) and those which are stationary (dative). English does not have anything even similar to this, but it is a necessary part of German. In English this motion is expressed simply by using different verbs, as illustrated in Table 8.2. Note that the past participles are different for stationary verbs and verbs of motion–verbs of motion have weak past participles, while stationary verbs have strong past participles. Fortunately, there is not a large number of prepositions that can govern either the dative or accusative in this fashion, so memorizing them should be quite easy: an auf hinter in neben ¨uber unter vor zwischen To learn how to correctly use them, one need only to think of the two different types of contexts they could appear in, as illustrated in Table 8.3.

Table 8.2: The ‘Two Way Verbs’

English German stationary with motion stationary with motion to stand to put/place stehen stellen to lie to lay liegen legen to sit (be sitting) to sit down sitzen sich (hin)setzen to sit to set sitzen setzen to hang to hang up h¨angen h¨angen 83

Table 8.3: Some Two-way Prepositions

Prep. with accusative–wohin? with dative–wo? an Er geht an die Tafel. Er steht an der Tafel. auf Leg es auf den Tisch. Es liegt auf dem Tisch. hinter Stellen Sie die St¨uhlehinter das Er schl¨aft hinter dem Haus. Haus. in Schaut in das Fenster hinein. Ich habe ihn in dem Bahnhof gesehen. neben H¨ange das Bild neben den Georg sitzt neben dem Fernse- Spiegel. her. ¨uber Er hat ¨uber das Buch und aus Uber¨ jedem Haus ist ein Dach. dem Fenster gesehen. unter Ich habe die Zeitung unter den Ich habe sie schon unter einem Tisch gelegt. Baum gelesen. vor Man geht nicht vor ein Auto, das Vor der Mauer waren auch viele gerade f¨ahrt. Leute ungl¨ucklich. zwischen Laufen wir zwischen die B¨aume Deine Milch steht zwischen den und ¨uber den H¨ugel. Flaschen auf dem Tisch. 84

Note that the prepositions retain this property whether they are used with time (zeitlich) or place (¨ortlich).

8.2.4 Prepositions governing the Genitive

None of the prepositions governing the genitive case belong to the group of twenty commonest preposition. Nonetheless, Table 8.4 illustrates several of the most important ones one may encounter. For written purposes, one should nearly always see them with the genitive case, also the the dative is slowly replacing the genitive. In the feminine and plural one cannot tell whether the genitive or dative case is being used, but it is evident with masculine and neuter singular nouns. For learners of German as a foreign language it is best to still stick to the genitive, as using a dative form will only draw a correction from a native speaker. 85

Table 8.4: Some Genitive Prepositions

Preposition English Characteristics equivalent wegen because of, on ac- also built with possessive pronouns seinetwegen, count of ihretwegen w¨ahrend during also as a subordinating conjunction, see Table 9.2 trotz despite, in spite of also trotzdem anstelle instead of not to be confused with verb anstellen, to hire aufgrund due to from Grund, reason kraft by virtue of, in pretty seldomly used virtue of laut according to, as also: laut=loud (adj.), lauter=many (adj) per angesichts in view of, in the from Gesicht, face face of dank thanks to zufolge as a result of from Folge, result zwecks for the purpose of from Zweck, purpose, intention 86

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Figure 8.23: vor/hinter with Dative Figure 8.24: zwischen with Dative CHAPTER 9 CONJUNCTIONS

Conjunctions are the words that connect two word groups or clauses. Grammar- ians divide conjunctions into four different groups according to their function, but one usually learns about two groups for beginning purposes and then discovers that two other constructions he is familiar with and uses are actually also conjunctions. In this paper all four groups will be presented together: 1. coordinating conjunctions 2. subordinating conjunctions 3. infinitive conjunctions 4. proportional conjunctions Although each group can be further broken down into many sub groups, each group is presented by itself over the next four sections and, with the exception of subordinating conjunctions, no attempt is made to categorize its members.

9.1 Coordinating Conjunctions

There is a limited number of coordinating conjunctions. They are und, aber, oder, denn, nur, sowohl . . . als auch, entweder . . . oder, sondern, allein, doch, jedoch. Their meanings are elucidated in Table 9.1.

