• Simple conversations

• Grammar: Pronouns: I,me etc.

• Polite and clitic forms

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Grammatica 1-1 ~ Introduction to Dutch grammar

Children learn their mother tongue without knowing the parts of speech such as verbs, nouns and phrases. However these are helpful for anyone attempting to learn a second language from a book or a website. Of course the children have it right: the best way to learn a language is to listen to a mother tongue speaker and simply repeat. But such a speaker may not always be available to you.

English speakers will find many strong parallels between their language and Dutch. Where possible we will try to point out the similarities and exploit them.

However, as noted in the introduction, Dutch grammar is more complex than English grammar, and identifying the meaning of words in a Dutch sentence is difficult without understanding the clues to word function that come from the grammatical rules. The basic lessons of this textbook are set up to first introduce the parts of speech, and then bring in the rules that govern these. Pay particular attention to sentence word order as you progress through the lessons.

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Gesprek 1-1 ~ vriend: Jan en Karel

Jan komt Karel op straat tegen. Ze zijn vrienden.
Dutch/Translation|Gesprek 1-1 |

John runs into Charles in the street. They are friends.

John: Hello Charles. How are you?

Charles: Hi, thank you, I'm fine. And you?

John: Thank you, I'm doing fine as well. Goodbye.

Charles: Goodbye John!

Dutch pronunciation varies with region and speaker, but the following gives a reasonable idea:


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Grammatica 1-2 ~ Forms

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Clitic forms

Notice the difference between "Hoe gaat het met je"? and "En met jou?". Both translate literally into with you, but there is a difference in emphasis. Jou carries emphasis, je does not. In Dutch, there are often two forms of the same pronoun: a strong one and a weak ('clitic') one. The clitic forms cannot have emphasis and the vowel in a clitic is often reduced to a neutral 'schwa' ə or omitted entirely. In colloquial English the same thing can be heard at times: seeya! instead of see you!.

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Polite forms

The above conversation was between two good friends. It utilizes the familiar form of the personal pronoun (je, jou) where English uses you. However, Dutch also has a polite or formal form of the personal pronoun for the second person (you), u. Many languages have this distinction. It is e.g. comparable with Sie in German, vous in French or Вы in Russian . When to use one or the other is not always easy to decide. Someone unknown, particularly if older, is generally u, an old friend typically je, jou. The latter roughly coincides with 'first name basis' in English. Notice the use of u in the conversation below.

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Regional forms

In the South of the area where Dutch is spoken (Flanders mostly), people do not distinguish between familiar and polite forms, instead they use yet another pronoun gij (clitic: ge, object: u). It is used much like you in English for both singular and plural. In the North gij is only encountered in archaic phrases like: gij zult niet stelen - thou shalt not steal. It is recommended that you learn Northern usage.

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Gesprek 1-2 ~ De handelaars

• Meneer Jansen: Goedendag, mevrouw De Vries!
• Mevrouw De Vries: Goedendag, meneer Jansen!
• Meneer Jansen: Hoe gaat het met u?
• Mevrouw De Vries: Zeer goed, dank u wel. En met u?
• Meneer Jansen: Ook goed.
• Mevrouw De Vries: Mooi. Kent u meneer Standish? Bent u hem al tegengekomen?
• Meneer Jansen: Uit Engeland? Nee. Is hij op bezoek?
• Mevrouw De Vries: Ja. Hij spreekt Nederlands. Tot ziens, meneer Jansen!
• Meneer Jansen: Tot ziens, mevrouw De Vries.

Dutch/Translation|Gesprek 1-2|

* Mr. Johnson encounters Mrs. De Vries. They are merchants.

*Mr. Johnson: Good day, Mrs. de Vries!

*Mrs. De Vries Good day, Mr. Johnson!

*Mr. Johnson: How do you do?

*Mrs. De Vries Very well, thank you. And how are you?

*Mr. Johnson: Fine as well.

*Mrs. De Vries: Good! Do you know Mr. Standish? Have you met him yet?

*Mr. Johnson: From England? No, is he visiting?

*Mrs. De Vries Yes, he is. He speaks Dutch. Goodbye, Mr. Johnson.

