INTRODUCTION |
Chuck: Absolute Beginner Season 2, Lesson 1, Learning the Basics of German. Hello. And welcome back to GermanPod101.com, the fastest, easiest and the most fun way to learn German. I’m joined in the studio by. |
Judith: Hello everyone, Judith here. |
Chuck: Glad to see you made it back. |
Judith: If you keep listening to this series, your German will improve by leaps and bounds. |
Chuck: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to introduce yourself in German. |
Judith: This conversation takes place on a German street. |
Chuck: The conversation is between Paul and Sabina whom we already meet in the previous lesson. |
Judith: The speakers still don’t know each other well. So they will be speaking formal German. |
Chuck: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
DIALOGUES |
Chuck: Lernen Sie auch Deutsch an der Goethe Schule? |
Judith: Ich? |
Chuck: Ja, Sie. |
Judith: Nein, haha. Ich unterrichte Deutsch. |
Chuck: Ahh. Ich lerne Deutsch. Übrigens, ich heiße Paul Martens. |
Judith: Und ich heiße Sabine Pächter. |
Judith: Now slowly. |
Chuck: Lernen Sie auch Deutsch an der Goethe Schule? |
Judith: Ich? |
Chuck: Ja, Sie. |
Judith: Nein, haha. Ich unterrichte Deutsch. |
Chuck: Ahh. Ich lerne Deutsch. Übrigens, ich heiße Paul Martens. |
Judith: Und ich heiße Sabine Pächter. |
Judith: Now with the translation. |
Judith: Lernen Sie auch Deutsch an der Goethe Schule? |
Chuck: Are you also learning German at the Goethe School? |
Judith: Ich? |
Chuck: Me? |
Judith: Ja, Sie. |
Chuck: Yes, you. |
Judith: Nein, haha. Ich unterrichte Deutsch. |
Chuck: No, I teach German. |
Judith: Ahh. Ich lerne Deutsch. Übrigens, ich heiße Paul Martens. |
Chuck: Ah, I’m learning German. By the way, I’m called Paul Martens. |
Judith: Und ich heiße Sabine Pächter. |
Chuck: And I’m called Sabina Pekta. |
POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
Judith: Okay. Maybe a little bit about meeting new people. What do you think? |
Chuck: Sounds good. |
Judith: When meeting someone new, only young people hug or exchange kisses on the check like the French. Most Germans will shake hands while bowing their heads a little kind of like a nod. |
Chuck: The older or high ranking person should offer his hand first. If you offer your hand to somebody ranking higher than you, a few will even snob it, but fortunately they’re in the minority. |
Judith: Even though not all Germans are known to observe the rules, please try to observe etiquette when you’re here, because that will definitely help your career in Germany. |
Chuck: A secret tip, also remember it’s quite important to remember to bow your head a little when shaking hands. If you keep looking straight ahead, people will instinctively perceive you as arrogant. Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. The first word we shall look at is? |
VOCAB LIST |
Judith: lernen |
Chuck: To learn or to study. |
Judith: lernen |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: Deutsch |
Chuck: German language. |
Judith: Deutsch |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: an |
Chuck: At or to. |
Judith: an |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: nein |
Chuck: No. |
Judith: nein |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: unterrichten |
Chuck: To teach or instruct. |
Judith: unterrichten |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: übrigens |
Chuck: By the way. |
Judith: übrigens |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: heißen |
Chuck: To be called. |
Judith: heißen |
Chuck: Next. |
Judith: und |
Chuck: And. |
Judith: und |
KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
Chuck: Let’s have a closer look t the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
Judith: The first word we’ll look at is the German verb „heißen“. |
Chuck: To be called. |
Judith: This one may be difficult for you to grasp at first because English doesn’t have a one word equivalent. Well, it’s kind of like to be called, but in German is not nearly as complicated. Anyway keep in mind „ich heiße“ for “I am called” or “my name is” “Ich heiße”. The other thing is that you can form a yes or no question in German simply by putting the verb at the beginning of a phrase like „Sie lernen Deutsch“ becomes „Lernen Sie Deutsch?“, when speaking, you don’t even need to change the word order, you can just raise your voice at the end of a normal sentence in order to make it a question. |
Lesson focus
|
Chuck: The focus of this lesson are the non-basics. |
Judith: As we saw last time, there is no simple equivalent to “the” in German. Instead there is „der“, „die“ and „das“, these reflective three genders that German nouns can have. Spanish or French nouns can be masculine or feminine, but German is more sensible by also allowing neutral nouns. |
Chuck: Unfortunately, just like in Spanish or French, nouns for inanimate objects also have a gender. And the gender for those are assigned rather randomly. That’s why we will always tell you the grammatical gender of a noun when we teach you a new noun in the vocabulary section. |
Judith: The rule is that masculine words get the article „der“ like „der Mann“. |
Chuck: The man. |
Judith: Feminine words get the article „die“ like „die Frau“. |
Chuck: The woman. |
Judith: Neutral words get the article „das“ like „das Bier“. |
Chuck: The beer. |
Judith: For whatever reason, school is feminine in German, „die Schule“. However, in today’s dialogue, we saw the phrase „an der Goethe Schule“, this does not mean that a school changed gender, instead it’s a reaction to having the preposition „an“ in front. |
Chuck: This is perhaps the toughest part of German grammar. In fact there is not just the gender of a noun that determines the correct article. You also have to take into account the role of the noun in the sentence. |
Judith: In some sentences, the article won’t change. For example Ich suche die Goethe Schule“, you know, that’s “die Goethe Schule”. But in others they are going to change like „Ich lerne Deutsch an der Goethe Schule“. |
Chuck: Since this is a difficult topic, it’s best to absorb things for a while and get a feel for the German language. Don’t worry about the different forms of “der, die, das”for now. We’ll get back to them in a later lesson when you’ll find it a lot easier to understand. Well, that just about does it for today. |
Judith: Listeners, do you know the powerful secret behind rapid progress? |
Chuck: Using the entire system. |
Judith: Lesson notes are an important part of this system. |
Chuck: They include a transcript and translation of the conversation. |
Judith: Key lesson vocabulary. |
Chuck: And detailed grammar explanations. |
Judith: Lesson notes accompany every audio or video lesson. |
Chuck: Use them on the site or mobile device or print them out. |
Judith: Using the lesson notes with audio or video media will rapidly increase your learning speed. |
Chuck: Go to GermanPod101.com and download the lesson notes for this lesson right away. Okay. See you next week. |
Judith: Bis nächste Woche! |
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