Kars • Häussermann • Hime-Everschor Laiman ,^ementa grammar The EnglishVersion of Grundgrammatik Deutsch ^--^- Diesterweg 6157 iesterweg ■ .-(cid:9) r Jürgen Kars Ulrich Häussermann Judith Hirne-Everschor Gerhard Koller J Verlag Moritz Diesterweg Frankfurt am Main 1 Die Deutsche Bibliothek – CIP-Einheitsaufnahme Kars, Jürgen: German Elementary Grammar / Jürgen Kars ; Ulrich Häussermann ; Judith Hime-Everschor. Unter Mitarb. von Gerhard Koller. – 1. Aufl. – Frankfurt am Main : Diesterweg, 1993 Deutsche Ausg. u.d.T.: Kars, Jürgen: Grundgrammatik Deutsch ISBN 3-425-06157-7 NE: Häussermann, Ulrich:; Hime-Everschor, Judith: ISBN 3-425-06157-7 1. Auflage 1993 © 1993 Verlag Moritz Diesterweg GmbH & Co., Frankfurt am Main. Alle Rechte vorbehalten. Das Werk und seine Teile sind urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung in anderen als den gesetzlich zugelassenen Fällen bedarf deshalb der vorherigen schriftlichen Einwilligung des Verlags. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of Verlag Moritz Diesterweg. Illustrationen: Uli Olschewski, München Gesamtherstellung: Universitätsdruckerei H. Stürtz AG, Würzburg Contents Sentences and Words 1 Main Clauses, Subordinate Clauses 2 The Parts of Speech 3 The Elements of the Sentence 7 The Verb controls the Sentence 9 The Verb 15 The Indicator of the Person 17 The Second Person 18 The Indicator of the Tenses 19 The Use of the Tenses 19 Separable and Inseparable Prefix Verbs 27 " Special Verbs" 29 haben 30 sein 32 The Modal Verbs 34 werden 40 lassen 42 kennen 42 wissen 44 The Participles 45 Present Participle 45 Past Participle 46 The Infinitive 47 Infinitive without 48 Infinitive with 49 The Indicator of the Closeness to Reality 50 Overview 50 Subjunctive II 51 Indirect Discourse 57 "Imperative" (Request/Command) 59 The Indicator of the "Interest" 61 The Forms of the Passive 62 The Use of the Passive Voice 63 The role of the do-er/agent 63 Reflexive Verbs 65 Partially Reflexive Verbs 66 Strictly Reflexive Verbs 66 Reciprocal Relationship 67 e 1g in anderen als den Noun Phrase 68 The Noun 68 r -_.L:smitted, in any form rnor permission of Verlag der die das (gender) 69 Singular and Plural 71 Declination 72 Diminutive Forms 75 The Article 76 Use of the Article 77 Declination 'of the Article 78 III Contents The Adjective 81 Comparative and Superlative 82 The Harmony of the Noun Phrase 86 The more Simple Noun Phrase 87 More Complicated Noun Phrases 89 The Numbers 91 The Cardinal Numbers 91 The Ordinal Numbers 92 Numbers used as Adverbs 93 Fractions 94 Time 94 Money 95 Mathematical Equations 95 Measures and Weights 96 The Pronoun 97 Personal Pronoun 98 Possessive Forms 100 Indefinite Pronoun einer / eine / eins, welcher / welche / welches Negative Pronoun keiner/keine/keins 102 Indefinite Pronoun jemand 104 wer 104 etwas 104 was 105 man 106 Negative Pronoun niemand 106 nichts 106 Indefinite Pronoun jeder/jede/jedes 107 alle 107 alles 108 mancher / manche / manches 108 irgendeiner, irgend jemand, irgendwer, irgendwas 108 The Words viel, wenig 109 Demonstrative Forms dieser/diese/dies(es) 109 jener/jene/jenes 110 der/die/das 100 selber/selbst 111 Reflexive Pronouns 112 Question Words 112 Pronominal Adverb 113 The Question 114 Definition Questions welcher/was für ein 115 Relative Pronoun 116 Relative Clause 117 The Use of the Word es 119 The Function Words 121 Joining Words 122 Prepositions 123 Conjunctions 134 Joining Words: Synopsis 153 - Adverbs 155 Modifiers of Time (Review) 171 Flavoring Particles 173 Interjections 176 Excursion: Gesture 178 Word Formation 180 Derived Forms 182 Compound Nouns 184 Compound Adjectives 185 The Sentence 186 Types of Sentences 186 The Word Order within the Sentence 187 The Inflected Verb 188 The Noun: Nominative, Accusative, Dative 188 The Pronoun: Nominative, Accusative, Dative 190 Contents The Bridge : complements with tendencies towards the left and complements with tendencies towards the right 192 Modifiers 194 Overview : The Main Clause 196 Overview : The Subordinate Clause 196 The Noun Phrase in the Sentence 198 The End Field 200 Main Clause and Subordinate Clause 202 How one can combine sentences 