This week we're doing the last part of this German Preposition Cases series. Let's take a look at those tricky dual-case prepositions that require either the accusative case or the dative case for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives.
The German dual-case prepositions are an, auf, hinter, in, neben, unter, vor, zwischen, and über. As a general rule, if the preposition suggests motion or movement from one place to another, it takes the accusative case. If there is no motion or movement suggested, it takes the dative case. Please take a moment to review the dative and accusative cases in the previous lessons.
The nominative pronoun ich becomes mir in the dative case and mich in the accusative case. Note in the following how "because of me" suggests no movement and uses the dative pronoun, whereas "send to me" suggests the motion of sending something and thus takes the accusative pronoun.
Er fragt sich: „Liegt es nur an mir, dass es jetzt schneit?“
He asks himself, "Is it just because of me that it's snowing now?"
Caption 10, Jan Wittmer - Weihnachtslied
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Wenn Sie sie einfach direkt an mich schicken würden...
If you'll just send them directly to me...
Caption 31, Berufsleben - das Vorstellungsgespräch
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The German feminine of the definite article "the" is die. In the next captions, there is no movement when discussing a scale of numbers, so the nominative die becomes the dative der. Apparently, viewing something conveys some motion in that you are actively looking at something, thus a "view of a bridge" uses the accusative die.
Auf der Skala eins bis zehn: Bei dir bin ich zehn
On a scale of one to ten: With you I am ten
Captions 16-17, 2raumwohnung - Liebe mit Musik am Laufen halten
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Das ist die Draufsicht auf die Brücke.
That is the view of the bridge.
Caption 40, 48 h in Innsbruck - Sehenswürdigkeiten & Tipps
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Back to the nominative personal pronoun "I," which in dative becomes mir and in accusative becomes mich. As you'll notice, the passive phrase "is situated" gets the dative case, and the active phrase "to get it behind me" receives the accusative case:
Hinter mir befindet sich die ehemalige amerikanische Botschaft.
The former American Embassy is situated behind me.
Caption 3, Berlin - der alte amerikanische Sektor
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Ja, ich wollte es einfach hinter mich bringen.
Yes, I just wanted to get it behind me.
Caption 9, Die Wohngemeinschaft - Probleme
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Hopefully these examples will help give you an idea of when to use the dative (no motion, passive) or accusative (motion, active) cases with the above dual-case prepositions.
Further Learning
We just went through the dative and accusative cases for the dual-case prepositions an, auf, and hinter. Try looking on Yabla German for dative and accusative examples of the remaining dual-case prepositions in, neben, unter, vor, zwischen, and über. It will help you find them if you look for specific accusative and dative definite articles or pronouns when you do the search!
When we describe events in the past, we often use temporal adverbs to give a more specific sense of what exact time period we are talking about. Are we talking about events of yesterday or something that happened thirty years ago? In the German language, both the present perfect and the preterite tenses indicate a finished action or state, but more information is often required for clarity's sake.
Generally, when we see in der Vergangenheit ("in the past") we know that it is not a matter of something that occurred in the recent past, but rather a long time ago.
Aus meiner Sicht: Ich fühle mich nicht schuldig für das, was in der Vergangenheit geschehen ist.
From my point of view, I don't feel guilty for that which happened in the past.
Caption 10, Konstantin - ein Freiwilliger in Israel
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We can also use damals and früher to indicate that something happened in the past. Both of these temporal adverbs indicate an action or state that has been concluded for a while. They can be translated as "back then" or "previously."
Früher haben hier die amerikanischen Soldaten gewohnt.
Previously, the American soldiers lived here.
Caption 6, Berlin - der alte amerikanische Sektor
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Damals schwor ich mir, dass mir das nicht wieder passieren sollte.
Back then I swore that something like that wouldn't happen to me again.
Caption 49, TEDx - Der Supermarkt der Zukunft
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Internet? Was ist das? Das kannten wir damals gar nicht.
Internet? What is that? We didn't know that at all back then.
Caption 35, Mittelalterlicher Markt - Mäuseroulette
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Sometimes, we want to emphasize that a state was constant or an action was repeated multiple times in the past. For this, we often use the phrase "used to" in English. Below, you can see how the word früher can function in a similar way in various contexts:
Weißt du noch, wie's früher war?
Do you still remember how it used to be?
Caption 8, Christina Stürmer - Wir leben den Moment
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Und du tanzt nich' mehr wie früher
And you don't dance like you used to anymore
Caption 4, AnnenMayKantereit - 21, 22, 23
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Ich ging früher im Urlaub immer reiten.
