Dutch question

Question for a dutch member:

I noticed that in the dutch language there are 2 different articles, HET and DE.
(For example de televisie, and het boek)

I there any rule to make the difference??

 

It's a hard question to answer since "we" generally don't think about using "de" or "het" on the correct words, since there is usually only one that sounds logical. But of course to anyone who hasn't learned this language from childhood, this must be confusing. The best answer I can give is that "de" is used to indicate words that have a gender, whereas "het" is used for words which have no gender. This is different in all languages. French only has "le" and "la" to indicate male or female words; German uses "die", "der" and "das" to indicate female, male and genderless words; English uses "the" for everything.

Whether a word does or doesn't have a gender can't be determined outright and as far as I know there are no rules.

 

Yes, but like all rules in dutch grammer they are broken.

Diminutives are het, ie words ending in je, te etc.

Languages are het.

and aproximately 4 others which fail me at the moment.

 

http://www.snvt.hum.uva.nl/Taalunievers ... ar/025.htm

Follow this link I think they are all there.

Sorry Roel.

Not quite Rules but guidelines. Anyway I let them think I'm a stupid foreigner who doesn't know better and pray it sounds right.

 

Hardly, GP...

These, as you can see, are not rules and even these guidelines are ridden with exceptions. Plus they are all new to me...

 

Yippeeeeee I taught someone something.


It was a good feeling when I taught my Norwegian colleague about his language too.

So that is 2 things I know. :lol:

 

That is dutch grammar for you.

Rule 1 applies on the months when the first monday is before the ........ providing the second ......

well you get the gist.

 

As an Englishman, I never quite got the idea of words having a 'gender'.
Why? How? :-?

 

Beats me. But in some languages, like Italian, the only thing which defines if the subject is female or male is the words gender. Uno ragazzo, una ragazza ( a boy, a girl ) - uno italiano, una italiana ( an Italian ( male ), an Italian ( female ) ).

We have genders in Norwegian, but like Roel with Dutch I can´t say I´m aware of any rules regarding which gender a word belongs to. Nothing is too obvious, the word "kvinne" ( woman ) can be used both in male form ( en kvinne, kvinnen ( a woman, the woman ) ) and in female form ( ei kvinne, kvinna ) depening on your dialect or which form of written Norwegian you use.

Perhaps GP knows a thing or two I don´t know.

 

From what I remember of French, the rule of thumb for ascribing gender was - Things that do are male, things are done to are female. My French is terrible so I always try to speak in plurals if possible!

 

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Yes, that's how it is in all latin languages.

UN/UNA/EL/LA in spanish
UN/UNA/Il/LA in italian
UN/UNE/LE/LA in french
UM/UMA/O/A in portugeese

In german it's EIN/EINE/DER/DIE


Actually Skua I think it is "un ragazzo".

Of course the endings of verbs also differ in latin languages depending on wether the subject is female or male.


The fact that the english language doesn't make a difference between female and male is one of the reasons is such easy to learn.

 

Yes, I know.

I haven´t practised my Italian in ages, but I have no idea why I made such a stupid mistake.

 

Thank God for English (now if we can just get those Glaswegians to speak it)

:smok:

 

LIKE IT

 

And the Americans. :lol:

It had to follow.

 

We don't speak English, we speak American (a language loosely based on English) with many dialects and accents.

 

PMN1 wrote

Glaswegians speak perfect English , the English just dont understand perfectly.

 

Sorry but you don't have that many dialects or accents.

 

I guess Saxon languages don't make a big deal out of genders like Latin languages do. In Dutch there are few times when you actually have to be aware of a word's gender, like when using "de" or "het", but in verbs it makes no difference. In German, rather, there is a huge amount of difference between the correct use of nouns depending on their gender, but in verbs there is no difference at all.

English is easy, indeed, and partly because of this. American is easier yet, because it's basically impoverished English.

 

I get annoyed at genders in languages. I generally understand them in French, but in German you think you understand it. But then you seem to use the Dative or the Genative, and it all changes!