Archive by Author
Contraction of prepositions and definite articles in German Posted by Sandra Rösner on Jan 9, 2011
In German it often occurs that definite articles and prepositions are contracted. This is, however, only possible when the article is not stressed. The contracted form of the definite article is called clitic – an unstressed ‘word’ that only appears when it can lean on another word. Clitics do also, in other grammatical forms, exist…
Silvester – New Year’s Eve Posted by Sandra Rösner on Dec 31, 2010
The countdown is running. There are only a few hours left till the old year is over. With this last post for this year I would like to give you an insight into how Germans Silvester feiern(see the New Year in) and what you can say to wish someone a Happy New Year. There are…
German nouns: gender hints Posted by Sandra Rösner on Dec 20, 2010
In German, all nouns have a particular grammatical gender. They can either be masculine (männlich), feminine (weiblich), or neuter (sächlich). The gender of a noun is indicated by its preceding article: „der“ (for masculine nouns), “die” (for feminine nouns), and “das” (for neuter nouns). Please note that not the thing or person is supposed to…
Writing the letters “ä”, “ö”, and “ü” without a German keyboard Posted by Sandra Rösner on Dec 13, 2010
There are three letters in German that do not exist in English. These are the Umlaute (umlauts) “ä”, “ö”, and “ü”. Although these letters do not exist in the alphabet, they play an important role in writing. Unfortunately, Umlaute cannot be found on all keyboards but there is no need to worry about that, seeing…
Separable Verbs II: Prepositions as prefixes Posted by Sandra Rösner on Dec 9, 2010
Separable verbs can be separated because they consist of two independent words, that is, they consist of the core verb and a particular prefix. The prefix is always either: a preposition, an adverb or an adjective. In the list below, you can find one example verb for every prepositional prefix. 1. ab- : 2. an-…
Separable Verbs I: Draw the line between prefixes and core verbs Posted by Sandra Rösner on Dec 1, 2010
With this post I would like to start a series on German separable verbs. In this introductory post I explain how you can distinguish separable verbs from inseparable verbs. The main difference between separable and inseparable verbs is that separable verbs consist of two words: a core verb and a semi-prefix, whereas inseparable verbs consist…
My home is my castle: German apartments Posted by Sandra Rösner on Nov 25, 2010
One’s own home is a kind of retreat for many people. It is a place where you can relax and spend time with your family and friends. In 2009, I spent some time in London (UK) where I did an internship in a kind of real estate agency. The company rented separated rooms in house…