9.2 Subordinating Conjunctions

The number of subordinating conjunctions is much larger than the number of coordinating conjunctions and they will not all be listed here. The two characteristics that subordinating conjunctions exhibit which differentiate them from coordinating conjunctions are

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Table 9.1: The Coordinating Conjunctions

• The coordination conjunctions do not change the order of the sentences and do count as position words when determining the location of the verb (see Section 1.1). Conjunction English Characteristics equivalent und and no comma before is subject is the same in both clauses aber but equivalent to Eng. ‘however’ sondern but (rather) requires a substitute–Eng.: not X but (rather) X oder or denn because cf. denn in Section 9.4–that one means than nur only sowohl . . . both . . . and sometimes translated as not only . . . but also al- als auch though nicht nur . . . sondern auch is more accurate in that case entweder . . . either . . . or not used for negatives–that requires weder . . . noch– oder see Chapter 10 allein alone, only more strengthening/alienating nur–do not confuse with the adjective allein–here it has no object and does not influence the case of the following words doch but, however contradicts whatever was just said or believed to be thought; can stand on its own as a contradictory sentence–then it is an interjection jedoch however infrequently used as the first word in a sentence 89

1. they introduce subordinate clauses, and subordinate clauses are characterized by verb-last 2. subordinate clauses are dependent clauses, which means they cannot stand on their own as sentences and their content is subordinated to the main clause on which they are dependent. A comparison of the two conjunctions denn and weil is a good way to demonstrate the difference between coordinating and subordinating conjunctions, the former being a coordinating, the latter a subordinating conjunction, both meaning because. 1. Ich muss zum Bahnhof, denn mein Zug f¨ahrtum f¨unf. 2. Ich muss zum Bahnhof, weil ich den Zug um f¨unfbekommen m¨ochte. Sentence one illustrates that denn does not influence the word order of the clause. The two independent clauses Ich muss zum Bahnhof and mein Zug f¨ahrt um f¨unf are connected at an equivalent level–in other words coordinated–by denn, but neither is dependent the other; one could just have used other coordinating conjunctions such as aber, und, or another with only a slight meaning in difference. Sentence two illustrates that a clause introduced by weil subordinates to the main clause, causing the verb to move to the end of the clause. The reasoning for the main clause is explained in this dependent clause: Why do I have to go the train station? Because I would like to catch the 5 o’clock train. The clause weil ich den Zug um f¨unfbekommen m¨ochte is not a complete thought and can therefore not exist on its own. All of the subordinating conjunctions in Table 9.2 exhibit these characteristics. Groups: 1. w¨ahrend, indem, solange, sobald, sooft, als, wenn 2. nachdem, seit, als, wenn, sobald, sowie 3. bis, bevor, ehe 4. dass 90

5. wie, als (ob), als/wie wenn 6. weil, zumal, da 7. je . . . desto, je . . . um so 8. obwohl (also obgleich, obschon, obzwar), wenn auch 9. damit

Table 9.2: Commonest Subordinating Conjunctions

Conjunction English Characteristics equivalent

Temporal w¨ahrend while, whilst also a preposition usually used with the genitive, see Table 8.4 indem as, while solange1 as long as often followed by als sobald as soon as, once sooft whenever als when used for one time actions in the past wenn when used for habitual actions in the past nachdem after seit since German Ich X seit Y is I have been Xing for Y X is verb and Y is time bis by (the time), until bevor; ehe before

Comparative wie as 91

Table 9.2–Continued

Conjunction English Characteristics equivalent

als (ob) as if

als wenn as if wie wenn

Causal

weil because for a comparison of weil and denn, see page 89

(zumal) da since

Showing correlation

je . . . desto the more X the more Y or je . . . um so The Xer the Yer

Concessive

obwohl 2 although, even though

wenn auch even though

Finite

damit so that, therewith

dass that

a also sofern

b also obgleich, obschon, obzwar

9.3 Infinitive Conjunctions

Strictly speaking, um zu should be translated into English as in order to, but in speech one usually simplifies this construction to to. Example: 92

Table 9.3: Uses of the Infinitive 1. um zu ... in order to ... I lese die Zeitung jeden Tag um die Welt besser zu verstehen. 2. ohne zu ... without . . . -ing Ohne ges¨under zu essen wirst du nicht richtig gesund.

• Ich kaufe die teuersten Boxen, um Musik laut spielen zu k¨onnen. I am buying the most expensive speakers (in order) to be able to play music loud. Note that um zu is most often used in conjunction with modals, whereas sen- tences such as: I want to work late today so that I can leave early tomorrow. do not use the infinitive in English or German. cf. I want to work late today in order that I might be able to leave early tomorrow. Ohne zu is rendered as a gerund and not as an infinitive in English, i.e. Ohne dich zu kennen . . . is Without knowing you . . . .

