Posts Tagged With: Dutch language

When I worked at my last position someone always remarked about the state of the Dutch language and how it is slowly degrading. Some people I talk with remark about the misuse of hun (their, them – when it’s a indirect object) vs. hen (them – when it’s an direct object).

And what are direct and indirect objects again?

Ik gaf het aan haar. I gave it to her.

het = direct object

haar = indirect object

Thus you can see a sentence like this:

Ik heb _____ gezien. (you are filling in the direct object)

hen = correct (for persons only)

hun = not correct, but often heard

ze = used for persons OR things

So what do we use hun for again? Possession of items.

Ik heb hun fiets gezien. I have seen their bike.

And what about prepositions? Because we all know those are just made to complicate things…

When preceded by a preposition, use hen (door hen, aan hen, voor hen).

And how did I get to the B2 level without realizing this?

As mentioned above, the unmarked/unstressed form for direct objects is ze. Thus: Ik heb ze gezien. is acceptable provided you are not emphasizing ‘them’.

If you can read Dutch, this is a very fun article to read. Kofschip op de klippen. It’s about a Dutch family which moved to the US, with the mother realizing that the children’s Dutch was being taken over by English phrases. Opening example: Ik heb de team gemaakt. (English – I made the team). Better Dutch: Ik wordt gekozen voor het team. I have been chosen for the team. (Note January 2016: it should be Ik word gekozen… the t was a typo.)

Last night’s grammatical topic was the passive form of sentences. These are sentences where the thing or person doing the action is not stated or is stated indirectly by using a preposition (by, through) so that the subject’s responsibility for the action is minimized. Here are some examples in Dutch. The tenses are present, simple past, present perfect and past perfect, in that order.

Active, het/een (or the/a) does not matter as much.

Hij bouwt het huis. He builds the house.
Hij bouwde het huis. He built the house.
Hij heeft het huis gebouwd. He has built the house.
Hij had het huis gebouwd. He had built the house.

Passive, where the object is known – i.e. het/the instead of een/a.

Het huis wordt gebouwd. The house is built.
Het huis werd gebouwd. The house was built.
Het huis is gebouwd. The house has been built.
Het huis was gebouwd. The house had been built.

(Anything else noticing the ‘fun’ problem where English using is/was for present and simple past, but Dutch uses that convention for present and past perfect? Yeah, it’s fun. Try not to think about it and you’ll actually have less issues!)

Passive, where the object is not known – i.e. een/a.

Things change a bit when you have an object which is not known, like “a house” versus “the house”. In that case it is much more common to use Er when using the passive form. 

Er wordt een huis gebouwd. There is a house built. (English=clunky)
Er werd een huis gebouwd. There was a house built.
Er is een huis gebouwd. There has been a house built.
Er was een huis gebouwd. There had been a house built.

You can hint at who did the action as well. In Dutch this is usually done by the preposition door. It is still passive because the emphasis on who or what did the action is downplayed (great for politicians!).

Het huis was gebouwd door Habitat for Humanity. The house had been built by Habitat for Humanity.

Er wordt een huis gebouwd door Habitat for Humanity. A house had been built by Habitat for Humanity.

One of the things that was mentioned in last night’s class was the subject of compound nouns. Dutch, like German, has some pretty long words because it is in the habit of sticking words together more often than not.

The subject came about because of a dictee that we were asked to write (dictees are when a teacher recites a sentence and you have to write it a they say it out loud). Here was our dictee:

Er wordt vermoedt dat het taal- en rekenniveau in het basisonderwijs de internationale concurrentiepositie van een land bepaalt. It is suspected that the language and math level in elementary education determines the international competitiveness of a country. What a mouthful.

(If you’re keeping track at home, I misspelled vermoedt as vermoet because I had never heard of the verb before. I should have realized worden + verb would require the use of the present perfect after. I also misspelled rekenniveau as rekenenniveau – that was just a mistake of not listening carefully and thinking there was an extra syllable. I didn’t realize concurrentiepositie was a compound noun, and thus one word, though I correctly knew basisonderwijs was. I also originally wrote bepaalt as bepaald, getting the tense wrong until I realized it was simply present tense. I figured that one out though myself.)

But I digress… basisonderwijs is elementary education, but it’s actually made up of two words smushed together. basis onderwijs. The Dutch like to do that a lot, though you’ll usually see an s in between. When I go home from work I frequently see a sign “waarschuwingslichten buiten gebruik”, or warning lights are out of order. waarschuwing (warning) lichten (lights) with an s in between to help the pronunciation transition between words.

