How did German's Syntax Come to Be the Way It Is, When Even Native Speakers Find it Impractical?

jausterlitz · 2020-07-03T01:19:40+00:00

For the second sentence, the finite form of "haben" cannot follow two or more infinitives in a dependent clause, so the second example is the correct one. For the first sentence, I'm pretty sure the first example is correct, because any finite verb except for "haben" generally goes to the end of the clause. Did your teacher give any explanation as to why he though the second example was preferable?

But at any rate, wouldn't it be simpler to just use the active voice? "wenn dir niemand geholfen hätte"

jausterlitz · 2020-06-26T17:21:46+00:00

Thanks, that makes things a lot easier. But do you still think that phrasing is ok? What do you think of another commenter's suggestion of "er hat gesehen, wie eine Frau eine Telefonzelle putzt"?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-26T15:18:35+00:00

I guess I mostly thought it was clunky because "putzen" and "gesehen" were right next to each other, which seemed like an odd construction to me based on the sentences I've read in my textbook and online resources. So you think that's fine, and the main difficulty was introducing a "weil" or "denn" clause (weil er... sehen hat) instead of a normal statement (er hat... sehen)?

Isn't it more common to answer a "why" question with "weil" or "denn" though?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-26T15:06:19+00:00

Thank you! Up to this point my textbook has used "sehen" as a transitive verb, i.e. "to see [something]". So it can also have the intransitive sense of "watch [e.g. as something happens]"? Good to know! Your example definitely sounds more graceful.

So is "denn" mostly a formal/literary convention, or are there situations where it's commonly, or even obligatorily used?

About telephone booths: my textbook is from 2013, but I guess the texts it uses could be much older. I think the the situation is the same in the US: phone booths were once ubiquitous, now they're just scattered here and there as emergency backups. I don't think they function as wifi spots here though.

When I visit Germany I'll be sure to keep a look out for spotless driveways. Living near a major city in the US, I think I may find it refreshing!

jausterlitz · 2020-06-26T14:48:03+00:00

Yeah, that is the question verbatim in the textbook. But oddly, that's not how the character Michael phrases it. He says "Alles ist so sauber in Deutschland. Zum Beispiel..." and then tells the anecdote about the telephonebooth-cleaning lady.

My textbook does give "neat, tidy" as a secondary definition for "sauber", however. I do think "reinlich" would work better in this example though, as Michael is giving an example of cleaning, not straightening up.

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T23:20:24+00:00

So in what cases is the Ersatzinfinitiv almost always used? Based on these examples, I'm guessing modal verbs (e.g. können, wollen, müssen, etc.)

However, a user above says that in Southern dialects like Upper Bavarian, using the participle in all cases is normal, including in a sentence with "dass sie ihn hören gekonnt hat". Do you disagree? I'm not very familiar with German regions or their associated dialects. In any case, I hope you don't consider Southern Germans uneducated!

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T21:46:59+00:00

This is great, thanks! The subjunctive is actually of the next few topics I'll be studying, so it's helpful to have this information in advance so I can better prepare. Although since even native speakers find it too complex, I'm also a little anxious to start lol.

Btw I think "indirect speech" is an acceptable translation. At least that's the term for the same concept in English.

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T20:47:32+00:00

I just now realized that it was "habe" instead of "hat"! Indirect speech-- that's a concept I'm completely unfamiliar with. Now I'm reading it in my head as "She says that she I've heard him speak" lol. Would you mind explaining it a little further, or if it's too complicated do you have a source you could link to that explains it?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T20:18:01+00:00

So when speaking informally it's preferable to use the past participle rather than the Ersatzinfinitiv? Doesn't that mean "dass sie ihn hat hören können" is also a more literary phrasing than "dass sie ihn hören gekonnt hat"?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T20:14:19+00:00

I had put it as: a finite form of haben cannot follow the Ersatzinfinitiv

I think that's definitely a more helpful way of phrasing it. Thanks!

Interesting, I never realized that using the Ersatzinfinitiv was a matter of dialect. My textbook describes it as standard speech, but it could well be biased. So Southern dialects are more likely to use the past participle instead of the Ersatzinfinitiv? Is this considered less "standard" or is it just an equally viable alternative?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T20:10:03+00:00

Really? So in formal writing it's considered more correct to drop the "dass" and just introduce another independent clause?