9.4 Proportionate Conjunctions

A fourth set of conjunctions are the proportionate conjunctions. They are rarely taught as such and for that reason alone cause beginning students trouble. Their name describes their function: they describe relations. In English, as and than are sometimes used to unite two parts of a sentence when making comparisons. These are proportionate conjunctions in German. They are umso, desto, als, als, wie, denn, denn, als CHAPTER 10 NEGATION

There are three basic things one might want to negate in a sentence: a noun, an adjective/adverb, or the whole sentence–i.e. the verb. Notice that English basically only has “no” and its forms (“none, not any, no one, nobody” etc.) for nouns and “not” for verbs and adjectives. This is exactly the same in German. It uses “kein ”, which is declined just like “ein ”, for the nouns and “nicht” for the adjectives, adverbs, and verbs. Without even understanding a sentence, one can easily pick out the negated part of sentence. The forms of “kein ” come directly before the nouns they negate, and “nicht” is found: • directly before the predicate adjectives and predicate nominatives: Das ist nicht mein Hund. Der Hund ist nicht gr¨un. • before adverbs of indefinite time, place, and manner: Ich kann nicht oft Fußball spielen. Ich darf nicht bald wieder in die Schweiz. Herr Reinhold ist nicht zu Hause. Er f¨ahrtnicht mit dem Bus von Amerika nach Europa. • before prepositions that express a direction or position: Er fliegt nicht in die Schweiz. Frau Hedewig m¨ochtenicht nach Mainz. Jacek ist nicht zu Hause. Jurek wohnt nicht in Polen. • before the infinitives in modal sentences: Man darf sie nicht sehen.

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Ihr sollt ihn nicht anschreien. • after adverbs of definite time: Er joggt am Samstag nicht. Wir sehen euch um 18:00 heute Abend nicht. It becomes more difficult when several elements appear in a sentence at once. This might lead to confusion regarding the position of nicht. There are two additional rules of thumb to keep in mind: if nicht refers to a specific element in the sentence and is meant to negate just it, then it comes directly before this element, as in: Ich liebe nicht dich. (i.e. I love someone, but not you) if nicht is negating an entire sentence or clause, it tends to come toward the end of the sentence: Ich fliege am Mittwoch nach Berlin nicht. (i.e. I’m not going to say when I am flying to Berlin or where I’m flying on Wednesday) This the way most sentences in German and English are, sometimes one may want to negate one noun and then suggest another in its place: Not the green ones, but rather the. . . ; Not your bike, mine. German has this same feature. For instance: . . . der zwar nicht mein Vater war, der mich jedoch [however]. . . The difference between these two English sentences: “I don’t want any money”, “I don’t want that [your/his/etc.] money” is paralleled by the German: “Ich will kein Geld”, “Ich will das Geld nicht” is that the first states the speaker does not want any Geld of any kind, whereas the second means that only the Geld in question is being referred to. The negation can also be strengthened by using ¨uberhaupt or gar. They essen- tially have the same meaning, but ¨uberhaupt is slightly stronger. Instead of nicht, the negating particle nie, meaning “never” may appear. 95

Table 10.1: Kein kein comes before indefinites. indefinite articles are preceeded by a k: • Ich will eine Wurst essen → Ich will keine Wurst essen. • Er m¨ochteeinen neuen Stuhl besitzen. → Er m¨ochtekeinen neuen Stuhl besitzen. plurals with no articles take keine: • Ihr seht St¨uhlevor euch. → Ihr seht keine St¨uhlevor euch. • Ich brauche B¨ucher. → Ich brauche keine B¨ucher. zero article indefinites (mass nouns, e.g.: Geld, Milch, Gem¨use, etc.) are preceded by kein with the appropriate endings which match in case, number, and gender: • Ich habe Geld. → Ich habe kein Geld. • Ich trinke morgens Milch. → Ich trinke morgens keine Milch.