I used to always go horseback riding during vacation.
Caption 16, Konjugation - Das Verb „gehen“
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Further Learning
You can search for more examples with früher and damals on Yabla German or take a look at this website for a more extensive list of different types of adverbs.
Capitalizing words in German is, for the most part, easier than English. In German, all nouns are capitalized, and most pronouns (except for the formal and "royal we" cases) are written in lower case. Unlike English, most German adjectives (including nationality) are written lower case.
Der Unterschied zwischen deutschen Texten und englischen Texten...
The difference between German lyrics and English lyrics...
Caption 34, Frida Gold - Interview
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Nor are adjectives capitalized, unlike the English title case in headlines or names of films, songs, etc. For book and film titles, only the first word and nouns (or nominative cases) are in upper case.
Deswegen gucken wir jetzt einfach mal rein in
Therefore we'll now simply take a look at
„Das heimliche Geräusch“.
"The Secret Noise."
Caption 10, Kurzfilm-Festival - Shorts at Moonlight
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The only exceptions are if the adjective is part of a proper name, such as of a species, a legal or historical term, or a place name, or titles of books, films, etc.
Nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg wurde Berlin in vier Sektoren unterteilt.
After the Second World War, Berlin was divided into four sectors.
Caption 1, Berlin - der alte amerikanische Sektor
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Nominalized adjectives are adjectives that are used as nouns, and in German these too are written in upper case. Generally, an adjective that has the definite article before it (der, die oder das) is a nominalized adjective:
Das ist das Beste, was es gibt auf der Welt
That's the best thing that there is in the world
Caption 36, Monsters of Liedermaching - Ein Pferd
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A possibly confusing exception are superlative adjectives, usually preceded by am and written in lower case:
Was hat dir am besten gefallen?
What did you like best?
Caption 33, Umweltlernen - Propellerpflanzen am Kräutertag
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Sometimes too, adjectives are written apart from the noun they are modifying and may at first appear to be nominalized. As you see in the following, schönsten actually modifies the preceding noun Auswärtssiege:
Am Samstag, da wir eh alle nach Kaiserslautern fahre
On Saturday, since we are all already driving to Kaiserslautern
und Auswärtssiege die schönsten sind,
and away wins are the most beautiful,
muss [sic, müssen] auf jeden Fall drei Punkte her.
three points are definitely a must.
Captions 54-56, Fußball - Eintracht-Fan gewinnt Wimpel
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Further Learning
Find some nominalized adjectives from this list, then search for them on Yabla German to see them used in a real world context.
Let’s take a look today at adjectives that define quantitative amounts without actually resorting to the specifics of numbers. The most common of them, viele (“much” or “many”) and wenige (“little” or “not many”), are used irregularly, however, so let’s check them out first. When viele and wenige occur as a definite article or after a definite article, they are conjugated as normal adjectives:
Für die vielen amerikanischen Soldaten im amerikanischen Sektor...
For the many American soldiers in the American Sector...
Caption 9, Berlin - der alte amerikanische Sektor
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But when viele or wenige occur without an article before a singular noun, they are usually left unconjugated:
Aber dafür bleibt wohl wenig Zeit.
But there seems to be too little time for that.
Caption 25, Fußball - Torwandschießen
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As you can see above, a normal adjective for the feminine word die Zeit would, in the nominative case as here, end with an “e.” Wenig is a little different!
Here are some examples of more typical indefinite quantity adjectives, which are conjugated as normal adjectives. We can start will alle (“everything”):
Natürlich stehe ich hinter allen Songs.
Of course I'm behind all of the songs.
Caption 62, Deutsche Bands - Luxuslärm
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And then wind up with keine (“none” or “no”):
Bisher allerdings ist noch keine Schildkröte in Sicht.
Up to now though there's still no turtle in sight.
Caption 43, Ausgrabungen - Auf den Spuren der Dinosaurier
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Some other common indefinite quantity adjectives to look out for are: beide (both), einige (some), einzelne (single, individual), ganze (whole), gesamte (entire), manche (some), sonstige (other, further), übrige (the rest), weitere (further), zahllose (innumerable), and zahlreiche (numerous).
Learning suggestions:
Keep your eyes out in every Yabla video for the many ways that indefinite quantity adjectives are used, and pay particular attention to the way that viele and wenige are conjugated, because the irregular usage will take some training and getting a feel for! For a further foray into the world of indefinite quantity adjectives written in German, take a look here. Ich wünsche euch viel Spaß beim Lernen!
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