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Better German Podcast with Susi

Susanne Schilk-Blümel
Since 09/2023 56 episodes

35 Introduction to German Cases Part 1

Understanding German "Fälle"

2024-05-09 10 min

Description & Show Notes

In episode 35 of the Better German Podcast , I am going to give you an introduction to German cases. And we are discussing here the very basics - what are cases at all? Why do we have them? Other languages ​​get along just fine without them, so what are they really? 

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Summary
 In this episode of Better German, host Susi Blumel introduces the concept of German cases, known as "Fallen" in German. She explains that cases are different forms that certain words (articles, adjectives, nouns, and pronouns) take based on their function in a sentence. Using examples, she illustrates how cases affect sentence structure and meaning in comparison to languages ​​without cases. Susi emphasizes that this is the first part of a short series on German cases and suggests listening to previous episodes for foundational knowledge. She concludes by mentioning that the next episode will delve into the different cases and invites listeners to explore the Better German Academy for additional language-learning resources. Tune in for a clear and straightforward introduction to German cases, designed to help learners understand and navigate this essential aspect of the German language.

Key Topics Explored🔎 

Primary Topic: Introduction to German Cases
  • Explanation of what cases are and why they are needed
  • Decision to make the episode into a short series due to complexity
  • Advice for complete beginners to put a pin on it and come back later
  • Suggestions to listen to specific episodes before diving into cases
  • Introduction to Articles and Parts of Speech episodes recommended for further understanding
  • Explanation of how cases work in German and other languages
  • Explanation of the words affected by cases: articles, adjectives, nouns, and pronouns
  • Summary of cases as different forms that words take based on their function in a sentence
  • Comparison of word order in languages without cases to the use of cases in German
  • Conclusion of the episode and announcement of the next episode covering different cases
  • Promotion of the Better German Academy as an alternative way to learn German with less focus on grammar and more practice
Related Episodes

Other Resources 📚
  • Download this PDF on Introduction to German cases that will provide you will an understanding what they are and tables of cases. But that’s only the beginning. You will get explanations of the basic meanings of all cases and tables of Verbs with Dativ, and the most important prepositions with the needed cases. ALL OF THAT WITH TRANSLATED EXAMPLE SENTENCES! Master German Cases today!
  • Check out this Interactive German Movie Guide with suitable TV shows and movies with subtitles in your language, so you can start using movies to learn right away! Watching German movies and TV shows is great to help you learn German.
  • Listen to All The Episodes Published So Far!

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Transcript

Welcome to the Better German podcast. My name is Susi Blümel, and I will teach you German and everything around the language , the countries and the culture. In this episode, we're going to talk about a subject that many German learners probably has bothered at some point. I'm going to give you an introduction into German cases. In German, they're called "Fälle - der Fall". Now, if you have started learning German, it is very, very likely that you have run across it. And maybe you have been slightly confused by them. I'm going to give you a little bit of an explanation, what they are and why we even need them and give you the most important beginning things to know about them. Originally, this was going to be one episode about this, but then I recorded the episode, and I decided to make it into a short series because even just giving you an introduction, has several different points. So this is going to be the first one off a short series about this subject cases and in this episode we're going to cover what are cases at all and why do we have them? Before we get completely into the subject of the episode, what I want to mention is that if you're a complete beginner and you haven't started learning German, other than listening to my podcast, you may not have to bother about this, right this second, you can put a pin on it and come later, once you come across it. If you already have come across cases, then this episode can help you to figure out, what they really are and to understand what they even are, because it is relatively hard to learn something and to spend quite a lot of time learning something, when you don't even know what they are and why they're here. So in that case, this episode is for you. If you are a total beginner and you want to learn this or you have no real information about grammar, I suggest you to listen to a few episodes before you do this one. I'm going to suggest to you that you listen to Episode 5, which is Introduction to Articles, and the other episode I suggest to you to listen before this one, If you're getting confused is Parts of Speech, Episode 27, where I defined the different parts of speech, the ones that we're going to talk about is, as well But don't worry. I'm going to keep it as simple as possible, and I'm going to give you examples of what they are. So let's get into this week subject. So what are cases, at all? Cases are different forms that certain words, I'm going to tell you in a second, which ones, are taking, based on the function that these words take in a sentence. This maybe sounds a little bit theoretical, so I'm going to give you more examples to make it tangible for you. Okay. So if you're saying, for example, in English the sentence "The man sees the tree". We know that the man is doing the seeing, and the tree is being seen, and there is no other possible interpretation of the sentence. And if you would say, "The trees sees the man", Not only would it be a little bit creepy, it would totally change the sentence. Now in German and in all the other languages that have cases, this is different. We have a different form for this part, the man, and the other part, the tree. And we know based on this form that the man is the one that does the seeing, and the tree is the one that is being seen. Example, in English, "The man sees the tree" - is German, "Der Mann sieht den Baum" And I can say without a change of meaning, "Den Baum sieht der Mann". And that translated word by word to English, that would be, "The tree sees the man". However, in German It still means "The man sees the tree". Because "den Baum" is a different case, and I know this is the one that is being seen and "the man" - "der Mann" is the one doing the seeing. Okay, the idea is, we have different forms of things based on the function, in the sentence and languages that don't have cases do this by the sentence sequence. So in English, the sequence is very, very, very strict. We always have first the person or thing that is doing the thing, then we have the verb, what is happening, and then we have, the object it's called, what is being effected by the action. And there is no change in that sequence ever. And in German and other languages that have cases, the sequence of the sentence is much more free, because we have cases. This is the way how these languages are made up. Let's look, which words are changing. So the words that are changing are articles, adjectives, nouns, and pronouns. These are the four types of words, parts of speech, in German "Wortarten," that are affected by cases. So "Articles",— "Artikels" are basically the words in English, "a" and "the". In German it's "ein, und (and) "der, die, das," and all of the different forms and all of these different forms, because of cases. And the next ones are adjectives. Adjectives are words "like small, big, tall," things like that. So in German, there's a lot of changing according to cases around adjectives. And then nouns are changing. Actually nouns aren't changing so much. So nouns are words like "tree, love, table." In German "Baum", "Liebe", "Tisch". And they're not changing so much, there's relatively little changes. Usually nouns are with another word, either an article or an adjective or both, and these are changing, so we see that there's different usages. And then the other words that are changing our pronouns. These are words like "I, you, he, these, those" in English. So these are the ones that are changing. These are the only ones that have anything to do with cases really. So let's sum it up, incorporating what we've learned now. So, cases are different forms, that articles, adjectives, nouns or pronouns will take in a sentence, according to what is their function in that sentence. Remember the tree and the, the man example. Okay, good. So in English, as I said, and in other languages that don't have cases, we only do this by word order. In German we do it with cases. This brings us to the end of this episode, which is the part one of the short series, which is an Introduction into German Cases. So in the next episode, we're going to cover the different cases. I'm going to tell you what the each of the cases are and the names and some basic information about them. By the way, if you're learning German in one of my courses, in the beginner's course, you will not hear the word cases because you're learning German in a different way, and you're learning even how to make correct sentences in a different way than in most traditional courses. So if you're looking for a course, with not a lot of grammar, and you're still learning correctly how to speak German, but with much more practice and little theory, then take a look at the better German Academy, and see what's there. There's more courses being at it. So you can already enroll at the German beginners course at the total beginners course, and, you will see what's there. There are different courses. There are some courses that just take you from beginner to very advanced, but they're also specialist courses like, courses for pronunciation or a movie challenge. So take a look at that and I'll see you in the next episode. Bye bye.

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