Negating schon, noch

Some sentences will not be able to be directly negated because of their unusual structure. For example, in English one says: • I already know what he’s going to say and I still claim he’s the murderer. but not: • *I already don’t know what he’s going to say. or • *I don’t still claim he’s the murderer. rather: • I don’t know what he’s going to say yet. and I no longer claim he’s the murderer. These are irregularities. German has the same thing for schon and noch: • Ich weiß ja schon, was sie glaubt. → Ich weiß noch nicht, was sie glaubt. • Ich esse noch Karotten. → Ich esse keine Karotten mehr. 96

Table 10.2: Nicht nicht negates everything else: verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositional phrases, predicate nominatives nicht comes before: adjectives Der Berg ist steil → Der Berg ist nicht steil. predicate nominatives Das ist Herr Schwarz → Das ist nicht Herr Schwarz. adverbs of manner, indefinite time and place:

• Margit geht zu Fuß. → Margit geht nicht zu Fuß. • Er besucht mich oft. → Er besucht mich nicht oft. • Er wohnt hier. → Er wohnt nicht hier. prepositional phrases expressing destination or location:

• Sie geht nach Hause. → Sie geht nicht nach Hause. • Er arbeitet in Berlin. → Er arbeitet nicht in Berlin. infinitives of modal verbs Er kann mich sehen. → Er kann mich nicht sehen. nicht comes after: verbs, personal pronouns, and definite subjects and direct objects:

• Ich esse. → Ich esse nicht. • Man besucht mich. → Man besucht mich nicht. • Wer geht mit ins Kino? Ich nicht. • Ich kenne deinen Freund. → Ich kenne deinen Freund nicht. expressions of definite time:

• Wir sehen uns heute Abend. → Wir sehen uns heute Abend nicht. • Ich lese jetzt. → Ich lese jetzt nicht. 97

• Sebastian spielt noch Golf. → Sebastian spielt Golf nicht mehr. Note that the use of kein or nicht is determined by the element which is being negated in the sentence, as described above. CHAPTER 11 QUESTIONS

German is a verb-second-language. This means that, as stated in Table 1.1, the verb is always in the second position in declarative sentences. In interrogative sentences (questions), that is not always the case. There are two basic types of interrogative sentence: 1. yes/no questions 2. questions using interrogative adverbs Yes/no questions use inversion; in the first person plural and second person formal forms look like imperatives, otherwise they are identical to declarative sentences. Questions of the first type are essentially looking for one-element answers and often elicit one-word responses: • Wer hat das getan? • Was hast du gesagt? • Wann bist du zur¨uckgekommen? • Mit wem warst du gestern? • Wo habt ihr geparkt? This is no different from English, e.g.: • How far did you travel? • Whom did you meet along the way? Additionally, German has wo- compounds in which wo- combines with a prepo- sition to form a question particle: • Worauf wartet ihr? (What are you waiting on?) • Womit schreibst du? (What are you writing with?)

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Note that this is only for objects–people and forms of wer are formed as in the previous sentences. Some interrogatives: wer, was, wann, wo, wie, warum, wieso, wieviel, wessen, wenn, wo- (such as worauf, womit, wozu, etc.) APPENDIX A PRONUNCIATION

A.1 Guide to German Pronunciation

These are the basic sounds of German. One should be able to use these general guidelines to correctly pronounce most German words one encounters. Notice that the third column contains examples of the sound occuring in initial, middle, and final position where available.

Table A.1: German Pronunciation Guide

Vowels1 a a as in Am. Eng.: father Achtung, Ventilator, da e similar to the e in English: bet eng, Hexe, B¨aume i short: similar to the vowel in English: if ich, wolkig, Zwirn ‘ie’ long: similar to the initial vowel in Eng.: Mikroskop, studieren, Utopie even

1 Two primary differences to be noticed in the German vowel system are 1. In English, we tend to slur or glide vowels at the beginnings of words, while all vowels beginning syllables begin with glottal stops (the ‘-’ in English ‘uh-oh’) in German. 2. Most of the vowels in American English are not pure, but rather diphthongs; we move our mouths to change from one vowel sound to a related one (feel this by saying the word “ape” or “idle” slowly), while the vowels in this section are pure and therefore involve no lip or jaw movement for their duration.

