Hello everyonebe
and welcome to a new episode of our practical guide series.
In this series, we take one important verb at a time and go through the IMPORTANT structures that you’ll need in daily life.
And not just in theory, but … by actually speaking.
Yes, it’s speech recognition AI time again, so warm up your jaw :)
The verb we’ll look at today is
nehmen
Which means to take, so it’s definitely an absolute must have.
But not only that. Because of a certain quirk of German, it’s also really great practice for some Dative pronouns, especially mir, dir and sich.
So are you ready to jump in?
Then let’s go.
nehmen is one of those verbs that have a little stem change in present tense for the du-form and the third person singular (er/sie/es).
Go ahead, give it a try…
- ich nehme
- du nimmst
- er/sie/nimmt
My version:
If we want to use nehmen idiomatically, though, we need to talk about a little quirk of it.
A slightly quirky phrasing
Take this simple sentence:
- I take a beer.
The most logical translation of this is of course
- Ich nehme ein Bier.
This is technically correct, but it sounds more like you’re talking about taking in the sense of choosing or buying. Like… you’re at a bar contemplating what to drink and then you decide to go for a beer.
But if you want to talk about going to the kitchen and taking a beer from the fridge, then German really, and I mean R.E.A.L.L.Y , likes to add in a self reference in Dative.
- Ich nehme mir ein Bier.
Literally, this translates to “I am taking this book to/for myself.” and in a way, this phrasing mirrors the structure of to give.
- I am giving something (direct object) to someone (indirect object).
- I am taking something (direct object) to myself (indirect object).
Of course, there’s no logical need for “to myself” to be there.
But German really likes it and it’s actually kind of part of a broader trend in German, where German uses mir/dir-phrasings for personal phrasings, where we’re kind of the “beneficiary” of something, for better or worse.
Instead of “washing my hands”, in German I wash “mir die Hände” (the hands to myself).
Instead of “brushing my teeth”, in German, I brush “mir die Zähne” (myself the teeth)
Instead of “being cold”, in German it “ist mir kalt” (is cold to me).
And my personal favorite… instead of “dropping a glass”, in German the glass “fällt mir runter” (drops down to me.)
In daily life, you’ll see a lot of little self referential mirs and dirs that don’t really need to be there if you translate them to English.
And nehmen uses them as well, if you’re the “beneficiary” of the taking.
That does NOT mean that you ALWAYS need to use this self reference.
- Ich nehme Maria in den Arm.
- I take Maria into the arms/in my arms.
- Thomas nimmt den Kindersitz aus dem Auto.
- Thomas takes the baby seat out of the car.
- Ich nehme den Bus.
- I take the bus.
Here, we DON’T use mir, because the focus is not on taking to directly using. Like… I don’t take Maria “for myself“, and I’m not taking the bus “for myself“.
Now, I’m sure many of you are a bit anxious right now about getting this distinction right, especially if you’re a beginner.
But please don’t worry too much about it. You’ll be understood either way and you’ll get a feeling for it over time.
Today, we’ll focus a little more on the uses that DO need this idiomatic self reference. I think it makes more sense this way around, because then you just have to drop it whenever you don’t need it, instead of putting something in that you’re not really used to.
So yeah… we’ll do a few without the mir-dir-stuff, but most examples will need it.
And with that, let’s get actually rolling and make some idiomatic sentences.
Present Tense
Let’s start really simple. You’re at a bar and you decide that you’ll go for a beer.
How do you tell that to the bartender?
My version:
Cool. And now let’s also say what Maria is having.
My version:
Great.
Now, let’s say you’re at home in the kitchen and you tell your roommate that you’re taking a beer.
My version:
And let’s do that again and make it a cold beer :).
My version:
Great.
Now, let’s do the same, but in third person.
And there, the self reference is always sich, no matter what the gender is or whether it is Accusative or Dative.
My version:
And let’s bring in something new…
My version:
Perfect!
Now let’s do some with modal verbs.
Which means that the nehmen now goes to… any ideas… exactly, to the end :).
The self references stay in position, though.
