38
votes
Accepted
Accusative vs Dative: "Schau in der/die Schublade!"
The confusion here comes from omitting a small word:
Schau in der Schublade nach.
Hence, in this example, the verb is nachschauen, in the other example it is schauen.
These differ a bit in ...
- 2,236
36
votes
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"Es gefällt ihm." How to identify similar exceptions?
It is not an exception or irregularity at all! Different grammar (from English or any other language) doesn’t constitute an irregularity. If you were an Italian or Russian then English “I like it” ...
- 4,618
24
votes
Accepted
Why does "fragen" take two accusatives?
Most sentence plans follow a few general rules. If there are multiple actants involved, typically the actant with the most active role is in the nominative case (subject), the actant with the least ...
- 7,648
23
votes
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Why do we use the dative case even when the object isn't receiving anything?
Blut im Auge (blood in the eye)
Where is the blood? - In the eye.
Mein Schlüssel ist im Auto. (My key is in the car.)
Where is the key? - In the car.
In both cases you are asking with "where" ...
- 117k
22
votes
Dative taking verbs in the passive?
The second example is wrong. No one would ever use it.
First example: This construct is called "Subjektloser Passivsatz". This occurs when there is no subject in the sentence and this non-existing ...
- 60.4k
21
votes
Use of the dative on inscriptions
For the same reason you use to in an English dedication:
To my father
You wouldn't just put 'My father', since you're telling us who you are dedicating the book to, not what it is.
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19
votes
Use of the dative on inscriptions
It's an ellipsis of
„Dieses Parlament ist dem deutschen Volk gewidmet“ (This parliament is dedicated to the German people).
Widmen requires a dativ object in German.
See here for a detailed ...
- 1,000
17
votes
"Es gefällt ihm." How to identify similar exceptions?
You have to compare the matching verbs in German and English.
Es gefällt ihm im Kindergarten sehr gut.
"It likes him in kindergarten a lot!"
"It pleases him in the kindergarten a lot."
Der ...
- 50.2k
16
votes
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Dative vs Accusative
The components of this sentence are:
ich
subject
personal pronoun, first person, singular, nominative case
spreche
predicate
verb (a form of "sprechen"), first person, singular, present tense
mit ...
- 117k
15
votes
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“Belange von Minderheiten” – why “von” and not a genitive?
1. »Von« + dative case is a substitute for genitive case
Very often it is possible to replace genitive case with »von« + dative case without changing the meaning:
Der Griff des Messers ist ...
- 117k
15
votes
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Präposition "an": Dativ oder Akkusativ?
Nein. Die Präposition an steht je nach Verwendung entweder mit Dativ oder mit Akkusativ. Als Grundregel gilt bei solchen "Wechselpräpositionen":
Antwortet die Phrase auf die Frage "wo?" (Ortsangabe - ...
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15
votes
Why does "fragen" take two accusatives?
There is no such thing as direct and indirect object in German. That's a concept from French which got shipped across The Channel. German instead has accusative, dative, genitive, and prepositional ...
- 50.2k
15
votes
Accepted
Is this sentence by Angela Merkel grammatically correct?
You are right, it should be aus gegebenem Anlass.
However: If you listen to the actual interview in the video (at around 0:40), which was linked in the article you mentioned, you can hear, that ...
- 1,094
15
votes
Accepted
Why do these sentences have different case despite being otherwise identical?
German has four cases (nominative, accusative, dative and genitive). Which case an object receives depends on the verb and has to be learned. We have an excellent list of verbs with a dative object.
...
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14
votes
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"Leider gibt es auf keinem keinen..." Ist das richtig geschrieben?
Leider gibt es auf keinem [Exemplar] keinen Sticker.
means that there is no exemplar without a sticker on it. So it is actually the opposite of what you want to express.
The correct way of saying ...
- 2,195
14
votes
Use of the dative on inscriptions
This is what's called a dativus finalis
It tends to denote purpose and thus means "this is for [the benefit of] the German people".
Latin knew the same notion, an example would be "tibi laetitiae", ...
- 60.4k
14
votes
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Warum ist es "du kannst dir nicht vorstellen" und nicht "du kannst dich nicht vorstellen"?
Those are two very different meanings of the verb vorstellen.
sich[reflexive, dat] etwas[acc] vorstellen - to imagine/picture something; This use always requires both a dative reflexive pronoun and ...
- 903
14
votes
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Lyrics translation: "Dalai Lama" by Rammstein
But I believe that the verb gehört requires the dativ …
Ordinarily you would be correct. In this case, however, we are not talking about simply gehören in the sense of belong to, but the collocation ...
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13
votes
Accepted
Grammatik von „zu meiner Reisen“?
Bei Reisen handelt es sich in diesem Fall um eine alte Dativform von Reise. In moderner Sprache würde es also zu meiner Reise heißen.
In älterer Literatur sind derartige Formen nicht besonders selten,...
- 19.7k
13
votes
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Can "nach" mean "about"?
"Nach" is a very natural choice for the topic of inquiries. Why? Because it's the preposition that goes with "fragen", which is the default/generic verb for that action.
Ich frage nach dem Weg.
I ...
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13
votes
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Is it "seit ein paar Tagen" or "seit einen paar Tagen"?
"Ein" is a part of "ein paar" and "ein paar" is an unchangeable pronoun. That is why "ein" is not changed to "einem". Note that "Tagen" is dative.
If you would use "einige" or "wenige" (synonyms of "...
- 4,618
13
votes
Why does the dative case of "Kunde" have an "n"?
These nouns are, according to current terminology, referred to as belonging to the n-Deklination; searching for this term will get you many lists and explanations. Historically, they were referred to ...
- 23.9k
12
votes
Zwei -em-Endungen in Adjektiven hintereinander
Man findet durchaus nicht selten eine wechselnde starke und schwache Flexion von artikellosen Adjektiven im Dativ Singular.
Einen Whatsapp-Account zu missbrauchen, sich einzuhacken, das sei dann ...
- 70.1k
12
votes
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Zwei -em-Endungen in Adjektiven hintereinander
Es gibt keine Norm, derzufolge es überheblichem heißen muss.
In "Duden - Richtiges und gutes Deutsch, 7. Aufl. Mannheim 2011" (das ist die aktuelle Auflage, soweit ich sehe), heißt es:
...
- 19k
12
votes
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Wechselpräpositionen
There are exactly nine Wechselpräpositionen, an, auf, hinter, neben, in, über, unter, vor and zwischen. These mean a different thing when used either with dative or accusative.
What's right is ...
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12
votes
Accepted
Hat dir der Film gefallen? oder Hat du der Film gefallen?
The verb "gefallen" is used with dative. You can roughly think of it as "to be pleasant to somebody":
Dieses Buch gefällt mir - this book is pleasant to me
Der Schauspieler hat ...
- 4,618
12
votes
Accepted
Accusative or dative?
The first one gives a description about the location of the chair. That is why we need the dative (position).
"Der Stuhl steht am (an dem) Tisch".
"Er setzt sich auf einen Stuhl am Tisch"
This ...
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12
votes
„e“ am Ende eines Wortes einfügen
Das "e" wird nicht eingefügt, sondern noch nicht weggelassen.
Der Dativ Singular vieler (maskuliner) Nomen lautet paradigmatisch auf -e: "auf dem Tische", "vor dem Hause" ...
- 14.2k
12
votes
Accepted
Why does the dative case of "Kunde" have an "n"?
This is a special class of masculine nouns. There are actually two subtypes depending on the genitive singular. (Many grammars identify these classes using "strong/mixed/weak" labels, but I'...
- 9,259
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