100 101 o a very pure o sound-no lip movement! oberfl¨achlich, obwohl, Situation also, Bote, Boot u a very pure, comparatively long u sound unglaublich, Abrundung, du ¨a very similar to the vowel sound in American ¨affisch, Schl¨age, – English bet, but the jaw is opened a little wider and the tongue is down just a bit ¨o the tongue and jaw are in the same position Okonomie,¨ obsz¨on, (Friseur) as in e, but the lips are rounded ¨u the tongue is in the same position as in the short: y (¨uppsilon), H¨utte, – long i, but the lips are very rounded; same long: ¨uber, Besitzt¨umer, – as French ‘u’ y same as long ¨u, but some pronounce it –, Syntax, – (dialectically) like the short i

Diphthongs ei composed of the two vowels a and i. Similar Eisberg, schmeicheln, Prahlerei to the Eng. diphthong (the long i in in prize), but the first vowel is formed a little further back in the mouth in German. ¨au/ the German version of the Am. Eng. ‘oi’ ¨außerst, Teufel, Efeu eu sound as in boy au like the Am. Eng. ouch without nasality auch, unglaublich, genau 102

Consonants b just as in English2 bringen, [But!:]absagen, Staub c3 usually a ‘k’ sound when found at the begin- Clou/Clique, –, – ning of words otherwise found in the combi- nation ‘ch’ ch either: 1: Chemie 2: acht 3: Chance 4: Chor 1. the ending sound in ‘ich’ [see Figure A.1]

after front vowels (i, e, ¨o,¨a,¨u)

2. as in Loch after back vowels (u, o, a)

3. the ‘sh’ sound we have in English

4. ‘k’4

d just as in English dahin [But!:] radfahren, Bad f just as in English fahren, Affe, Graf g just as in English grau, [But!:] Wegweiser, Tag h5 just as in English + lengthens vowel before helfen, –, – ; Mal → Mahl it in combinations with a o ¨ou ¨u Wolle → wohl; M¨uller → M¨uhle

2 but note that all consonants lose their voicing at the end of words and syllables 3 the rules for this consonant are not as difficult to deal with as they at first appear. In a dictionary of 16,000 words, only about 60 begin with ‘c’ or ‘ch’, and the meanings of more than half of them can be guessed because they are spelled exactly as in English. This is because nearly all German words beginning with ‘c’ are loanwords 4 the deciding factor of which of these last two variants is used is based on the word’s origin: the French words are often pronounced ‘sh’ and the Greek ones ‘k’ 5 in the middle and at end of words ‘h’ lengthens the immediately preceding vowel 103 k just as in English kaufen, abkriegen, stark j almost always pronounced just like the En- Julia/jemand, –, – glish ‘y’, except in: Jargon, Job, Jazz l very similar to American English ‘l’ but with Linguistik, unglaublich/Tollwut, the tongue contacting a bit closer to the jawohl front of the mouth (teeth) m just as in English Mutter, kommen, am n just as in English Nuance, Tante, Ton p just as in English Privileg, Knorpel, Typ q followed by ‘u’, together they make a sound quietschen/qualmen, –, – like English: ‘kv’ r there are three German rs: Frau/rechts, fahren, Tor • one produced with the tip of the tongue–usually in song, on stage, and as a variant in certain regions–note that it is only rarely used in normal speech except in certain dialects

• the “high German” uvular ‘r’, which is like the sound you make when you gargle–it is not very common other than in very formal speeches

• the most widespread and what is con- sidered “standard” in Germany, the velar ‘r’ is formed just a hair closer to the back of the mouth than the ‘k’ and ‘g’; see Figure A.2; this is the one most foreign language learners want to emulate s between Eng. ‘s’ and ‘z’; semi-voiced begin- Sonne, [But!:] tags¨uber, nachts ning a syllable and unvoiced after unvoiced consonants and at syllable-end 104 t just as in English, except in -tion, where it tausend/trinken/stinken, is pronounced ‘ts’–see following section achtzehn, sp¨at v except for a few exceptions (Vase, Vulkan) verfahren, –, – pronounced like English ‘f’ w just like English ‘v’ Wasser, –, – x like the English ‘ks’ Xenophobie, Xerxes, – z almost always like English ‘ts’ Zeit, entnazifizieren/Pizza, Kreuz

More Troublemakers -er this halbvokal (semi-vowel) is pronounced er, –, Tr¨aumer halfway between the e and a vowels. At a normal speech rate the r is not heard! -ion sounds like how Germans would pronounce –, national, Inflation ‘Jon’, ie with a ‘y’ initial consonant and a pure vowel ‘o’ -ung there are about 30,000 (feminine!) German –, –, Regierung substantives that carry this ending. Just remember that the ‘g’ is pronounced as a soft ‘k’ (i.e. voiceless!) -ig this is not pronounced as a normal final –, –, wolkig/K¨onig g (which is [k]) as one would expect, but rather the ch variant which follows front vowels ([¸c],Figure A.1), which means it is pronounced just as ich 105

