I. Omitting Articles
Unlike in Romance languages, German requires no partitive before nouns and thus you will often find independent nouns with no article before them. For speakers of English, another Germanic language, this comes naturally.Examples:
| Die deutschen Filme sind interessant. The German films (specific ones) are interesting. Deutsche Filme sind interessant. German films (in general) are interesting. Ich trinke den Rotwein. I drink the red wine (a specific one). Ich trinke Rotwein. I drink red wine (in general). |
II. Negation: nicht
To negate a verb in German, the word nicht is used which is quite similar to the English not. The place of nicht in a sentence can be somewhat tricky however. In most cases, nicht comes after the verb it is negating.Examples:
| Das ist nicht mein Auto. That’s not my car. Das Wetter ist nicht warm. The weather is not warm. Er versteht nicht. He doesn’t understand. Salzburg ist nicht die Hauptstadt von Österreich. Salzburg is not the capital of Austria. |
As you can see in the examples above, nicht is used to negate when there is a definite article (der, die, das, etc.) before the noun. It also negates nounless verbs. If you are negating a noun without a definite article or one with an indefinite article before it (ein), then kein must be used.
III. Negation: kein
Kein can be translated roughly as not any or no when used before nouns in English. Therefore, if you have none of something, kein would be used and it takes the exact same endings as ein would. German’s do not say not have… but rather have no…Examples:
| Ich habe kein Geld. I don’t have any money. Sie hat keine Zeit. She has no time. Es gibt keine Post in der Nähe. There is no post office nearby. Wir sprechen kein Französisch. We do not speak French. |
As you see in the last example specifically, certain things cannot be translated word-for-word between German and English. While we say that we don’t speak French, Germans would say that they speak no French.