{"id":458,"date":"2010-07-13T15:54:21","date_gmt":"2010-07-13T15:54:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?p=458"},"modified":"2010-07-22T15:46:04","modified_gmt":"2010-07-22T15:46:04","slug":"mastering-german-word-order-i-main-clauses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/mastering-german-word-order-i-main-clauses\/","title":{"rendered":"Mastering German word order I: main clauses"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>German word order may appear to be very random and confusing for foreign learners. Thus, I want to try to help you to overcome this challenge.<\/p>\n<p>To make it as easy as possible for you to follow my explanation, I am going to start with the easiest and most basic sentence structure (containing less information) and progress to the more difficult ones (by adding more information to my sentence).<\/p>\n<p>These are the words\/phrases I am going to use in the following:<\/p>\n<p>Verb (V): (<span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>schreibe<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 \u201cam writing\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Object (O): (<strong>einen Brief<\/strong>) \u2013 \u201ca letter\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Subject (S): (<span style=\"color: #0000ff\"><strong>ich<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 \u201cI\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Time (T): (<span style=\"color: #008000\"><strong>heute<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 \u201ctoday\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Location (L): (<span style=\"color: #800080\"><strong>im B\u00fcro<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 \u201cat the office\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The easiest and most basic sentence structure in German is SUBJECT + VERB.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Ich<\/span><\/strong><strong> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">schreibe<\/span>.<\/strong> \u2013 I am writing<\/p>\n<form>However, \u201cIch schreibe\u201d is yet not a complete sentence. Maybe you are curious what I am writing, thus, I add some more information to my sentence, i.e. attach my OBJECT \u201ceinen Brief\u201d (a letter) to it.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Ich<\/span><\/strong><strong> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">schreibe<\/span><\/strong><strong> einen Brief<\/strong>. \u2013 I am writing a letter.<\/p>\n<p>This word order is quite straightforward in German. Compare: <span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Sie<\/span> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">liest<\/span> ein Buch. \u2013 She is reading a book. \/ <span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Er<\/span> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">trinkt<\/span> eine Tasse Kaffee. \u2013 He is drinking a cup of coffee. \/ <span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Sie<\/span> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">kaufen<\/span> Lebensmittel. \u2013 They are buying groceries.<\/p>\n<p>But now I would like you to know WHEN and WHERE I am writing my letter. Let\u2019s begin with adding a specific TIME to my sentence. I want to say that I am writing my letter \u201ctoday\u201d (heute). In German I have only one option to do this:<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Ich<\/span><\/strong><strong> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">schreibe<\/span><\/strong><strong> <span style=\"color: #008000\">heute<\/span><\/strong><strong> einen Brief.<\/strong> \u2013 I am writing a letter today.<\/p>\n<p>That is, I have to insert the specification of time between the verb and the object. The word \u201cheute\u201d cannot be added anywhere else in this sentence.<\/p>\n<p>Now let me add some information about the LOCATION of my action. I want to say that I am writing my letter \u201cat the office\u201d (im B\u00fcro). I have two options to do this. I can insert the location before or behind the object. This results in the following sentences:<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff\"><strong>Ich<\/strong><\/span><strong> <\/strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>schreibe<\/strong><\/span><strong> einen Brief <\/strong><span style=\"color: #800080\"><strong>im B\u00fcro<\/strong><\/span><strong>.<\/strong> \u2013 I write a letter at the office.<\/p>\n<p>or:<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Ich<\/span> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">schreibe<\/span><span style=\"color: #800080\"> im B\u00fcro<\/span> einen Brief.<\/strong> \u2013 I write a letter at the office.<\/p>\n<\/form>\n<p>When I want to add both information TIME and LOCATION to my sentence, I only have to employ the rules from above simultaneously. Thus, my sentence can look like this:<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Ich<\/span> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">schreibe<\/span> <span style=\"color: #008000\">heute<\/span> im B\u00fcro <span style=\"color: #800080\">einen Brief<\/span>.<\/strong> \u2013 Today I write a letter at the office.<\/p>\n<p>or:<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"color: #0000ff\">Ich<\/span> <span style=\"color: #ff0000\">schreibe<\/span> <span style=\"color: #008000\">heute<\/span> <span style=\"color: #800080\">einen Brief<\/span> im B\u00fcro.<\/strong> \u2013 Today I write a letter at the office.<\/p>\n<p>Exercise:<\/p>\n<p>And now it is your turn. Here are some words, which you can chain together to build similar sentences like the ones I have just discussed above. I will provide all possible sentences in my next post.<\/p>\n<p>1. V: (<span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>liest<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 is reading \/\u00a0O: (<strong>ein Buch<\/strong>) \u2013 a book \/\u00a0L: (<span style=\"color: #800080\"><strong>in der Bibliothek<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 in the library \/\u00a0S: (<span style=\"color: #0000ff\"><strong>sie<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 she \/\u00a0T: (<span style=\"color: #008000\"><strong>heute Abend<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 tonight<\/p>\n<p>2. S: (<span style=\"color: #0000ff\"><strong>er<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 he \/\u00a0O: (<strong>eine Tasse Kaffee<\/strong>) \u2013 a cup of coffee \/\u00a0T: (<span style=\"color: #008000\"><strong>morgens<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 in the morning \/\u00a0V: (<span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>trinkt<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 is drinking \/\u00a0L: (<span style=\"color: #800080\"><strong>im Garten<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 in the garden<\/p>\n<p>3. S: (<span style=\"color: #0000ff\"><strong>sie<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 they \/ T: (<span style=\"color: #008000\"><strong>freitags<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 on Fridays \/ V: (<span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>kaufen<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 are buying \/\u00a0O: (<strong>Lebensmittel<\/strong>) \u2013 groceries \/ \u00a0L: (<span style=\"color: #800080\"><strong>im Supermarkt<\/strong><\/span>) \u2013 in the supermarket<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>German word order may appear to be very random and confusing for foreign learners. Thus, I want to try to help you to overcome this challenge. To make it as easy as possible for you to follow my explanation, I am going to start with the easiest and most basic sentence structure (containing less information)&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/mastering-german-word-order-i-main-clauses\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[10206,10205,10203,3356,10204],"class_list":["post-458","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-language","tag-active-sentences","tag-declarative-sentences","tag-main-clauses","tag-present-tense","tag-straight-word-order"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=458"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8875,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458\/revisions\/8875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}