Learn about the differences between German and American towns such as housing positions
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Chuck: Chuck here. Intermediate Season 4, Lesson 9 – “Visiting a Famous German Artists’ Community” |
| Judith: Hello everyone, I’m Judith and welcome to GermanPod101.com |
| Chuck: With us you’ll learn German with fun and effective lessons. |
| Judith: We also provide you with cultural insights. |
| Chuck: And tips you won’t find in a textbook. In this lesson, you’ll learn how to describe objects in detail. |
| Judith: This conversation takes place outside in Berlin, on Oranienburger Straße. |
| Chuck: The conversation is between Joe and Anke. |
| Judith: The speakers are friends, therefore they will be speaking informal German. |
| Chuck: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| A: So, wollen wir uns jetzt das Tacheles ansehen? Es gibt keine Schlange mehr. |
| J: Ja, klingt gut. |
| ... |
| A: Hier hinten im Hof gibt es zwei Bereiche. Einmal gibt es links diesen Strand, den die Leute abends als Klub benutzen. |
| J: Was ist denn das hier? Eine Art Schaukelpferd aus Metall? |
| A: Haha, ja, es gibt sehr interessante Sitzmöglichkeiten hier. Auch ausgebaute Autositze, oder Sitze aus Flugzeugen... |
| J: Nicht schlecht. |
| A: Der zweite Bereich ist da drüben. Da kann man interessante Skulpturen aus Altmetall sehen. |
| J: Ich seh' schon. |
| A: Eigentlich gucke ich mir nicht oft Kunst an, aber das hier ist etwas Besonderes. |
| J: Ja, das stimmt. |
| ... |
| (wieder draußen) |
| A: Und, was sagst du jetzt? |
| J: Es ist ein interessanter Ort. Ich hoffe, dass das Tacheles so bleibt, wie es jetzt ist. |
| A: Und die Skulpturen? |
| J: Die meisten Skulpturen sind sehr gut gemacht. Nur eine verstehe ich nicht. |
| A: Welche? |
| J: Die zwischen dem großen Mann und der Frau. Was sollte die darstellen? |
| A: Hmm, ich weiß noch nicht, welche Skulptur du meinst. |
| J: Die kleine Skulptur mit einem Computerchip. |
| A: Ohh. Ich weiß auch nicht, was die darstellen soll. Tut mir leid. |
| A: So, should we go see Tacheles? There's no more line-up. |
| J: Yes, sounds good. |
| ... |
| A: Back here in the courtyard there are two areas. On the left there's this "beach," which people use as a club in the evening. |
| J: What's this here? Some sort of rocking-chair made of metal? |
| A: Haha, yes, there are very interesting seating options here. Also seats removed from cars, or seats from airplanes... |
| J: Not bad. |
| A: The second area is over there. There you can see interesting sculptures made of scrap metal. |
| J: I see already. |
| A: I don't actually look at art often, but here it's something special. |
| J: Yes, that's right. |
| ... |
| (outside again) |
| A: And what do you say now? |
| J: It's an interesting place. I hope that Tacheles stays just like it is now. |
| A: And the sculptures? |
| J: Most of the sculptures are quite well done. There's only one that I don't understand. |
| A: Which one? |
| J: The one between the large man and the woman. What is it supposed to represent? |
| A: Hmm, I still don't know which sculpture you mean. |
| J: The small sculpture with a computer chip. |
| A: Ohh. I don't know what it's supposed to represent either. Sorry. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Judith: Okay, how about we talk a bit about the urban landscape in Germany? |
| Chuck: Okay, sounds good. |
| Judith: When coming to Germany, you’ll find that the towns feel quite different than the American towns. |
| Chuck: Especially notice this in the suburbs, because here they all have sidewalks and maybe bicycle paths and you can also shop and eat out even without a car. |
| Judith: The inner cities feel different, too. For one thing, people are less likely to own a lot of space. Germany is a lot more populated than the U.S.. |
| Chuck: You’ll find that even some people in the city run gardens outside the center so you don’t have to give up the pleasure of having a cookout or a relaxing night outside in the summer. |
| Judith: Another thing is all the streets twist and turn and not all houses are in fact at the street. Some houses can be reached by passing through an archway and crossing a yard. In this lesson, you learned that it’s called [Hof] in German. If there’s such a yard, the house near the street is called [Vorderhaus] and the house away from the street is called [Hinterhaus]. |
| Chuck: In Berlin especially, you’ll find that when you’re visiting someone you might often have to go through the building and then like, let’s say [zweiter Hinterhof] you have to find the second house of the back core yard on the right and it’s confusing. |
| Judith: Yeah. In Berlin there are several areas where a maze of houses are connected through such archways and common yards. One famous of such example are the [Hackeschen Höfe]. |
| Chuck: Maybe you’ll get to hear about that more in the future lessons, soon. |
