Introduction
English and German languages come out of one language group, so there are some similarities in the grammar of these languages. German and English have articles, they have similar verbs (have – haben, to be – seen). The word order in English and German is the same. But there are also a lot of differences. The case of German nouns is seen from the endings of these nouns, and in English, it is seen from prepositions.
Main Body
Grammatisches Geschlecht – grammatical gender shows us what we are talking about: man, woman, or thing. Gender in German may be male, female, or neuter. The English language does not have gender. We may see gender in English by pronouns he, she, it. German is more complicated on this point. The gender of nouns is seen by their endings. Endings of male gender: -er, -ner, -ler, -ling, -at, -or, -ent, -ist, -eur, -ier (Arbeiter – male worker). Endings of female gender: -in, -ung, -heit, -keit, -schaft, -ei (Arbeiter + in = Arbeiterin – female worker). Endings of neuter gender -chen, -lein, -tel (Madchen – girl, is in neuter gender in German). The gender of nouns is also seen in articles.
Artikel — article. In German, like in English, there are two types of articles, definite and indefinite. Articles are also divided according to gender in German, and there is no such division in English. We use definite article der (indefinite in) with male nouns, die (eine) with indefinite, and das (ein) with neuter gender.
Substantive — Noun is used to name a person or object. Nouns in German are declined by gender, case, and plural and singular forms. We may see all these changes by articles and endings. Let me give the example of declining the nouns:
Pronomen — pronoun can be used instead of nouns. The personal pronouns in German are ich (I), du (you), er (he), sie (she), es (it), wir (we), ihr (you), sie (they). Sie (You) is also the polite form. Pronouns are also declined by gender, case and number form.
Kasus — case is one of the main grammar characteristics in German. The examples may be the following:
Die Arbeit beginnt um neun Uhr morgens (“Die Arbeit“ is in nominative case)
Ich habe einen Kugelschreiber. (“Einen Kugelschreiber“ is in Accusative case) I have a pen.
Der Lehrer gibt dem Schuler das Heft (“dem Schuler” is in dative case). The teacher gave the copy-book to the pupil.
Verb – verb is used to name the action. The verb to be in English corresponds to German sein. The declination of sein in present tense:
ich bin wir sind
du bist ihr seid
er (sie, es) ist sie (Sie) sind
The English verb to have corresponds to German haben and is declined as follows
ich habe Wir haben
du hast ihr habt
er (sie, es) hat sie (Sie) haben
Possessivadjektive — describing possessive adjectives in German we may give the following table:
Conclusion
In sum, we have considered the differences and similarities in English and German grammar. We have written the examples of nouns, verbs, pronouns, and the cases where they are similar and where we see some differences. The pronouns are declined according to a similar system. The articles are also almost the same. Definite and indefinite articles are present in German and in English. The great difference between English and German is gender: English has no gender signs and German nouns and pronouns are declined by genders.