*Mr. Johnson: Goodbye, Mrs. De Vries.

Dutch/Exercise|Waar of niet waar |

dit is waar - this is true

dit is niet waar - this is not true

Answer the following questions with either waar or niet waar

1. Mevrouw De Vries is meneer Standish al tegengekomen.
2. Meneer Jansen en mevrouw De Vries zijn goede vrienden.
3. Meneer Jansen en mevrouw de Vries zeggen (they say) je en jou tegen elkaar (to each other)
4. De Engelsman, meneer Standish is op bezoek.
5. Het gaat goed met Karel.

# |

1. Mevrouw De Vries is meneer Standish al tegengekomen. - niet waar
2. Meneer Jansen en mevrouw De Vries zijn goede vrienden. - niet waar, zij zijn collega's
3. Meneer Jansen en mevrouw de Vries zeggen (they say) je en jou tegen elkaar (to each other) - niet waar, zij zeggen u tegen elkaar
4. De Engelsman, meneer Standish is op bezoek. - dit is waar
5. Het gaat goed met Karel. - waar

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Grammatica 1-3 ~ Introduction to pronouns

A pronoun is a short word that takes the place of a noun previously mentioned in the sentence, paragraph, or conversation.

Recall: Kent u meneer Standish? Bent u hem al tegengekomen?

Hem refers back to meneer Standish. It is a pronoun that stands for (pro- !) meneer Standish.

There is a variety of pronouns like personal, possessive, relative and indefinite ones. Let's look at the personal pronouns first.

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Personal pronouns

Personal pronouns are quite familiar in English: They are words like I,you,he,she,we,you and they. At least this is the case for the subject (nominative case). As object (accusative) some of them are different: me,you,him,us,you,them. Compare:


Notice how I turns into me when used as an object. You remains the same.

Much like in English ik (subject) turns into mij as object in Dutch, whereas je remains the same in both roles:


The system in Dutch resembles the English one quite a bit, after all the languages are close relatives:

• As in English there are three persons in Dutch grammar: first (I), second (you) and third (he)
• As in English there is a distinction in number between singular (I) and plural (we).
• As in English there are gender distinctions in the third person singular (he, she, it)
• As in English there are case distinctions between object and subject (he, him)

Nevertheless the Dutch system is a little more involved, as we have seen there are:

• familiar and polite forms: je versus u.
• weak (clitics) and strong forms: je versus jou.

In addition there are

• regional differences: (jij/jullie - u) (North) versus (gij) (South)
• a growing rift between how inanimate and animate nouns are treated

In English he and she are reserved for animate nouns -usually persons- and this is increasingly the case in Dutch as well, certainly in Northern usage.

In English all inanimate objects can be referred to as it. However, in Dutch this is only true for het-words (neuter gender) and that leaves two thirds of all nouns uncovered.... We will revisit this awkward problem later.

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Subject case (nominative)

Person	singular	clitic	plural	clitic
1st	ik	('k)	wij	we
2nd (fam.)	jij	je	jullie	-
2nd (polite)	u	-	u	-
2nd (South)	gij	ge	gij	ge
3rd	hij zij het	(-ie) ze ('t)	zij	ze

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Object case (accusative)

person	singular	clitic	plural	clitic
1st	mij	me	ons	-
2nd (fam.)	jou	je	jullie	-
2nd (polite)	u	-	u	-
2nd (South)	u	-	u	-
3rd	hem haar het	(-m) (d'r) ('t)	hen (hun*)	ze

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Remarks

1. As you see not all pronouns have clitics and some of them (shown in parentheses) are not used in the written language.
2. The pronouns in italics: hij, zij (sing.), hem, haar, hen and hun are increasingly reserved for persons and animate objects. For inanimate objects these pronouns usually get replaced either by demonstrative pronouns or by a special kind of adverb, the pronominal adverb
3. *In speaking, many Dutch speakers use the dative form hun instead of the accusative hen. This is because the hen form was artificially created by the grammarians of the past "Dutch" by Jan G. Kooij in The world's major languages edt. Bernard Comrie ISBN 0-19-520521-9 Oxford University Press 1987 In the spoken language hen is seldom used and speakers increasingly avoid the issue by opting for the clitic ze.

