Learn about the German genitive singular case
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Chuck: Chuck here. Intermediate Season 4, Lesson 3 – “This is Your German Captain Speaking”. Hello and welcome to GermanPod101.com, where we study German in a fun educational format. |
| Judith: So, brush up on the German that you started learning long ago or start learning today! |
| Chuck: Thanks for being with us for this lesson Judith. What are we looking at today? |
| Judith: In this lesson you will learn how to understand a German flight announcement. |
| Chuck: This conversation takes place in a plane bound to Berlin. |
| Judith: The speaker is the captain of the plane and he’s addressing the passengers therefore he’ll be speaking formal German. |
| Chuck: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Kapitän: Meine Damen und Herren, herzlich willkommen an Bord dieses Air France Fluges von Paris Charles de Gaulle nach Berlin-Tegel. |
| Kapitän: Mein Name ist Andreas Büchner und ich bin der Kapitän dieses Flugzeugs. |
| Kapitän: Wir möchten Sie darauf hinweisen, dass dieser Flug ein Nichtraucherflug ist. Auch in den Toiletten ist das Rauchen verboten. |
| Kapitän: Die Notausgänge dieser Maschine sind vorne und an den Seiten. Bitte sehen Sie jetzt nach, wo der nächste Notausgang ist, damit Sie sich später nicht verlaufen. |
| Kapitän: Das Wetter ist heute gut, also erwarten wir einen ruhigen Flug. In etwa einer Stunde sind wir in Berlin. |
| Kapitän: Im Moment sind es 26 Grad in Berlin und die Sonne scheint. Hoffentlich bleibt es so bis zu unserer Ankunft. Wir sagen Ihnen am Ende unseres Fluges noch einmal Bescheid. |
| Kapitän: Vielen Dank und guten Flug! |
| Captain: Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome on board this Air France flight from Paris Charles de Gaulle to Berlin-Tegel. |
| Captain: My name is Andreas Büchner and I'm the captain of this aircraft. |
| Captain: We would like to point out that this flight is a non-smoking flight. Smoking is also forbidden in the washrooms. |
| Captain: The emergency exits of this craft are at the front and on the sides. Please find your nearest emergency exit now, so that later you won't get lost. |
| Captain: The weather is good today, so we expect a calm flight. We'll be in Berlin in about an hour. |
| Captain: Currently it's 26 degrees in Berlin and sunny. Hopefully it'll stay that way until our arrival. We'll give another report at the end of the flight. |
| Captain: Thanks very much, and have a good flight! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Judith: If you’re thinking about coming to Germany now, it’s important to know what to may or may not bring to Germany on airplane. One thing is if that you want to bring goods with more than 150 euros then you’ll need to pay taxes on them. There are also things that you just won’t bring into Germany. |
| Chuck: Like injured animals and their products. |
| Judith: Medicine from outside the EU except for your personal use. |
| Chuck: Drugs and drug ingredients. |
| Judith: Fireworks. Except in very specific circumstances. |
| Chuck: Dangerous dog races, except for short-term touristy visits. |
| Judith: Certain foods like potatoes or wild mushrooms. |
| Chuck: [unintelligible 00:01:14] products or imitations. |
| Judith: Media with unconstitutional content like racism, Nazi content and symbols and undemocratic ideas. |
| Chuck: Porn involving children or animals. |
| Judith: Certain animals and animal products that might carry a disease. |
| Chuck: Weapons, weapon parts or ammunition including butterfly knives. German weapon laws are very strict. Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Chuck: The first word we shall see is? |
| Judith: [Dame]. |
| Chuck: “Lady” or “madam”. |
| Judith: [Dame, die Dame] and the plural is [Damen]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [herzlich]. |
| Chuck: “Hearty” or “heartfelt”. |
| Judith: [herzlich]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Willkommen]. |
| Chuck: “Welcome”. |
| Judith: [Willkommen]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Bord]. |
| Chuck: “Board” or “shelf”. |
| Judith: [Bord, das Bord]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Kapitän]. |
| Chuck: “Captain”. |
| Judith: [Kapitän, der Kapitän] and the plural is [Kapitäne]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [hinweisen]. |
| Chuck: “To indicate” or “suggest”. |
| Judith: [hinweisen]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Toilette]. |
| Chuck: “Toilet”. |
| Judith: [Toilette, die Toilette] and the plural is [Toiletten]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [verbieten]. |
| Chuck: “To forbid”. |
| Judith: [verbieten]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Notausgang] |
| Chuck: “Emergency exist”. |