Figure A.1: ich Figure A.2: Radfahren 106

A.2 Book Cover Guide

Table A.2: Short Pronunciation Guide for German

Vowels a a as in American Eng.: father Achtung, Ventilator, da e similar to the e in Eng.: bet eng, Hexe, B¨aume i short: similar to the vowel in: if ich, wolkig, Zwirn ‘ie’ long: similar to the 1st vowel in: even Mikroskop, studieren, Utopie o pure o sound-no lip movement! oberfl¨achlich, obwohl, Situation u pure, relatively long u sound unglaublich, Abrundung, du ¨a similar to -e in: bet–jaw wider ¨affisch, Schl¨age, – ¨o like e with rounded lips Okonomie,¨ obsz¨on,(Friseur) ¨u long i with rounded lips short: y (¨uppsilon), H¨utte,– (French ‘u’) long: ¨uber, Besitzt¨umer,– y same as long ¨u –, Syntax, – Diphthongs ei a + i; (long i in prize) Eisberg, schmeicheln, Prahlerei ¨au/euthe German version of the American Eng. ‘oi’ ¨außerst,Teufel, Efeu sound as in boy au like the American Eng. ouch auch, unglaublich, genau Consonants b just as in Eng.‘p’ at syllable end bringen, [But!:]absagen, Staub c ‘k’ sound at the beginning of words; otherwise Clou/Clique, –, – in ‘ch’ continued on back cover 107 ch 1: as in ‘ich’ after i, e, ¨o,¨a,¨u 1: Chemie 2: acht 3: Chance 2: as in Loch after (u, o, a) 4: Chor 3: the ‘sh’ sound in Eng. 4: ‘k’ d just as in Eng.‘t’ at syllable end dahin [But!:] radfahren, Bad f just as in Eng. fahren, Affe, Graf g just as in Eng.‘k’ at syllable end grau, [But!:] Wegweiser, Tag h just as in Eng.lengthens preceding vowel with helfen, –, – ; Mal → Mahl; a o ¨ou ¨u Wolle → wohl; M¨uller → M¨uhle k just as in Eng. kaufen, abkriegen, stark j usually like Eng. ‘y’ (but: loan words) Julia/jemand, –, – (Job, Jazz) l very similar to American Eng. ‘l’ Linguistik, unglaublich/Tollwut m just as in Eng. Mutter, kommen, am n just as in Eng. Nuance, Tante, Ton p just as in Eng. Privileg, Knorpel, Typ q followed by ‘u’, sounds like Eng.: ‘kv’ quietschen/qualmen, –, – r usually: velar – formed a bit closer to the back Frau/rechts, fahren, Tor of the mouth than the ‘k’/‘g’ s usually ‘z’ ; ‘s’ at end of syllables Sonne, [But!:] tags¨uber, nachts t just as in Eng. (but: -tion=‘ts) tausend/trinken/stinken, achtzehn v usually like Eng. ‘f’ (but: loan words) verfahren, –, – (Vase, Vulkan) w just like Eng. ‘v’ Wasser, –, – x just like Eng. ‘ks’ Xenophobie, Xerxes, – z almost always like Eng. ‘ts’ Zeit, Pizza, Kreuz continued on back cover APPENDIX B IRREGULAR VERB LIST

Table B.1: Irregular verbs arranged according to patterns

English German 3rd singular Praeterite Perfect to pull ziehen er zieht zog er hat gezogen to smell riechen er riecht roch er hat gerochen to lie (tell a lie) l¨ugen er l¨ugt log er hat gelogen to speak sprechen er spricht sprach er hat gesprochen to close schließen er schließt schloß er hat geschlossen to take nehmen er nimmt nahm er hat genommen to begin, start beginnen er beginnt begann er hat begonnen to begin, start anfangen er f¨angt an fing an er hat angefangen to call (up) anrufen er ruft an rief an er hat angerufen to give geben er gibt gab er hat gegeben to wash waschen er w¨ascht wusch er hat gewaschen to read lesen er liest las er hat gelesen to sleep schlafen er schl¨aft schlief er hat geschlafen to see sehen er sieht sah er hat gesehen to carry tragen er tr¨agt trug er hat getragen to stay, remain bleiben er bleibt blieb er ist geblieben to decide entscheiden er entscheidet entschied er hat entschieden to be called heißen er heißt hieß er hat geheißen to seem; to shine scheinen es scheint schien es hat geschienen to write schreiben er schreibt schrieb er hat geschrieben