| Judith: You’re trying to be an oracle? |
| Chuck: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Chuck: The first word we shall look at is? |
| Judith: [Hinten] |
| Chuck: “Behind”. |
| Judith: [Hinten] |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Hof] |
| Chuck: “Courtyard” or “court”. |
| Judith: [Hof, Hof] this word is masculine and the plural is [Höfe]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Bereich] |
| Chuck: “Area” or “field”. |
| Judith: [Bereich, Bereich] this word is masculine and the plural is [Bereiche]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Strand] |
| Chuck: “Beach”. |
| Judith: [Strand, Strand] and the plural is [Strände]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Club] |
| Chuck: “Club” as in nightclub. |
| Judith: [Club, der Club] and the plural is [Clubs]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [benutzen] |
| Chuck: “To use”. |
| Judith: [benutzen, benutzen] |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Art] |
| Chuck: “Type” or “kind”. |
| Judith: [Art, die Art] and the plural is [Arten]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Schaukelpferd] |
| Chuck: “Rocking horse”. |
| Judith: [Schaukelpferd, das Schaukelpferd] and the plural is [Schaukelpferde]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Metall] |
| Chuck: “Metal”. |
| Judith: [Metall, das Metall] and the plural is [Metalle]. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [ausbauen] |
| Chuck: “To expand, restore, to remove” or “dismantle”. |
| Judith: [ausbauen, ausbauen] and the [aus] splits off. |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [Kunst] |
| Chuck: “Art”. |
| Judith: [Kunst, Kunst] this word is feminine and the plural is [Künste] |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [meiste] |
| Chuck: “Most”. |
| Judith: [meiste, meiste] |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [zwischen] |
| Chuck: “Between”. |
| Judith: [zwischen, zwischen] |
| Chuck: Next? |
| Judith: [darstellen] |
| Chuck: “To portray” or “depict”. |
| Judith: [darstellen, darstellen] |
| 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 word we’ll look at is [der Sitz]. |
| Chuck: “Seat”. |
| Judith: It’s a noun bases on [sitzen]. |
| Chuck: “To sit”. |
| Judith: It’s also used to form various related compound nouns, such as [Sitzplatz]. |
| Chuck: “Reserved seat”. |
| Judith: [Autositz] |
| Chuck: “Car seat”. |
| Judith: And now [Sitzmöglichkeit] |
| Chuck: “Sitting possibility”. |
| Judith: That’s just a fancy word for “seat”. Next we should look at [die Skulptur] |
| Chuck: “Sculpture”. |
| Judith: This is not a word you need to learn. |
| Chuck: Well, unless you’re an art student. |
| Judith: And finally [das Altmetall] |
| Chuck: “Scrap metal”. |
| Judith: Literally “old metal”. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Chuck: The focus of this lesson is dative singular. So far we’ve studies the genitive and the accusative cases in depth, now it’s time to look at the last one we haven’t treated yet; the dative. |
| Judith: Today we’re looking at the dative singular endings, since the dialogue contained quite a few of them. |
| Chuck: For masculine nouns such as [der Mann], the key ending is “em” for the dative. The key ending always has to be present. |
| Judith: So, the masculine dative singular form of “the” is [dem] and the equivalent form for “a” is [einem] |
| Chuck: So if the article already contained the key ending, adjectives will only get the bland “en” ending and same for those nouns that add endings. |
| Judith: So we get [bei dem Mann, bei dem netten Mann, bei einem Mann, bei einem Menschen] |
| Chuck: For feminine nouns such as [die Frau], the key ending is “er”. |
| Judith: So, the articles would be [der] or [einer]. |
| Chuck: Again the key ending is used by the article already and all it is left for the adjective is the bland “en” ending. |
| Judith: [Bei der Frau, bei der netten Frau, bei einer Frau]. |
| Chuck: Finally, neutral nouns such as [das Kind] behave exactly like masculine nouns in the dative. |
| Judith: So, the articles are [dem] or [einem] and the adjectives end in “en”, [bei dem Kind, bei dem netten Kind, bei einem Kind] same is for masculine. |
| Chuck: Memorize these well and have another look at the dialogue to identify all the dative forms. Make sure you can figure out now why they have the endings they do. |
| Judith: Also review the dative personal pronouns such as [mir, dir, Ihnen]. |
Outro |
| Chuck: That just about does it for today. |
| Judith: There’s nothing like a little competition. |
| Chuck: Even against yourself. |
| Judith: Test what you’ve learned in this lesson with our fun review quizzes. |
| Chuck: Master vocabulary and grammar with short challenging quizzes. |
| Judith: Find these lessons on the lesson’s page at GermanPod101.com |
| Chuck: So, see you next week! |
| Judith: [Also bis nächste Woche!] |
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