English language got it backwards. German is correct.
this post was submitted on 31 Oct 2023
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The real trouble with learning most languages outside of English, is in English, we have a very casual way of approaching our own language. No one speaks with perfect grammar, and slang is extremely commonplace. This is great for English learners, because as long as you get most of the words out, everyone will understand what you meant. In German, if you don't speak it with utmost clarity and if you don't 100% nail the word order, people will look at you as if you have a learning disability.
Probably doesn't help English is a lingua franca. It's not just the native English speakers that use and change the language, especially in the age of internet, but everyone that knows it as a second language, which includes a significant chunk of the human population.
German actually has more freedom in word order within a sentence.
Ich gehen nachher noch zum Laden.
Nachher gehe ich noch zum Laden.
Zum Laden gehe ich nachher noch.
Zum Laden gehe ich noch nachher.
And slang, like every language has slang. "Kommst du Fußball?" Some people will sneer at it, some use it every day. Or the shortening of word endings (neben ->nem')(kannst du -> kannste)
Quick Google shows English changed it at some point. From Middle English wer, were, from Old English wer (“man”), from Proto-Germanic *weraz, from Proto-Indo-European *wiHrós (“man, freeman”).
For me it was der, das, and die
I don't care what that stupid green owl thinks, I'm not gonna learn three different words for "the"
The right order is: der, die, das :p
trällert Wieso? Weshalb? Warum?
It's not that hard the article corresponds to the gender of the noune like "der Mann" for male, "die Frau" for female or "das Brot" for neutral. Oh and there are 500 exceptions to that rule, because why should natural be easy and follow a comprehensive set of rules.
Most confused words: "der Bus" (the bus, clearly male...) and "das Mädchen"(the girl, because girls are definitely not female...)
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Wait until day 2 of German class.
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I learned Dutch before I started learning German (having lived in The Netherlands for almost a decade) and they're quite close as languages go (at least for somebody whose mother-tongue is a romance language) so that was pretty useful, but the one thing that really got me a lot in the beginning is that in German, "wie" means "how" but in Dutch "wie" means "who" (and both words sound exactly the same), so I would hear the very common German greeting "wie geht's" (how's it going) and would translate it as "who goes", and even after knowing the meaning properly it would trip me since the mental "circuitry" doing the translation seemed to be the instinctive one I had developed for Dutch.
"Halt! How's it going?"
Ah yes, the cursed Germanic loop:
who (EN) translates to wie (NL)
wie (NL) sounds like wie (DE)
wie (DE) translates to hoe (NL)
hoe (NL) sounds like who (EN)
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It also helps if one doesn't try to pronounce German as if it was English 😈
Works ze ozer way around, zo
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Wait until you see that "see" is lake, and "meer" is sea. It gets me every time as a Dutchman. In Dutch "zee" is sea and "meer" is lake.
Not always true. Baltic sea is "Ostsee" (East Sea) and North Sea is "Nordsee". Deap sea is "Hohe See" etc. Mediterranean is "Mittelmeer" though..
The difference being der See means the lake and die See means the sea
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Warum? WARUM?*
French - dessous (below) and dessus (above). Utterly indistinguishable for a non-native of course
It's not that hard, though. The difference is about the same as the one between "moot" and "mute" in English.
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Can't forget that was means what! Was ist das? is one of the few phrases I can remember from my two semesters of German approximately 20 years ago.
Dunno if someone already mentioned it, but good luck with "umfahren". Depending on the pronunciation you either mean drive over someone/thing or drive around someone/thing lol.
Wieso/Weshalb/Warum = Why
That's why
Isn't wieso more like 'How come'? I mean, yes, it also means 'why', but so does 'how come'; but I guess they are more like an equivalent to each other than to 'why'. I know less than zero about weshalb, though.
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Hmmmm weird, I know both languages but I never considered that. The See/Meer being Lake/Sea situation is much more confusing to me, especially since it's the inverse in Dutch.
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Wait until you get to the indefinite articles.
Does this mean that a werewolf is just a whowolf in German?
A werewolf in German is a Werwolf. Wer from the germanic word from man and wolf.
Not to be confused with the Wehrwolf, which fights back fiercely, and the Wärwolf, which would but isn't. The Werfwolf, while very throwable, is right out.
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Der Werwolf
Ein Werwolf eines Nachts entwich von Weib und Kind und sich begab an eines Dorfschullehrers Grab und bat ihn: Bitte, beuge mich!
Der Dorfschulmeister stieg hinauf auf seines Blechschilds Messingknauf und sprach zum Wolf, der seine Pfoten geduldig kreuzte vor dem Toten:
„Der Werwolf“ – sprach der gute Mann, „des Weswolfs, Genitiv sodann, dem Wemwolf, Dativ, wie man’s nennt, den Wenwolf, – damit hat’s ein End.“
Dem Werwolf schmeichelten die Fälle, er rollte seine Augenbälle. Indessen, bat er, füge doch zur Einzahl auch die Mehrzahl noch!
Der Dorfschulmeister aber mußte gestehn, daß er von ihr nichts wußte. Zwar Wölfe gäb’s in großer Schar, doch „Wer“ gäb’s nur im Singular.
Der Wolf erhob sich tränenblind – er hatte ja doch Weib und Kind!! Doch da er kein Gelehrter eben, so schied er dankend und ergeben.
Christian Morgenstern
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Wos hoast g'sacht?
The Proto-Germanic words these both derived from are hwar (where) and hwas (who). English clearly stayed closer to hwar, but both neither English nor German kept close to hwas.
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Americans when they discover that languages evolved in seperate directions:
I've read about people's difficulties learning German. From what I understand every grammatical rule has so many exceptions it just as well not be a rule.
Then theres English, with "I before E, except after C." Weird.
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