Friday, February 21, 2020

German word order Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

German word order - Essay Example Verb final position is an older form, inherited from Indo-European, and Fagan explains that â€Å"Verb second or middle position is an innovation in OHG as in the other Germanic languages and is the norm in declarative sentences† (Fagan, p. 193). Fagan calls this the â€Å"verb-second constraint† because strictly speaking the norm in German does not necessarily include the subject in the first position. Many other items can take the first place, so long as the verb remains second, for example: 1) Seinem Sohn hat er das Elternhaus geschenkt. [poss. dative to his] [indir. obj son] [verb has] [sub, he] [def art acc the] [obj house] [verb inf given] 2) Sehr oft haben sie Sommersprossen. [adv very often] [verb have] [subj they] [obj freckles] 3) Fußball spielen wollte er. [obj football] [verb inf to play] [verb wanted] [subj he] (From Fagan p. 131) In these sentences an indirect object (to his son), an adjectival phrase (very often) and an object (football) are moved to first position in order to create emphasis on these items. The subject is moved back to a position later in the sentence, but the verb stays in the second position. Because German is an inflected language, which gives indication of subject, object, indirect object, etc, in the words themselves, word order does not need to indicate the function of each item in the sentence, and this allows more ordering flexibility in noun phrases and adjectival phrases.

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

German assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

German - Assignment Example oon during daytime and will tie a rope in the oak tree and pull the moon down and when it lays on the ground, they will cover it with cloth so no one will notice the robbery. 6. Once back home, what do they do with the moon, and how do the people and dwarfs react? Once the travelers got home, they happily placed the moon up the oak tree and the people were glad the entire field as well as all of the chambers were filled with brightness, while the dwarfs came out and danced with joy. 7. When one of the travelers is getting sick and facing death, what does he order? When one of the travelers fell ill and foresaw his death, he requested that the fourth part or a quarter of the moon should be given to him and be laid upon his coffin. 9. Describe what the dead do when they wake up. When parts of the moon re-united in the underworld, the 4 travelers rose from their grave and became astonished when they knew that they could still see. They became amusing and accepted of the magistrate’s old life-style again. And eventually, they play, dance, get drunk until they finally quarreled to each and everyone. 10. Why do the dead prefer the moon to the sun? The dead prefer the moon because this is the only thing that they do not have in their previous land and that they could take parts of the moon to themselves. Once, there was a land that lived in complete darkness – no moon has ever appeared in it but only stars. When the sun set behind mountains, there comes a luminous ball stood high up an oak tree and generously poured out light to the entire land. Hence, the luminous ball in the oak tree served as a moon for the people who lived there. One night, four travelers who have came from another country planned to steal the luminous ball so they could bring it to their magistrate and her land that does not have a moon. They asked a farmer what that luminous ball stand for and later found out that it was their â€Å"moon† and could only give light or brilliance by pouring