Vocabulary
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Learn a little about how to write
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Hi! |
Welcome to Introduction to German. |
My name is Alisha and I'm joined by... |
Hi everyone! I'm Jenni. |
In this lesson you'll learn the basics of German writing. |
The German Alphabet |
German uses the exact same alphabet as English from A to Z. However, it also uses a special character (ß). |
This character is called “sharp S” or scharfes S in German. It isn't considered a distinct letter in German though. |
Spaß (= “fun”) |
Maß (= “measure”) |
Similarly, some additional markers represented by two dots, can appear over three vowels. We call these "Umlaute.” |
ä ö ü |
The Umlaute are used to signal a vowel combination. They are essentially a combination between the vowel, + the vowel E. |
ä – Äpfel (= “apples”) a + e |
ö – Öl (= “oil”) o + e |
ü – über (=“over”) u + e |
They can also be represented as AE, OE, and UE. These are common alternatives that are understood by every German speaker. |
Spelling |
Sometimes, German spelling can be a challenge for English learners. There are a few words that are pronounced the same as English, but are however spelled differently. Let's take a look at some of the most common spelling issues. |
German uses the same “sh” sound, as in the English "ship.” However, it isn't spelled SH, but SCH in German. |
Schuh (= “shoe”) |
Schiff (= “ship”) |
So whenever you see SCH in German, know that it's pronounced “sh.” |
Words beginning with ST or SP, are pronounced with the “sh” sound too. But this only applies to words beginning with ST and SP in German. |
Stein (pronounced Schtein) (= “stone”) |
Sport (pronounced Schport) (= “sport”) |
Remember, this only applies to words beginning with ST and SP. |
The letters V, F, and PH, are all pronounced as an F sound in German. |
f → laufen (=“to run”) |
v → vergessen (“to forget”) |
ph → Philosophie (“philosophy”) |
Even though they're spelled differently, they're all pronounced with the same “ffff” sound. |
Capitalization |
Capitalization in German is similar to that of English, but a lot more. |
We capitalize at the beginning of each sentence, days of the week, months of the year, names, countries – almost everything that is capitalized in English, is also capitalized in German. |
One big difference however, is that German capitalizes ALL nouns. |
Compare the following sentence: |
Der Hund und die Katze gingen aus dem Haus heraus, den Weg hinunter bis zur Garage. |
"The dog and cat went out of the house, down the path to the garage." |
Dog, cat, house, path, and garage aren't capitalized in English. |
But the equivalent words, Hund, Katze, Haus, Weg and Garage, are capitalized in German because they're all nouns, and all nouns in German are capitalized. |
German also capitalizes verbs that are used as nouns. Compare the following: |
Das Zuhören, das Sprechen, das Lesen und das Schreiben sind alle entscheidend beim Lernen. |
"Listening, speaking, reading, and writing are all important when learning." |
Notice how the equivalent words, Zuhören, Sprechen, Lesen, Schreiben, and Lernen are all capitalized. So remember, ALL nouns in German are capitalized! |
There is but one exception to the rule! The word for “I” isn't capitalized in German. |
Er schenkt mir Rosen, weil ich sie gerne mag. |
"He gave me roses because I like them." |
Notice how ich isn't capitalized. |
All nouns except “I,” are capitalized in German. |
Compound Words |
A special quirk of German, is the length of words. German words are, on average, longer than English words due to their tendency of forming compound words. |
English usually limits compounding to two words, such as "snowman" or "baseball.” |
There's no such limit in German however. Take the word for speed limit for example. |
Höchstgeschwindigkeitsbegrenzung. |
If we break it down we'd get... |
höchst-, meaning "highest," |
-geschwindigkeits-, meaning "speed,” |
and -begrenzung, meaning "limit.” |
And just for fun, the longest, officially approved word in German is: |
Donaudampfschifffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft |
That's a mouthful. OK. Let's recap what we've learned. |
In this lesson, you learned that German uses the exact same alphabet as English. |
There are four additional characters in use, although they aren't recognized as distinct letters. |
You also learned that there are some tricky consonant and clusters you need to look out for. |
You then learned that all nouns except for “I” are capitalized in German. |
And finally, there is no limit to how many words you can compound in German. |
Umlaute: ä ö ü, and the ß |
In the next lesson, you'll be entering German boot camp, where you'll learn some useful beginner phrases to get you speaking German right away! |
See you in the next lesson! Bye! |
Bye! |
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