My version:
And again a bit longer.
My version:
And again, in third person
My version:
And now, the boss battle for present tense… a side sentence :).
So now the modal verb goes to the end as well, but the rest stays in place.
My version:
My version:
Hot damn… that was quite a long German sentence you just made!
Good job!
And now let’s go right on with past tense.
Past Tense
The past tense for nehmen is pretty simple. You pretty much only need the spoken past, it goes with haben, and the ge-form is genommen.
- Maria hat heute den Bus genommen.
- Maria took the bus today.
And now it’s your turn… don’t forget the self reference ;).
- I took a beer. (at home)
My version:
Perfect.
Let’s do that again, but now, let’s also add in some time information.
There’s a couple of options to place it, so let do both of them.
First, let’s add it in front of the beer.
My version:
And now, let’s put the time in front.
Which of course means that we have to move the ich BEHIND the verb, because the verb stays where it is.
My version:
Let’s also do one in third person.
My version:
And let’s do a couple of side sentences.
My version:
My version:
All right.
As far as statements go, we’ve covered the basics, but of course there is one important type of phrasing missing… the questions.
Yes or no – Questions
Let’s start with the yes-or-no questions.
And here, German is much more consistent …
- Ich nehme den Bus?
Nehme ich den Bus? - Du hast den Bus genommen.
Hast du den Bus genommen? - Maria kann die U-Bahn nehmen.
Kann Maria die U-Bahn nehmen?
Whatever the verb in position two in the statement, it’ll just go to position one and boom… question achieved :).
And also, German doesn’t really use a future tense in daily life, so multiple English variants of a question will essentially be the same thing in German.
Are you going to take a day off?
Will you take a day off?
Do you take a day off?
All these translate to the same sentence.
- Nimmst du dir einen Tag frei?
So it’s actually better to NOT translate from English, and make the sentence up from scratch in German instead.
Are you ready?
Then let’s give it a try…
My version:
Another one (or is it ;))
My version:
And the same in past tense
My version:
My version:
Cool.
And another round… this time, with the quirk ;)
- Did you take a cookie?
My version:
And a longer one…
My version:
Perfect.
And, to wrap it up, let’s do a few questions with question words.
Questions with Question Words
And all we have to do here is add the question word to the beginning of the yes-or-no question.
- Nimmst du den Zug?
(Do you take the train?)
(Are you taking the train?)
(Are you going to take the train?)
(Will go take the train?)
- Warum nimmst du den Zug?
(Why do you take the train?)
(Why are you taking the train?)
(…)
So let’s give it a try, first with asking our friend at the bar what they’ll take/have.
My version:
Your friend, much to your surprise is taking ein kleines Bier (a small beer). So let’s inquire…
My version:
And now, the same but in past tense…
My version:
And let’s do a couple more with “the quirk”
My version:
And one last one that might come in handy if you live in a shared apartment.
My version:
All right!
Now, of course there’s more we could practice but we definitely covered all the basics you’ll need.
And remember… the idea of this exercise is that you come back to it a few times, until you can make all the sentences without thinking.
Oh, one quick note before we wrap up.
Watch out for this!
There are a few uses of English to take that are NOT shared by German nehmen.
The most important one of them is to take in the sense of needing/requiring.
- This takes a lot of effort.
- It takes a lot of time.
- The waiter takes half an hour to bring the bill.
Nehmen does NOT work in sentences like these and it would actually sound fairly confusing. The proper translation depends on the context. The most common ones are dauern and brauchen but that’s beyond the scope of this exercise. Just know that nehmen does NOT work for this kind of taking.
And we should also mention that “taking a course” is also NOT translated with nehmen but instead with machen.
Ich mache einen Deutschkurs.
And that’s it for today.
As always, if you have any questions about any of this, just let me know in the comments, and I’ll try to clear it up.
And don’t forget to come back to the exercise and do it again after a few days, because…
Repetition is the mother of skill.
Have a great week and I’ll see you next time.
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Emanuel
In English we can say “I took a trip to Sydney”.