The main rule about compound words is that the last word determines the gender of the entire word. 

de taal, het niveau = het taalniveau

You can create compound nouns in Dutch using four methods:

1) two nouns: het theekopje (de thee + het kopje = cup of tea)

2) adjective + noun: de groothandel (groot + de handel = wholesale)

3) preposition + noun: de tegenspeller (tegen + de speller = opponent)

4) stem form of verb + noun: de eetkamer (eet [stem form of eten] + de kamer = dining room)

A few weeks ago we had a minor test over chapters 1 and 2 in the textbook. Nothing too bad – you had to complete a few sentences, or put the right word in the sentence, or give the right synonym for a word… We got the test back today. Of course the teacher did some scare tactics and said almost everyone needs to work harder and that you should really have at least 70% right. Of course I didn’t study as hard as I usually do. (There was only 25 points and it was only 2 pages, so not that long.)

And then I got the test back and saw that I got a 90%, or 22 1/2 points out of 25 right. Considering I really didn’t study, I’ll take it of course!

Here are a few things I missed:

De brief waar we op hadden gewacht kwam veel te laat. (I had ‘die’, but forgot the rule where ‘die’ changes into ‘waar’ when there’s also a preposition involved. i.e. ‘op’).

Nadat we het ongeluk hadden gehad, hebben we een auto gekocht. (I left out ‘gehad’ completely, thinking I could mix the past tense of ‘hadden’ with the perfect tense of ‘hebben gekocht’. Sometimes you can, I found out. But not always…)

And here are some rules for het that we learned, although we might have already had it previously.

1. All diminutives are het words. (het hondje, het meisje – the dog, the girl)

2. All words that are exactly two syllables and start with one of these prefixes:

be – het begin, het bedrag (the beginning, the amount [i.e. the amount to pay])

ge – het geheim, het gezin (the secret, the family)

ver – het vervoer, het verkeer (the transportation, the traffic)

ont – het ontbijt, het ontslag (the breakfast, the termination [i.e. firing someone])

3. All words that end up -isme. het communisme, het kapitalisme (communism, capitalism)

4. All words that end up -ment. het argument, het monument, het parliment…. no translations needed, right?

5. All words that end up -tuig. het vliegtuig, het voertuig. (the airplane, the vehicle [i.e. anything with wheels])

The last few classes we have talked about Er. It’s an adverb. In Dutch it has five different functions. It’s also a very, very annoying subject for buitenlanders to understand (myself included).

Function 1:

1. Er + telwoord (numeral, etc). Things to know with this form include:

a) it usually answers a question (if it is not you might be better off with function three)

b) some examples of telwoorden are: normal numbers (een, twee), but also words that describe an amount like weinig (not much), veel (a lot), geen (none), een paar (a few), een aantaal (a number).

c) er comes directly after the verb.

Heb je nog sigaretten? Do you still have cigarettes?

Ja, ik heb er nog twee. Yes, I have two.

Nee, ik heb er geen. No, I don’t have any.

Function 2:

Referring to a place. Er is the unstressed form of daar. Either might be used. Again, er/daar comes after the verb.

Ben je ooit naar Duitsland geweest? Have you ever been to Germany?

Ja, ik ben daar een paar keer geweest. Yes, I have been there a few times.

Function 3:

Er with an indefinite subject (There is a pen on the table, versus THE pen). Some things to know:

a) Er begins the sentence in a main clause. The indefinite subject comes after the verb.

b) You either use een (English = a) or nothing at all before the indefinite subject. Er loopt een man op straat. Er lopen mensen op straat. (A man walks in the street, people walk in the street – it is not always a clean translation)

Er staat een rode auto voor de deur. There is (literally: stands) a red car before the door.

Function 4 (B1-B2 level):

Here you have Er or the stressed form daar with a preposition. Sub function: Er pointing to a relative clause (i.e. a part of a sentence which cannot stand on its own like a main clause can).

a) For the first form, er usually combines with the preposition in some way. Usually as one word.

b) For the sub function, it’s harder to predict where er will be in this function. I think it is again right after the verb but I am not 100% sure.

Denk je aan de vakantie? (aandenken, to think of)

Ja, ik denk eraan. (Yes, I think about it.)