| Judith: [Notausgang] this is masculine and the plural is [Notausgänge]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Maschine]. |
| Chuck: “Machine”. |
| Judith: [Maschine, die Maschine] and the plural is [Maschinen]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [erwarten]. |
| Chuck: “To expect” or “to await”. |
| Judith: [erwarten]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [ruhig]. |
| Chuck: “Tranquil” or “cone”. |
| Judith: [ruhig]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [etwa]. |
| Chuck: “Approximately” or “in questions”. |
| Judith: [etwa]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Ende]. |
| Chuck: “End”. |
| Judith: [Ende, das Ende] and the plural is [Enden]. |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Chuck: Let’s have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Judith: The first phrase we’ll look at is [Meine Damen und Herren] this is a said expression meaning “Ladies and Gentlemen”. You’ll hear [meine Damen und Herren] at the beginning of a lot of speeches. There’s also a similar expression for letters, that is [Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren]. |
| Chuck: “Much reviewed, ladies and gentlemen”. |
| Judith: [Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren] is what you should put at the beginning of every formal letter, unless you know the exact person you’re writing to. Next up, strangely enough [verboten] is a word that a lot of people know in German. [Verboten] means “forbidden” is actually the past participle of the word [verbieten] which means “to forbid”. Then, there is [nachsehen]. |
| Chuck: “To look after”. |
| Judith: No, it literally says “to look after”, but actually means “to check-up” or “to look up”. |
| Chuck: Literally, “to look after”. |
| Judith: Lastly [Notausgang]. |
| Chuck: “Emergency exit”. |
| Judith: This actually consists of two words: [not] |
| Chuck: “The stress, misery” or “emergency”. |
| Judith: And [Ausgang]. |
| Chuck: “Exit”. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Chuck: The focus of this lesson is the genitive singular. In the beginning of Upper Beginner Lessons, we already had a general overview of German cases. Now it’s the time to study them in depth. |
| Judith: Today we shall start by looking at the genitive singular. The genitive is typically used to show possession, for example “the man’s name” is [der Name des Mannes] in German. |
| Chuck: Note that the genitive noun which in English comes first comes afterwards in German. |
| Judith: The key ending for the genitive singular is “es”, you’ll find it in various forms for masculine and neutral nouns. |
| Chuck: For example the definite article is [des] and the indefinite article is [eines], for genitive singular for masculine and neutral nouns. |
| Judith: Since the key ending is already present in the article, the adjective then only takes the bland “en” ending. However, some nouns will also add “es” or “s”, so you say [des guten Mannes, eines guten Mannes, des guten Kindes, eines guten Kindes]. |
| Chuck: So what does these actually mean? |
| Judith: “Of the good man” or “of the good child”. |
| Chuck: Okay. The same ending even applies to possessive pronouns. |
| Judith: For example, in this lesson we had [am Ende unseres Fluges]. |
| Chuck: “At the end of our flight” or “at our flight’s end”. For feminine nouns we don’t see any “s” ending anywhere. The nouns don’t change and the articles both end in “r”, [der, der] and [einer]. |
| Judith: Again, any adjective just takes the neutral “en” ending, so we have [der guten Frau] or [einer guten Frau] “Of the good woman” or “Of a good woman”. Be aware that the genitive is slowly going out of use, in spoken German, people are more and more likely to say [der Name von dem Mann] instead [der Name des Mannes]. |
| Chuck: Also the prepositions that traditionally took the genitive increasingly use the dative now. |
| Judith: Prepositions like [während] |
| Chuck: “During”. |
| Judith: Or [wegen]. |
| Chuck: “Because of”. The genitive is slowly being replaced by the dative. Everywhere except in said phrases. This is especially true for the spoken language. |
| Judith: In written German, the genitive can still be found more often and German teachers might get angry at you if you’re not using the genitive in writing. |
| Chuck: Don’t worry, you just won’t. |
| Judith: Yeah. A teacher look at a kind of that is actually spoken. I don’t care much about the theoretical German. |
Outro |
| Chuck: Well, that just about does it for today. |
| Judith: Get instant access to all of our language learning lessons. |
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| Chuck: Or skip around different levels, it’s up to you. |
| Judith: Instantly access them all right now at GermanPod101.com. |
| Chuck: Okay, see you next time! |
| Judith: [Also bis nächstes Mal]! |
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