108 109

Table B.1–Continued English German 3rd singular Praeterite Perfect to be sein er ist war er ist gewesen to die sterben er stirbt starb er ist gestorben to become werden er wird ward er ist geworden to swim schwimmen er schwimmt schwamm er ist geschwommen to come kommen er kommt kam er ist gekommen to go gehen er geht ging er ist gegangen to walk/run laufen er l¨auft lief er ist gelaufen to fly fliegen er fliegt flog er ist geflogen to flow fließen er fließt floß er ist geflossen to drive fahren er f¨ahrt fuhr er ist gefahren to drink trinken er trinkt trank er hat getrunken to stink stinken er stinkt stank er hat gestunken to force zwingen er zwingt zwang er hat gezwungen to sing singen er singt sang er hat gesungen to find finden er findet fand er hat gefunden to leave verlassen er verl¨aßt verließ er hat verlassen to forget vergessen er vergißt vergaß er hat vergessen to own besitzen er besitzt besaß er hat besessen to eat essen er isst aß er hat gegessen to do tun er tut tat er hat getan to stand stehen er steht stand er hat gestanden to lie (past=lay) liegen er liegt lag er hat gelegen to stop (trans.) halten er h¨alt hielt er hat gehalten REFERENCES

[Dreyer] Dreyer, Hilke and Richard Schmidt. A Practice Grammar of German. Leipzig: Verlag f¨urDeutsch. 1999. [Wahrig] dtv-W¨orterbuch der deutschen Sprache. Hrsg. v. Gerhard Wahrig. M¨unchen: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag. 14. Auflage 1994. [Duden] Duden Grammatik der deutschen Gegenwartssprache. Hrsg. v. G¨unther Drosdowski. Der Duden; Bd. 4. Mannheim: Dudenverlag, 1995. [Fleischer] Fleischer, Wolfgang and Irnhild Barz. Wortbildung der deutschen Gegenwartssprache. 2. Aufl. T¨ubingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 1995. [Helbig] Gerhard Helbig, and Joachim Buscha Deutsche Grammatik. Ein Hand- buch f¨urden Ausl¨anderunterricht. Leipzig: Verlag Enzyklop¨adie. 10. Auflage 1987. [Rausch] Rausch, Rudolf and Ilka: Deutsche Phonetik f¨urAusl¨ander. Leipzig: Verlag Enzyklop¨adie.4. Auflage 1995. [Quirk] Quirk, Randolph and Sidney Greenbaum: A Concise Grammar of Contem- porary English. New York: Harcourt Brace Javanovich, 1973. [Zorach] Zorach, Cecile and Charlotte Melin. English Grammar for Students of German, 3rd ed. Ann Arbor, Michigan: The Olivia and Hill Press, 1994.

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[Dreyer] is something everyone should have by the end of the first semester. It is 360 pages long, has lots of exercises (with key). Audio cassettes/cds also available. [Wahrig] is a German/German dictionary. The author strongly recommends everyone who ever plans to learn German to buy a copy. There are many examples of different usages given, which makes it indispensable for any student of German. [Duden] is indispensable for anyone who speaks or writes German. It is the 4th of 12 volumes of books describing many aspects of German. Roughly 850 pages in German is difficult for most students, but after a short period abroad it is certainly worth it. [Helbig] is international standard for advance learners of German. In conjunction with or after [Dreyer], it is very useful. [Rausch] is a pronunciation and phonology/phonetics book. It is too difficult for most beginners as it is in German and of a technical nature, but it is good for serious students further along in their studies. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

After his first year as a student of German at the University of Florida in 1995, Jon Busey spent a year abroad at the Universit¨atMannheim studying German Litera- ture and Linguistics. The Department of Germanic and Slavic studies was then gener- ous enough to help him acquire full financial support for a second year in Mannheim, during which time he also studied Classics at the Universit¨at Heidelberg. He earned a B.A. in German Studies and Linguistics from the University of Florida in 1999. He then taught two semesters solo of Beginning German at the University of Florida and helped the department develop an online introductory German course which began in Fall 2001. After finishing an M.A. in German Literature in 2001 he will begin working on a degree in Applied Mathematics at Florida State University. His hobbies include com- puter assisted learning technologies, chess, home supercomputing, and cryptography. His permanent E-mail address is: [email protected]

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