Function 2 – sentence without Er first: Ik ben trots op mijn kinderen. (I am proud of my kids, trots op zijn). Sentence with Er: Ik ben er trots op dat mijn kinderen op school goede resultaten halen. Er refers to ‘that my kids get good grades at school’, a relative clause. It is not easy to master this function!

Function 5 (B1-B2 level):

The last use of Er is in a passive sentence. Usually (if not always), Er begins the sentence and is followed by a conjugated version of worden or zijn.

Normal, active sentence: Ze praten in Nederlands veel over het weer. They talk in Dutch a lot about the weather. Passive version: Er wordt in Nederlands veel gepraat over het weer. There is a lot of talk in Dutch about the weather.

Happy Friday!

We found out earlier this week that we would have a new teacher every Thursday. In the beginning he was a bit nervous but he definitely got into the groove of teaching in the second half of the class.

One thing he did have was sentences where we had to fill in the missing conjunction. For example,

Er stond een lange file, vandaar dat ik te laat op mijn werk was. There was a lot of traffic, (and) from that I was late to work. Vandaar is  a bit bit interesting because it must always be proceeded by ‘dat’ or ‘that’.

Hij heeft erg weinig tijd. Dus gaat hij dit jaar niet met vakantie. He has too little time. Thus he is not going on vacation this year.

He also corrected our pronunciation a lot (probably a good thing!) and seemed quick to point out the differences between spoken Dutch and written Dutch. Things like mits (only if) and tenzij (but not if) being mostly written Dutch; normally you would say als (if) if you were speaking. Also daar (because) is written Dutch but omdat (because) is much more widely used especially when speaking.

He also talked a bit about the structure of a sentence, breaking it into its respective parts.

Jan en Joke || gaan || komende zondag || met hun kinderen || bij Tante Toos || logeren.

Jan and Joke are going to stay over at Aunt Toos with their kids this Sunday.

In Dutch you can start the sentence with pretty much element except logeren because it is the infinitive and is not a conjugated verb. You only need to remember one rule: the conjugated verb either comes first (if it is a question) with the subject right after, or the conjugated verb  goes into the second place, with the subject either right before it or right after it. The subject in this case is always Jan and Joke.

Here are some examples:

Gaan || Jan en Joke || komende zondag || met hun kinderen || bij Tante Toos || logeren?

Jan en Joke || gaan || komende zondag || met hun kinderen || bij Tante Toos || logeren.

Komende zondag || gaan || Jan en Joke || met hun kinderen || bij Tante Toos || logeren. (When you want to emphasis it is this Sunday.)

Met hun kinderen || gaan || Jan en Joke || komende zondag || bij Tante Toos || logeren. (When you want to emphasis that it is with their kids.)

Bij Tante Toos || gaan || Jan en Joke || komende zondag || met hun kinderen || logeren. (When you want to emphasis it is with Aunt Toos / where it is.)

Pretty cool, huh?

(Just say yes.)

Note: we don’t have class tonight, so the next class-related post won’t be until after Tuesday’s lesson.

I’m still alive! I have a short funny story from work, but first you need to know a bit of Dutch. In Dutch one can say “een … of <number>” to reference a length of time. For example, een jaar of tien. A year or ten. The one thing to remember is that een translates to ‘a’ not ‘one’ (it is the same word in Dutch). But you are expressing a bit of uncertainty with the answer. In English we would usually say “10 years or so”. You also have to know that where I work the working language is English, although you’ll hear some Dutch or similar occasionally.

When I came in this morning, there was a few people already in the kitchen/cafeteria area. A coworker as well as someone fixing the coffee machine – i.e. someone from the coffee company. My coworker asked how long it would be until the coffee machine was fixed. He replied (in English) “a minute or 10”. Heh.

In other news, here is some grammar (actually from the lesson before). I’ve already covered separable verbs, but in Dutch you can also have non-separable verbs. These are verbs that have a prefix on the front of the word, but it never separates from the verb. Examples are mislukken, voorspellen, ondertekenen (to fail, to predict, to sign). Unlike seperable verbs where the accent falls on the prefix, here the accent always falls on the first syllable after the prefix (mislukken, voorspellen, onderteken).

Mijn moeder was een getuige voor mijn bruiloft. Zij heeft de trouwakte ondertekend. My mother was a witness for my wedding. She signed the marriage license. Hi Mom!

Further examples:

Voor mijn verjaardag heeft mijn man mij met een etentje verrast. For my birthday my husband surprised me with a dinner.

