Lesson 1: The First German Course you Can't Fail! / Statements, Verben, Conjugations

Episode one. The first German course You Can't Fail.

Hallo allerseits and welcome to Guts, the first German course you can't fail. Hello, Michael. How are you?

Good, uh I mean good. Are you ready to dive in? Because there is an old saying in German. deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache. That means even we Germans feel that the German language is a tough language.

Yes, I want to make sure to tell our listeners that you should not let this intimidate you. It might feel scary, and maybe you weren't expecting that we have, for example, a ridiculous amount of pronouns. Like only eleven. But our goal here is to keep it simple. We call it virtual immersion, but we do it so slowly and naturally. you won't even notice as we add more and more German to our conversation.

We will basically start from the very beginning, as if you are trying to check out a German car and need to learn how to drive stick. But seriously, if you check out the lessons and take the quizzes, you will very quickly see that you can break this difficult language down to its elements and even master it.

Great analogy. And it just so happens that today we are discussing verbs because we need action.

Hm This is my favourite part. May I go ahead and explain?

Yes, of course, Michael.

As you know, verbs are action words. Most verbs in German end with en Here are some examples. Diskutieren to discuss. Telefonieren To phone someone Schwimmen to swim Trinken to drink. Sounds easy, right?

Oh, those were great choices because they have the same root as a lot of English words.

Well, English is a Germanic language. See how much the Germans invented?

Very funny. Here are some other verbs that might make you laugh. Marchieren to march. Recyclen to recycle. And

Fa vergnügen haha most likely our listeners will know that word, but it's actually not a verb. It just means having fun driving. But it felt like you were going with some words that we Germans are well known for.

Yes, we might talk a little about German stereotypes too. We do like to keep things nice and orderly. So, recycling is a way of life in Germany. Marshirin is luckily a thing of the past.

And now for the tricky part, we have to conjugate the verbs, which means the ending changes depending on who is doing the action.

To give you the easiest version, we start with one where it doesn't change. When we say we, the ending stays the same. Wir diskutieren.

Ja, und wir reagieren. And we react.

another great and easy verb Here is a tough one. In Derman, the verb to conjugate, or to change the verb ending to agree with the subject of the sentence, sounds like this. Conjugieren. Pay attention to how it changes here.

Ich diskutiere.

So the pattern is that when the subject is I, which is ich, then the ending is eh.

Ich recycle mein Papier. I recycle my paper.

Oh, that was nice. Let's add a new verb to the list. Something we do here at News in Slow German. reading, which is lesen.

So then our listeners will know I read translates into ich lese. Es in Ich lese die Nachrichten.

Great. Now let's introduce an important personal pronoun if you are talking to someone. If the subject is you, then the word for that is doing.

And then the ending changes to Du trinkst.

Nein, du trinkst Bier, ich trinke Tee.

Okay. And we should also mention the most confusing and amusing version of a conjugated verb, which is when we address people in a formal way in the plural version of the verb. can mean they are drinking or you are drinking. That's why context is important to understand whether it is the or the

Oh, and most Germans still love to be very formal to this day. Unless you go to Berlin. The majority of people outside the Capitol prefer to be addressed with Z, and not the more informal do. Generally speaking, most Germans love it when they notice a foreigner is really trying their best and will offer to say do. And to explain again, the plural form also ends like the general verb ending in en zi or you read. Sie sehen, they or you see, and so on.

Okay, well I think we should end it here.

Nine. We have to mention one more weird thing. So, in the singular third person, the verbs end the same way. No matter whether a male or female is the subject, er trinked, he drinks. Z trinked, she drinks. The verb ends with a t

Gender equality.

Well, yes and no. we have this little word man to speak of someone in a general sense. In English, this is called impersonal you. For instance, man sagt, die Deutschen trinken viel Bier. In this case, I was using the verb zagen, which means to say. The expression man sagt means one says, or people say. So, man sagt, die Deutschen trinken viel Bier, means. They say Germans drink a lot of beer.

Oh, you're so right. I keep forgetting, but that sounds as if we are speaking of man only, since it sounds exactly as the word man, the German word for man.

Exactly, and we do use it quite often. Mund diskutiert feel here. We have a lot of discussions here. Let me help translate for our listeners. Aw man. But once you understand the way it's being used, it feels gender neutral again.

Speaking of gender, I will also add one last thing. In addition to er and sie, we have s.

Yes, the neutral version of a subject or condition. Es regnet. It's raining.

Or another example would be if we are talking about a baby. For the purpose of German grammar, Baby is a neuter noun. Trinkt Milch. It's drinking milk.

Well, Michael, look back and see the many words we already learnt today. Not just some very useful verbs, but some of the many pronouns, and then a few things you might not have noticed. Hier und da.

and some culturally important words like beer. Ha ha.

Oh, danke, Michael. Thanks to your humor, this was not too dry. Okay.

Okay, tschüss.

Ciao!