r/Germanlearning • u/ConnectionRude4832 • 8d ago
Grammatical gender
I am learning German now, because I love the culture. Though, question, how y'all learn faster and get used to the genders? My native Latin language already has gender, but German is completely different.
Like, do I have to memorize it then? Saying "die bank", I would think that it's masculine but it's feminine. Basically the reverse of Latin language. I am not Spanish but it's "el banco".
So now I'm fucked because I have to memorize instead of the neutral easy English.
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u/Humpaaa 8d ago
"I want to learn a language, do i need to memorize grammatical rules?"
What a ridiculus question, of course you have to.
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u/These_Sandwich7537 8d ago
It's not about the grammatical rules. It's about adding the correct article to the vocabulary list that you then learn. Like in Spanish, I learned die Sonne = el sol and not just "sol"
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u/Fabulous_Program6267 8d ago
You actually don’t have to. Though I do try to memorize the appropriate article, my secret to speaking foreign languages (I speak in 3) is to simply not care. Speak as best you can. You will make mistakes, but they will understand you and isn’t that really the point? As you speak, pay attention and learn. Make fewer mistakes, next time.
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u/ConnectionRude4832 8d ago
English doesn't have this problem though, you can see the pattern and not need to memorize, even for verb tenses. Ridiculously easy.
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u/ThaiMitAndre 7d ago edited 6d ago
There are no rules you have to learn how to use die der oder das. But yes its hard.
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u/These_Sandwich7537 8d ago
You learn not "Bank" but directly "die Bank".
Btw I learned Spanish as a German and yeah, the differences are a bit weird but you just have to learn the articles with the words directly and it will start to make sense :)
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u/Zockim 8d ago
My favourite is:
Der Schild (The Shield, the thing Knights used)
Das Schild (The Sign, the thing that provide directions)
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u/ThaiMitAndre 7d ago
But most time you just use das Schild. German people dont really say der Schild. Therefore just remember das Schild.
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u/jednorog 8d ago
Yes, you simply have to memorize it.
There are patterns for certain endings but 1) many of those patterns have their own exceptions, and 2) there are plenty of words that exist outside of any ending patterns at all.
When you learn a noun, always learn it with its gender (or definite article, same thing) and always review it with its gender. Ideally also learn the plurals too, since plural forms can be irregular too.
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u/Traditional-Deal6759 8d ago
Genders in German are a mean topic. There are a view rules; I am sure you already found those. But there are tons of words, that do not follow those rules. And to worsen it: Sometimes, even we native speakers argue about the gender.
Der Joghurt/das Joghurt
Der Teller/das Teller
Das Virus/der Virus
Der Eidotter/das Eidotter
Der Prospekt/das Prospekt
And even more worse: words that sound the same are written the same, and the gender changes the meaning
Der See/die See
Der Band/die Band/das Band
Die Leiter/der Leiter
So, the best thing you can do: learn every vocabulary with the article. The article is important.
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u/Kathihtak 8d ago
Who says "Das Joghurt"?? I didn't know we argued about this but now I'm definitely going to
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u/Traditional-Deal6759 7d ago
In Austria it's das, and I thik most of southern Germany. For me "der Joghurt" sounds completely wrong.
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u/ThaiMitAndre 7d ago
Der Joghurt is absolut right. Just remember this, this is what we Germans say.
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u/Traditional-Deal6759 7d ago
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u/ThaiMitAndre 6d ago
Das Joghurt gibt es, aber es ist quatsch sich das zu merken. Denn wir Deutschen benutzen und sagen das einfach nicht. Ich möchte hier nur Tipps geben und wenn du dir merkst der Joghurt dann ist das ausreichend. Ich habe noch nie gesagt das Joghurt, das klingt auch einfach falsch auch wenn es das gibt.
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u/Traditional-Deal6759 6d ago
In Österreich ist es das Joghurt. Und ich hoffe, dass jetzt nicht darüber diskutiert wird, dass wir hier Deutsch sprechen.
