MLG 1001 Grammar Lectures Paul Joyces German MLG 1001语法讲座保罗乔伊斯的德国.pptVIP

German Grammar Lectures Lecture 1: The Gender of German Nouns Designed by Paul Joyce University of Portsmouth E-Mail: Paul.Joyce@port.ac.uk 1.1 German noun declension There is no noun declension as such in German. Exceptions: -(e)s endings on masculine and neuter nouns in the genitive case -(e)n endings on nouns in the dative plural Endings on weak masculine nouns 1.2 German Articles Instead German cases are shown by means of the articles i.e. words such as “a”or “the” which are invariable in English. The German definite article is called “der” and equates to English “the”. The German indefinite article is called “ein” and equates to English “a”. 1.3 The Definite Article 1.4 The Indefinite Article 1.5 Know your genders! For this reason you must learn German nouns together with their gender as shown by the relevant definite article! As the previous tables indicate, German nouns have one of three genders: masculine, feminine or neuter. There are no gender differences in the plural in German. 1.6 Quick Quiz (1) Because things are always referred to as “it” in English, English students of German tend to guess the gender of an unfamiliar word as neuter - “das”. But are they right to do so? Which of the three genders actually occurs most often in German? 1.7 Quiz Answer Approximately 45% of German nouns are masculine. 35% of German nouns are feminine. Only 20% of German nouns are neuter! 1.8 Typisch deutsch! Whereas in English gender virtually always corresponds logically to the sex of the noun, this is not the case in German. Most German nouns denoting male people and animals are in fact masculine, and those denoting females are mostly feminine. BUT there are exceptions - das M?dchen, das Fr?ulein, das Weib! 1.9 Typisch deutsch (2)! And unlike English nouns, names of inanimate objects may be masculine, feminine or neuter in German. This state of affairs prompted the 19th Century American writer Mark Twain to make the followi