Okay we just went over the verb in the previous section. This will basically be a list that will help you memorize them better, and there is not a lot. Other then "klingen" and "fühlen" you should know all of these. The the "Er sieht aus" is to show you it is a separable-prefix verb.
Sein To Be Aussehen To Look Er sieht aus He Looks Fühlen To Feel Klingen To Sound
Nationality
This also a large section of this lesson, nationality, it is very important. You can use it as a stereotype, or for your heritage. There are many nationalities, too many to go over in this lesson, you will more nationality as this level, and book goes on. Right now we are just going to have a vague little list, and as this section goes there will be more, like Swede and Swedish or Frenchman, Frenchwoman, and French. And so for the list...
Major Nationalities
This is the small list, make sure you memorize this list and the next one.
Deutscher
Amerikaner
Spanier
Italiener
Franzose Frenchman
Describing People with Nationality
It is no surprise you can describe people with nationality, most times, it's stereotypical, like norwegians are blonde, tall, ect. or germans wear lederhosen, drink beer, and play polka all day long, but that is just not true. However you can just use it for what it is, a nationality. If you do describe people by
nationality this will help. Okay, you should already know how to describe, right?
This part we will get more in to detail later, but right is is an important part of describing people with nationality, even though in English we most times don't do this, in German they do. The difference between nationality and language, like in English, French and french. But in german it is französisch and Franzose, Französin. This also is how it works for nationality describion by noun or adjective, which we are going to learn right now.
Noun or Adjective Nationality
There are two ways to describe someone. With a noun-based nationality word or an adjective-based nationality word. Most times in English, the adjective-based nationality and the language of that country as the same word, but, most of the time, not in German. You can see the difference with this exmaple.
Example: Ich bin schwedisch (I am Swedish) and Ich spreche Swedish (I speak Swedish)
Although, sometimes they are the same, see the example below for that, but most times it like the example above.
Example: Ich bin französisch (I am French) and Ich spreche französisch (I speak French)
Age
Now we are all familiar with the word "alt'", which means old. And in English, to find out somebody's age we ask "How old are you?". In German it is exactly the same. And you were taught, in latter lessons about verbs and questions. You might think it would be something like "Wie alt du?" or "Wie bist du alt?". That would be incorrect because the first question doesn't have a verb, and the second one is incorrect because when asking a question it is okay to have a adjective after the verb or interrogative adverb. This all might sound confusing, but it's really not.
Now to ask the question with 1st person it is...
Wie alt bin ich? - How old am I?
And response you might get is...
Ich bin __ Jahre alt.
I am __ years old.
Du bist __ Jahre alt. - You are __ years old.
And now the plural version of the 1st person...
Wie alt sind wir? - How old are we?
The responses you will get is...
Wir sind __ Jahre alt. = We are __ years old.
Ihr seid __ Jahre alt. - You all are __ years old.
To ask this important question in the 2nd person. First, we will learn the biggest question here, "How old are you?" which is...
Wie alt bist du? - How old are you?
And there is only one response to this it is...
Ich bin __ Jahre alt. - I am __ years old.
For the equally important plural 2nd person...
Wie alt seid ihr? - How old are you all?
Which the response is...
Wir sind __ Jahre alt. - We are __ years old.
And formal question, for both singular and plural is...
Wie alt sind Sie? - How old are you?
How old are you all?
You should all ready get the pattern for this, but we are going to keep on doing this doing this list, if you aren't sure of something or you are confused. So for the 3rd person...
Wie alt ist er/sie? - How old is he/she?
The responses to this are...
Er ist __ Jahre alt. - He is __ years old.
Sie ist __ Jahre alt. - She is __ years old.
And now the plural 3rd person of question and response...
Wie alt sind sie? - How old are they?
And of course the response...
Sie sind __ Jahre alt. - They __ years old.
Now with some people you might be able to guess their age, and you could ask them directly about it.
This is usually pretty of rude, but it illustrates nicely how the phrase has to be changed if you ask a yes-no-question, so let's get started, anyway!
Bist du __ Jahre alt? - Are you __ years old?
Ist er/sie __ Jahre alt? - Is he/she __ years old?
Sind sie __ Jahre alt? - Are they __ years old?
Note the inversed order between "Wie alt bist du?" und "Bist du __ Jahre alt?" This is exactly the same as in English!
Possessives
Person Singular Plural
English German English German
1st my mein our unser
2nd your dein, Ihr your euer, Ihr
3rd his, she, its sein, ihr, sein their ihr
Note: 'Euer' is irregular. When 'euer' has to have a different ending the e before r is dropped, so it turns into 'eur-'.
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Lesson 1.05 • Volk und Familie
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