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Nouns, Cases, Articles and Demonstratives
German Nouns, Cases, Articles and Demonstratives
Nouns and Cases
All nouns have a gender in German, either masculine, feminine or neuter. There really isn't a lot of logic to which nouns are which gender, so you must memorize the gender of each noun. Male persons or animals, the seasons, months, and days are all masculine, as are nouns ending in -ant, -ast, -ich, -ig, -ismus, -ling, -or and -us. Female persons or animals, German rivers and numerals are all feminine, as are nouns ending in -a, -anz, -ei, -enz, -heit, -ie, -ik, -in, -keit, -schaft, -sion, -sis, -tät, -tion, -ung and -ur. Young persons or animals, metals, chemical elements, letters of the alphabet, hotels, restaurants, cinemas, continents, countries and provinces are all neuter, as are nouns that end in -chen, -icht, -il, -it, -lein, -ma, -ment, -tel, -tum, and -um. Nouns referring to things that end in -al, -an, -ar, -ät, -ent, -ett, -ier, -iv, -o and -on, as well as most words with the prefix ge- and most nouns ending in -nis and -sal are also neuter. All nouns in German are capitalized as well.
All nouns (as well as pronouns and adjectives) have a case depending on what function they serve in the sentence. These may seem strange, but remember that English uses cases also; however, we would say direct object instead of accusative, or indirect object instead of dative. Although these cases may make learning new words difficult, they actually help with word order because the position of words in a sentence is not as crucial in German as it is in English. And the reason for that is because words can occur in these four cases:
Nominative
subject of the sentence
The girl is reading.
Accusative
direct objects
We see the guide.
Dative
indirect objects
We give it to the guide.
Genitive
indicates possession or relationship
The book of the girl.
Note: The nouns I give you, and the ones you look up in a dictionary, will be in the nominative case.
Articles and Demonstratives
Definite Articles (The)
Masculine
Feminine
Neuter
Plural
Nominative
der (dare)
die (dee)
das (dahs)
die
Accusative
den (dane)
die
das
die
Dative
dem (dame)
der
dem
den
Genitive
des (dess)
der
des
der
Indefinite Articles (A, An)
Masculine
Feminine
Neuter
Nom.
ein (ine)
eine (ine-uh)
ein
Acc.
einen (ine-en)
eine
ein
Dat.
einem (ine-em)
einer(ine-er)
einem
Gen.
eines (ine-es)
einer
eines
Demonstratives (This, That, These, Those)
This / These
That / Those
Masc.
Fem.
Neu.
Pl.
Masc.
Fem.
Neu.
Pl.
Nom.
dieser
diese
dieses
diese
der
die
das
die
Acc.
diesen
diese
dieses
diese
den
die
das
die
Dat.
diesem
dieser
diesem
diesen
dem
der
dem
den
Gen.
dieses
dieser
dieses
dieser
des
der
des
der
Note: Jener is an older word found in written German that was used to mean that or those, but today in spoken German the definite articles are used. Dort or da may accompany the definite articles for emphasis. Das is also a universal demonstrative and therefore shows no agreement. Notice the last letter of each of the words above. They correspond to the last letters of the words for the definite articles. Words that are formed this same way are called der-words because they follow the pattern of the der-die-das declension. Other der-words are: jeder-every, and welcher-which. Mancher (many) and solcher (such) are also der-words, but they are used almost always in the plural.
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