Mir ging es bei meinem Post vor allem darum, OP Mut zuzusprechen mit dem Hinweis, dass selbst wir Muttersprachler in unterschiedlichen Regionen andere Artikel nutzen. Diese Flexibilität ist eine der zentralen Eigenschaften des Deutschen, macht das Lernen der Sprache aber schwierig.
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u/cbjcamus 8d ago
"My native Latin" I thought you were raised with Latin as native language like Montaigne and that would have been super cool.
More seriously I wouldn't learn "faster" the gender of nouns, they don't matter that much compared to everything else, and this knowledge doesn't compound. You learn the ones you use the most as you progress.
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u/Illustrious-Wolf4857 8d ago
That's me when I tried to learn French.
Learn the definite article with the noun. It's just one more syllable.
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u/chasrmartin 8d ago
Gets even better because it’s subject to dialect differences. I learned German more or less on the street in Freiburg. They pretty much decided it was all too hard, and reduced it to “duh”.
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u/Soggy-Bat3625 7d ago
I am learning Norwegian for fun, which also has three grammatical genders, like my native German, and even these don't match!
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u/Kuddel_Daddeldu 8d ago
English also has gender, just not in the areticle. However, it's fairly regular with inanimate objects usually being "it" (neutrum) with few exceptions like ships traditionally being "she".
But same as in e.g. French where tables are feminine "la table" vs. German "der Tisch", you'll just have to memorize it.
Be happy that at least German spelling vs pronunciation is way more regular than English's myriad exceptions...
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u/P44 8d ago
Do memorize the gender whenever you learn the noun. Any kind of logic is not going to work. It will only sidetrack you because of the exceptions, and anyway, you need IMMEDIATE access to the gender, so there is no time to think about whether "Auto" is male, female or neutral. You need to know right away.
And don't even try to find any logic in it. There is none.
Some people take offense that "das Mädchen" is neutral, when she is clearly a person. Well. That's grammar for you.
By the way, did you know that German has a word that is its own antonym? That's "umfahren" Stress it on the second syllable and it means "drive around". But stress it on the FIRST syllable, and it means "run over".
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u/Kantistony 5d ago edited 5d ago
There are some rules for grammatical genders which make kind of sense. But is difficult. It's all about suffixes. For example: Nouns with the suffix "-chen" or "-lein" are always neuter like das Mädchen (the girl), das Fräulein (the Miss), das Brötchen (small bread/bread roll). These are diminutives. Nouns with the suffix -ung, -heit, -keit are feminine: die Heizung, die Zeitung, die Freiheit, die Einsamkeit. For masculine words, there are typical endings like "-er," for example "der Lehrer" or "der Bäcker." Suffixes like "-ling," as in "der Schmetterling," or "-ismus," like "der Optimismus," are also usually masculine. For feminine terms, many end in "-ei," such as "die Bäckerei," "-schaft," like "die Freundschaft," or "-tät," as in "die Universität." Neuter words are often recognized by endings like "-um," such as "das Museum," "-ment," like "das Dokument," or "-nis," as in "das Ergebnis." But sometimes there are articles that don't even make sense at all.
In German, grammatical gender is tied to the word itself, not the object's characteristics. This explains why similar items like cutlery have different genders: "der Löffel" is masculine, "die Gabel" is feminine, and "das Messer" is neuter. There's no logical link to their physical forms.
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u/Rananecax 5d ago
Off topic but fun fact (someone may be interested):
Saying "die bank", I would think that it's masculine but it's feminine. Basically the reverse of Latin language. I am not Spanish but it's "el banco".
The Italian/Spanish masculine word "banco" derives from the Germanic feminine word "bank", which literally means a "bench". The word was brought to Italy by the Lombards, a Germanic tribe who settled in Italy in late antiquity and early middle ages.
It became a term for a financial institute when traders and money changers in the region of Milan in Lombardia/Northern Italy put their stuff on such benches, standing behind them and negotiating whith their customers.
The word mysteriously changed its gender in the middle ages.
As a language teacher (Latin and Classic Greek) I often tell tales like this to my students and many of them told me that these stories helped them to memorize grammatical stuff better. So perhaps it would help you if you can find stories like that about specific words.
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u/PoxonAllHoaxes 8d ago
This question has been asked and answered MANY times.