204 Negation and Intensifikation 206 Negation 206 Intensification 209 The Spoken Language 212 Sentence Structure 213 Another Word Order in the Sentence 213 Correcting yourself 213 A new Start 213 Sentence without a Beginning or End 214 Grammatical Details 214 Common Regional Language Habits 215 Orthography 217 The Sentence Structure 218 The Sound of Words 220 Quality of Sound 222 Quantity of Sound 222 The Meaning of Words 223 same meaning – same spelling 224 different meaning different spelling 224 Punctuation 226 The Period 226 Question Mark 227 Exclamation Mark 228 The Comma 228 The Semi-Colon 229 The Colon 229 Quotation Marks 229 Parentheses 230 The Dash 230 The Apostrophe 230 The Hyphen 231 Appendices 232 Bibliography 232 Verbs and Adjectives with Prepositions of their own 234 Irregular Verbs 239 German Register 246 Sentences and Words Mir macht meine neue Arbeit Spaß sagt er ich hoffe in zwei Jahren bekomme ich dann einen Studienplatz. Many people speak like this — without using a period, without using a comma, without taking a breath. It is difficult to follow them through this mountain of words. Most people arrange their thoughts in sentences : „Mir macht meine neue Arbeit Spaß", sagt er, „ich hoffe, in zwei Jahren bekomme ich dann einen Studienplatz." ("My new job is fun ", he says, "I hope that 1 will then get accepted to the university in two years.") Now there is light between the words. I understand the text more easily because now it is expressed step by step. Speaking is the formation of sentences. 1 Main clauses, Subordinate clauses Main clauses, Subordinate clauses Just as there are main streets and side streets, main thoughts and subsequent thoughts, there are also main clauses (also known as independent clauses) and subordinate clauses (also known as dependent clauses). A subordinate clause can not stand alone; it is dependent. A main clause can stand alone; it can also carry the weight of one or several subordinate clauses: Das ist das Haus, wo Mozart geboren wurde. (This is the house, where Mozart was born.) Main clause Subordinate clause Ich lege mich nie zu Bett, ohne zu bedenken, daß ich vielleicht(cid:9) den andern Tag nicht mehr sein werde. (so jung ich bin)(cid:9) W.A. Mozart (1 never go to bed without considering the fact that, as young as I am, I may not live to the following day.) Mozart: Silhouette 1785 You will find details on the various types of main clauses and subordinate clauses and on the structure of the sentence (word order within the sentence) on pages 202-205. We form sentences by using words. Sofort! Drei Mark zehn. These are not complete sentences, but rather half-sentences (Ellipsis). The whole sentence would be: Ich komme sofort. Das kostet drei Mark zehn. Which words does a sentence need? We will show you in the following excerpt. The Parts of Speech The Parts of Speech A complete sentence normally requires a verb and a noun or a pronoun*: toughts and subsequent is independent clauses) Der Floh beißt. :lauses). A subordinate Die Milch kocht. clause can stand alone; Ich komme. iinate clauses: The verb (das Verb) tells us what is happening or what is (a happening or a condition) – in short: the verb tells us what is going on: beißt kocht komme The noun (das Non-ten) or the pronoun (das Pronomen) refers to a living thing: Der Floh / ich / die Tänzerin lad mehr sein werde. or to a (concrete or abstract) thing: W.A. Mozart die Milch / es / der Tanz sag as l am, I may not live Nouns seldom stand alone. They are mostly accompanied by an article (der Artikel) : der, die, das ein, eine, ein Subordinate clause clause or by a demonstrative pronoun or demonstrative adjective (Demonstrati- vum) : ubordinate clauses and dieser, diese, dieses ice on pages 202-205. or by a possessive pronoun or possessive adjective (Possessivum): mein, meine, mein Ihr, eure, sein... ences (Ellipsis). Also an imperative is a complete sentence: Komm! Helft! Here the person is hidden in the verb form. Also interjections are complete sentences : Ja. Danke. Oh! For more informa- -ou in the following tion, see page 176. Otherwise, the noun or pronoun is very rarely missing. 3