In German can you say: “Ich habe eine Reise nach Sydney genommen”? or is “gemacht” or “geht auf” better?
The only one that works is
– eine Reise gemacht
“auf Reisen gehen” is also a phrasing but you don’t add a location to that.
Emanuel, I believe that your use of “benefactor” in this article is not correct. English has two words : “benefactor” and “beneficiary”. When a benefit is bestowed, the benefactor is the one who provide the benefit, and the beneficiary is the one who receives it. I think that “beneficiary” is what is needed here.
Oh, you’re absolutely right, thanks for pointing that out!!
I did think they were kind of synonyms but that made my explanation pretty confusing actually.
Vielen Dank!
This was a PERFECT lesson, Vielen Danke, I learned a lot!
Happy to hear that. Make sure to do it a couple more time, just to really automate the stuff.
Dear Emanuel, very nice prepared again.. DANKE.
Es ist auch, sehr gut vorbereitet….Danke…
Danke :)!
Sponsorship account has been found suitable for my situation. Many thanks to Emanuel and dear sponsors. It means a lot to me. Detailed and etimological touches to the subjects made them more understandable and easy to memorise/learn. As a regular human being, learning German is quite hard but thanks to this website and sponsorship, I believe that I’ll study it more effectively.
I cannot find true words to show how appreciated I am. I deeply thank you.
Any of Emanuel’s insight on the -statten verbs?
I concur!
cheers to Emanuel and the donators for this (completely free) subscription. this is actually really cool
I want to thank the (YourDailyGerman) team and mr Emanuel for gifting me this subscription. I would like to also thank everyone who have donated. God bless you all
Very good stuff on nehmen! I’ll get the hang of it. It can be a bit intimidating reading German in the comments while barely following the conversation but yea, alles ist in ordnung. Baby steps.
I wanna thanks YourDailyGerman team and Emanuel for giving me the scholarship, and also i thank anyone who have donated, please do donate everybody it really helps us -the people who can’t afford paying: poor- i really appreciate this donation for me, thanks again and keep going.
Willkommen!!
Hi Emanuel, just wanted to say thanks for giving me the ability to read your content, and to be part of your community! This 2022 I started my German journey, and thanks to you, I was able to comprehend a lot of a language that would have been alien to me otherwise.
I hope I can end this 2023 being able to thank you again…auf Deutsch :)
Thanks again, Emanuel, and have a great year!
Good challenge. Ich erwarte deinen Kommentar nächstes Jahr :)!
Ich benutze sehr viel die Möglichkeit, meine eigene Stimme einzuspielen, und mit der deinen zu vergleichen. Es ist wirklich sehr nützlich, um die Aussprache zu üben. Vielen Dank dafür!
Darum wollte ich einige Fragen stellen:
1. Es hört sich an, als ob du so ein bisschen das Wort “ich” am Anfang von den Sätzen betonst, oder zumindest das die Satzmelodie da ein bisschen höher ist. Ein bisschen als ob du sagst, dass es “ich” ist und niemand anders. Bilde ich mir das einfach ein?
2. Gibt es Fälle, wobei du dir bemerkt hast, dass das Algoritmus schlechte Punkte gibt, obwohl die Aussprache gut ist? zB wenn man schnell sprechen oder murmeln würde? Ich rede nicht von Mikrofonproblemen, die kenne ich schon. Wenn du genau so wie in den Aufnahmen sprichst, kriegst du denn normalerweise >= 95%? Ich finde manchmal, dass ich bessere Punkte kriege, wenn ich sehr langsam und alles fast ein bisschen künstich wohl artikuliere.
3. Im Sats “Ich nehme mir ein Bier aus dem Kühlschrank” betonst du “Bier”. In den Artikeln über Wortfolge hast du gesagt, dass die Neuigkeiten am Ende vom Satz kommt, aber auch, dass mehrere Wörter als eine Einheit gesehen kann. Würde in diesem Satz “ein Bier aus dem Kühlschrank” als eine Einheit gesehen werden, und deswegen nicht “KÜHLschrank” sondern “Bier” betont werden? Also wie hängt die Betonung mit der Wortfolge zusammen?