Translate into Dutch:

1. How are you, Mr. Bush?
2. How are you, Jan?
3. Are you merchants?
4. John runs into us.
5. We meet John in the street
6. He is visiting
7. We are from England

1. How are you, Mr. Bush?
2. : Hoe gaat het met u, meneer Bos
3. How are you, Jan?
4. : Hoe gaat het met je, Jan
5. Are you merchants?
6. : Zijn jullie handelaars?
7. John runs into us.
8. : Jan komt ons tegen
9. We meet John in the street
10. : Wij komen Jan op straat tegen
11. He is visiting
12. : Hij is op bezoek
13. We are from England
14. : Wij zijn* uit Engeland

dentify all personal pronouns in the two above conversations by person, case, number polite/familliar form and weak/strong form.
Jan komt Karel op straat tegen. Ze zijn vrienden.
In the expression hoe gaat het met jou, jou is in the object case, because it follows a preposition met (with). Literally it says how goes it with you. English would say: How are you? In that case you is subject, not object.

(2nd person singular accusative polite)

(same)

(2nd person singular nominative polite)

(3rd person singular nominative)

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Woordenlijst 1

appendix appendix, supplement bezoek visit, attendance Engeland England Nederlands Dutch vriend, vrienden friend, friends handelaars business people, businessmen, tradesmen, merchants (pl.) gesprek, gesprekken conversation, conversations grammatica grammar les lesson straat street woordenlijst word list woordenschat vocabulary

op straat on (in) the street tot ziens goodbye (lit: see you again) uit Engeland from England Met mij gaat het goed I am fine (lit: With me goes it well) Goedendag! Good day (greeting) Dag! (Good) day! Hi! Hello! dag day goed good En met jou? And how are you? (lit: And with you?) Hoe gaat het met jou (u)? How are you (lit: How goes it with you?) hoe how gaan to go het gaat it goes met with is op bezoek is visiting tegenkomen to meet, come across, encounter, run into komt ... tegen comes across bezoeken to visit

maar but, however ook also, too, as well dank je, dank u. thank you; bedankt thanks simpel simple het it (pronoun) mevrouw Ms., Miss, or Mrs. meneer Mr. mij me nee no ja yes correct correct al already, yet mooi beautiful (in this case, 'nice' or 'fine') zeer very en and

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Your turn! Building vocabulary 1

When learning a language you need to start building up your vocabulary. There are various ways of doing that. One is to study the above conversations well. Often words are easier to remember when put in context. But there are other ways. Wiki adds a few methods to the range of possibilities. One is the hover'' method. Just hover your mouse over C|this|as you see we can make things pop up for you. We will add vocabulary building exercises to each lesson to make it easier for you to memorize it all.

Try to translate the following:

1. Wil jij misschien een vrouw aanraken?
2. Dit is erg slecht, denk ik.
3. Na het leven is er de dood
4. Ik hoor mensen hierbeneden
5. Er is een tijd en een plaats voor alle dingen
6. Goed en slecht, klein en groot, kort en lang zijn niet dezelfde dingen
7. Zet een klein deel voor, een ander deel achter , iets meer boven en de rest beneden

1. Would you like to touch a woman perhaps?
2. That is very bad, I think
3. After life there is death
4. I hear people down here
5. There is a time and a place for all things
6. Good and bad, small and big, short and long are not the same things
7. Put a small part in front, another part behind, a bit more on top and the rest below.

For learning Dutch Category Uncategorized Level Unspecified Second language English Created May 13, 2008 15:36 Views 1056 Share:

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  malou 6 month(s) ago

  de laatste zinnen lijken me niet gepast voor iemand die pas 1 les nederlands heeft gehad. Het zijn ook zinnen die nederlanders zelf niet eens gebruiken, behalve die eerste in een bordeel misschien..

     Flag
• 
  malou 6 month(s) ago

  de laatste zinnen lijken me niet gepast voor iemand die pas 1 les nederlands heeft gehad. Het zijn ook zinnen die nederlanders zelf niet eens gebruiken, behalve die eerste in een bordeel misschien..

     Flag