{"id":7604,"date":"2016-07-26T07:00:20","date_gmt":"2016-07-26T07:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?p=7604"},"modified":"2016-07-22T14:14:33","modified_gmt":"2016-07-22T14:14:33","slug":"how-to-say-dont-in-german","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/how-to-say-dont-in-german\/","title":{"rendered":"How To Say “Don’t” In German"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes I get asked how to say single English words or phrases in German, and more often than not I find myself having to explain my translation because it\u2019s not what the person asking expected to hear. They usually say, \u201cOh, but doesn\u2019t that word mean\u2026?\u201d to which I usually reply \u201cYes, it does mean that, but\u2026\u201d. German likes to challenge our minds. Take the word Don\u2019t, for instance.<\/p>\n

\"Halt!\"<\/a>

Photo: frank_behrens on flickr.com under a CC license (CC BY-SA 2.0)<\/p><\/div>\n

Example conversation:<\/u><\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you say \u2018Don\u2019t!\u2019 in German? Like when your friend is about to swing their bag over their shoulder, but you can see if they do it\u2019ll knock over a vase behind them, and so you want to stop them before they smash it to pieces??\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI would say \u2018Nicht!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut doesn\u2019t \u2018Nicht\u2019 mean \u2018Not\u2019 in German? As in, \u2018Ich mache das nicht<\/strong>\u2019 \u2013 \u2018I\u2019m not<\/strong> doing that\u2019 ?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, it does, but\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Then I often tail off saying something along the lines of \u201cBut in this context it means \u2018Don\u2019t\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So I decided to think about it a bit more.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Nicht\"<\/a>

Nicht. Photo by frnetz on flickr.com under a CC license (CC BY 2.0)<\/p><\/div>\n

When we give the command \u201cDon\u2019t!\u201d in English, we are saying a shortened version of the phrase \u201cDon\u2019t do that!\u201d or \u201cDon\u2019t say that!\u201d, for example. So, we are omitting the second two<\/strong> words of that phrase because the first one, Don\u2019t, conveys the necessary message.<\/p>\n

In German, to say \u201cDon\u2019t do that!\u201d or \u201cDon\u2019t say that!\u201d you\u2019d say \u201cMach das nicht!\u201d or \u201cSag das nicht!\u201d Literally, these phrases mean \u201cMake that not!\u201d and \u201cSay that not!\u201d. In English, these phrases aren\u2019t correct, so they couldn\u2019t be translated literally.<\/p>\n

By saying \u201cNicht!\u201d as the shortened version of \u201cMach das nicht!\u201d (\u2018Don\u2019t do that!\u2019), we are omitting the first two<\/strong> words of the phrase this time. Why? Because the word \u2018Nicht\u2019 is the word that conveys the necessary message here.<\/p>\n

Therefore, if you think of the word \u2018Nicht!\u2019 as a shortened version of the phrase \u2018Mach das nicht!\u2019, this translation makes sense.<\/p>\n

****<\/p>\n

I am no expert at explaining grammar (which is why I tend to stay away from posts of this nature), but this is how I would explain it to a German learner if I was asked. I guess I hope this simplistic approach might help those of you who find German grammar hard to digest.<\/p>\n

Can you think of any alternative ways of saying \u2018Don\u2019t!\u2019 in German?
\nLeave them in the comments!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

Sometimes I get asked how to say single English words or phrases in German, and more often than not I find myself having to explain my translation because it\u2019s not what the person asking expected to hear. They usually say, \u201cOh, but doesn\u2019t that word mean\u2026?\u201d to which I usually reply \u201cYes, it does mean…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":7606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[10955,12133,95131,451644,6,376023,457006,1401],"class_list":["post-7604","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-language","tag-dont","tag-german-grammar","tag-german-language","tag-german-words","tag-grammar","tag-language","tag-nicht","tag-words"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7604","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\/119"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7604"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7604\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7605,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7604\/revisions\/7605"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}