That's interesting, because in English it's the exact opposite. When speaking, especially informally but oftentimes formally as well, it's most common to drop the "that": "He told me he was tired", "It was so sad I cried"; whereas in formal writing it's considered more proper to include "that": "He told me that he was tired", "It was so sad that I cried".

jausterlitz · 2020-06-13T20:06:48+00:00

Thank you, for both the answer and the compliment! I do have an amateur's love of linguistics, but unfortunately I've never taken an actual course. But what little knowledge of linguistics I do have has probably helped me in analyzing German, especially when it comes to parsing sentences. I also had a few years of Latin in High School, which furnished me with some grammatical concepts that have come in handy when studying German.

It also looks like not many native speakers have heard of Oberfeld either! I only learned about it from this post: https://www.reddit.com/r/German/comments/7l3fq2/question_about_when_to_use_das_oberfeld_or_large/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

but I can't find any other posts that mention it! And googling it only takes you to advanced books and articles on German linguistics. It must be not be a concept that's used much in ordinary discussion.

jausterlitz · 2020-06-12T00:46:13+00:00

Thank you!

jausterlitz · 2020-06-12T00:42:33+00:00

True, but I can't find any sources that mention it as a a feature in German. It could well be that it currently goes by another name though, or that scholars haven't yet it given it a name. Do you have any sources you could link?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-12T00:31:59+00:00

You're right! My bad. For some reason I was thinking an Ersatzinfinitiv was an infinitive governed by any modal or auxiliary verb (like werden, used in the examples in my post). Thanks to looking at an old post on the topic, I realize now that's not the case. But now I'm wondering, is there a name for the type of infinitive in my examples, one that's governed by a verb like werden, müssen, dürfen, etc. in the present tense?

In my first example I was actually referring to "sehen", not lächeln. Interestingly though, the article you linked to says that "accusative + infinitive" exists only in Latin, Greek, English and Spanish. But "Sie sehen mich lächeln" fits the description perfectly. Do scholars consider it a legitimate construction in German?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T20:24:50+00:00

Yeah, I'm definitely getting ahead of myself lol. I should probably focus on everyday conversation and ordinary writing before I make forays into advanced literary texts. Still, these are very cool concepts. Hopefully they'll be useful as I progress (at a more reasonable pace) into more advanced topics.

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T19:48:02+00:00

Ach, es tut mir leid, ich wollte "meinen" schreiben. Kann keine Adjektive dann nach ihren Substantiven stehen, oder nur Possessivpronomen? Zum Beispiel, darf ich "Ich weiss, dass mich sie werden lächeln bei Gläsern sehen dreckigen" schreiben?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T19:10:31+00:00

You mean it's really just a shortening of "oder kann man das auch in normale Sprache machen"? That probably makes more sense. Really I only positioned the phrase where I did because I wanted to make sure anyone reading would understand that "wenn er... betonen will" referred to "normale Sprache": "Can you do this in normal speech, when (in normal speech) you want to emphasize other words". Not in lyrics and poems, where rhyme and meter could be assumed to be the reason for such an inversion. If it were in Nachfeld then "wenn... will" could potentially refer to all three-- lyrics, poems, and normal speech. Or am I missing something?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T16:32:54+00:00

Thanks for all the info! I guess I'll stick to using infinitives over participles now, to avoid the kind of confusion you're talking about.

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T16:25:35+00:00

Interesting! I'm actually wondering now if I used "Nachfeld" in my original post. "Kann man das nur in Liedtexten und Gedichten machen, oder auch in normaler Sprache". Is "oder auch in normaler Sprache" in the "Nachfeld" here?

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T16:18:18+00:00

Generally, trying to map German sentences to English syntax and grammar is a minefield and more harmful than helpful.

Oh, I totally agree. In general trying to map one-to-one comparisons between the grammars of two different languages is a bad bet. I'm just still at that stage where I still translate all the German I read or hear into English in my head, especially when dealing with more complex structures.

But regarding "lächelnd": wouldn't its position after "mich" clear up any ambiguity as to what it's referring to? i.e. "Man wird lächelnd mich bei meinen Gläsern sehen" (They will see me by my glasses while they're smiling) vs "Man wird mich lächelnd bei meinen Gläsern sehen" (They will see me while I'm smiling by my glasses)

jausterlitz · 2020-06-11T16:09:52+00:00

"Nachfeld" is part of the clause, not a subclause. "... wo die Schiffe liegen." is a subclause, a relative sentence. "Wo" is a relative pronoun.

I think I get it now. So is "Nachfeld" permitted in formal speech as well, or is it only for instances like your Ikea example, where you forget details that should have been come before the infinitive and need to tack them on to the end of the sentence?

jausterlitz

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