Dit kan de overvaller niet zijn. Hij werd als een jongensachtig type omschreven. This cannot be the robber. He was described as a youngish type.

Mijn appeltaart mislukt altijd want mijn oven werkt niet goed. My apple pies always fail because my oven doesn’t work well.

Note: no school related posts next week, as we are on vacation.

Well, not breaking them. Just pulling them apart. Last night we learned about separable and not-separable verbs, although this post will only cover the first kind. Somewhat similar to English I suppose, except that our prepositions tend to come after the verb (to bring with) and are not attached to the verb. In Dutch, the prepositions are actually prefixes attached to the verb.

Verbs classified as separable always have the accent on the first syllable! WEG-gaan (to go away). AF-was-sen (to wash dishes). UIT-leg-gen (to explain).

Here are some rules in the various tenses:

Present tense, main clause/hoofdzin: Ik was vanavond af. (I wash the dishes tonight – afwassen). Here the prefix separates and moves to the end of the clause.

Present tense, relative clause/bijzin: Ik beloof je dat ik vanavond afwas. (I promise you I will wash the dishes tonight). Since it’s a relative clause (introduced by dat) the verb must move to the end of the relative clause and conjugate itself based on the subject (ik/I). If it does, the prefix remains attached to the verb and comes before.

Past tense, main clause/hoofdzin: Mijn moeder stapte een halte te vroeg uit. (My mother got out a stop too early – uitstappen.) As present tense/main clause, you conjugate the verb and move the prefix to the end of the clause.

Past tense, relative clause/bijzin:  Toen mijn moeder uitstapte, regende het hard. (When my mother got out, it rained hard.) As the verb is already at the end of the clause (required for relative clauses), the prefix stays with it.

Modal auxiliary verbs (can, should, shall, may, must, etc), present or imperfect, with verb as infinitive: Ik wil jullie voor mijn verjaardag uitnodigen. (I want to invite you [all] for my birthday – uitnodigen.) As it is not the main verb, but just an infinitive, it goes to the end of the sentence and thus the prefix remains attached.

Present perfect (perfectum), main clause/hoofdzin: Hij heeft ons voor zijn verjardag uitgenodigd. (He has invited us for his party.) Again, the present perfect tense demands that the participum (genodigd) goes to the end of the clause, thus the prefix is allowed to attach itself to it. NOTE: ‘ge’ goes between the prefix and the verb. uitgenodigd.

Present perfect (perfectum), relative clause/bijzin: Weet je dat ik de grammatica al drie keer heb uitgelegd? (Did you know that I have already explained the grammar three times?) In this case since it is a relative clause the helper element (heb from ‘hebben’) also moves to the end of the clause, but otherwise it is the same as above. NOTE: the order of the helper element (hebben or zijn) and the participum (in this case uitleggen) does not matter. It’s a style choice.

Past perfect (plusquamperfectum), main clauses and relative clauses: The same rules as above for present perfect apply, including the order of the helper element and the participum. The only difference is that the helper element can only be had/hadden (from hebben) or was/waren (from zijn).

te + infinitief: Je hoeft me niet meer op te bellen. (You do not have to call me anymore – opbellen). Some verbs require the om … te construction (or in this case the te construction). If te is present it will go between the prefix and the rest of the verb, with spaces on either side. One of the semi rare times a prefix can still come before the verb but not be attached to it.

Imperatives (giving commands): Pas op! (Watch out – oppassen). Ga weg! (Go away – weggaan). Trek een jas aan! (Put a jacket on – aantrekken). It might not be obvious but this is of course another example of separable verbs, where the verb is conjugated and the prefix comes at the end of the clause (Note: Trek aan een jas is wrong – you must put the prefix all the way at the end of the clause).

I hope you found this informative. If you didn’t, sorry to be such a grammar geek!

No grammar today. Here are two random things we covered in Tuesday’s class, for fun:

1) hunebedden in the providence of Drenthe (Dutch wikipedia | Lijst). These are heavy, unwieldy ‘grave stones’. During the last ice age the northern half of the Netherlands was covered by ice. The boulders were brought over from Scandinavia on slow moving glaciers. When the ice melted, the stones remained. Around 4000 BC people moved the boulders into grave stone formation  – somehow.

2. Laan van Meerdervoort in The Hague follows an old shoreline (which was apparently very popular to live near). I’ve already mentioned this, but it’s also the longest street in the country.