1)
Das ist auf keinen Fall Absicht, oder speziell. Ich betone das nicht extra. Es kann sein, dass es ein wenig betont ist, weil ich nicht natürlich spreche, sondern viele solche Sätze hintereinander vorlese. Das klingt anders als im Dialog, ohne dass ich das merken würde. Aber nein, es gibt keinen speziellen Akzent.
2)
Ich kriege fast immer zwischen 95 und 100% egal, wie ich spreche (schnell, langsam, mit leichtem Akzent). Die AI macht das sehr gut, sonst würde ich sie nicht verwenden.
There are a few words it has trouble with, specifically “du”. That one I do have to “overpronounce” or I’ll get 80%.
But all in all it does a pretty good job grading my native speaker-ness.
3)
Ja, “ein Bier aus dem Kühlschrank” ist ein komischer Mix aus zwei Elementen (Bier + Kühlschrank) und einem Element (Bier mit Spezifikation).
Wenn ich den Kühlschrank herausstellen will, dann würde ich KÜHLschrank sagen. Das ist eigentlich ein gutes Beispiel, wo mein Ansatz zur Wortstellung nicht so gut funktioniert, leider. Wenn man hier “Bier” ans Ende stellt, klingt es merkwürdig. Ich glaube, “nehmen” hat sehr sehr gerne eine “location/origin” und “aus dem Kühlschrank” fühlt sich fast ein bisschen so an, wie ein Präfix.
Aha, cool! Danke sehr!
Es ist spannend, dass man zwei Möglichkeiten hat (Satzmelodie/Betonung und Wortfolge), die „Neuigkeit“ des Satzes auszudrücken. Wenn man da total frei wäre, würde die Neuigkeit am Ende vom Satz kommen, und sie würde auch betont werden. Damit würde die Betonung immer am Ende liegen, aber so ist es ja nicht. Also, manchmal braucht man denn die Betonung, manchmal die Wortfolge. Wahrscheinlich soll man darüber nicht zu viel denken (so wie ich das gemacht habe). Macht aber Spaß, das zu tun.
:)
Viele Grüße!
Ja, Wortstellung ist das Ergebnis von einem komplexen Spiel verschiedener Kräfte, und je genauer man versucht hinzugucken, desto weniger sieht man. Am besten ein bisschen blinzeln, dann sieht man die groben Formen :)
AI Bot kann mich 70 Prozent der Zeit verstehen :) mehr als ich dachte
wonderful of course not for laziest. Hope your energy last forever
It will!
What a disappointment!
This is clearly a brilliant exercise, and listening to one’s own efforts (and seeing the score) is a fantastic learning aid.
But here in the frozen north of Canada, with no wifi and limited phone signal, I got no sound … so I didn’t know any of the answers!
If it’s possible, a “Read the answer” button would be wonderful.
Are you sure it’s the connection? What device are you using? Apple devices have had problem playing audio before.
Were you able to record yourself? It should tell you the correct answer in written form when it gives you your score.
Solved – works perfectly 300km south, with better phone/data service. Wonderful learning exercise.
That´s the most useful article of you ever! That`s exactly what I struggle in German, especially the last part where words have a different phrasing in German. Please do more of this kind of content!
Super useful. Great programming for the pronunciation checking.
The AI for that is trained by EF languages, so props to them :).
If I remember correctly, to TAKE a picture is another example where the English take does not translate to Nehmen.
True!!. In German, you machen a picture!
My two cents worth, I like the hints for my level. Because it does, as you say, allow me to focus on the current verb and not obsess with the incidental phrases.
Für ““Thomas says that I can take a beer from the fridge” hätte ich darf anstatt kann gesagt. Geht das? Oder verschwindet der Unterschied zwischen dürfen und können wie zwischen may und can auf Englisch?
Ja, das geht auch. In diesem Beispiel geht es wahrscheinlich nicht um “pure capability” sondern um “permission”, also “können” und “dürfen” sind fast gleich.