Hello everyone,
and welcome to your favorite German learning Podcast. Yes, this is a podcast now. And this time we will have a look at the meaning of
angehen
If you want just a quick overview of the meanings, you can find it in my second project:
The German Prefix Verb Dictionary – “angehen”
There, you can find a lot of the most common prefix verbs like angehen, bekommen or aufmachen, and you don’t only get hand made translations that actually make sense and that come with audio examples – no, you also get a really cool an unique interface that let’s you explore prefixes and verbs like nowhere else. It’s a new project, but growing fast, so check it out.
if you want a deeper look though and understand WHY the word angehen has all these different meanings, then this podcast here is perfect for you.
Yeah… this is totally a podcast now. I… it’s 2025, okay? You can just say things now. Like… make it up.
And as a podcast, I can of course show you some audio that is iconic for angehen.
The Zoomers among you are probably like “Is that Mozart or something?”, but the older folks among you probably recognize what this is…
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Guten Morgen lieber Emanuel,
vielen Dank für diesen fantastischen Artikel! Er hat mir viele Zweifel beiseite gelegt.
Ich hätte aber trotzdem noch eine Frage (vielleicht ein bisschen off-topic):
wenn du schreibst:
“Oh ja… als ich mich vorhin beim Essen zu ihr gesetzt hab’, um ein bisschen Small Talk zu machen, ist sie mich angegangen, von wegen, dass ich sie doch in Ruhe lassen soll mit diesem banalen Gequatsche und so…”
Dieser “von wegen” irritiert mich ein biscchen. Ich habe mich an deinen Artikeln üver “von Wegen!” (ich glaube, es war eine Adventskalendar-Türchen) aber ich könnte letztendlich keinen Sinn daraus machen.. mm..
Würdest du mir sagen, was hier bedeutet?
Lieben Dank vorab.
Gute Frage!
Das “von wegen” hier bedeutet sowas wie “hinsichtlich” oder “bezüglich”. In Englisch könnte man auch einfach das Füll-“like” nehmen.
Die Bedeutung macht keinen Sinn, wenn du an das Standard “von wegen” denkst, aber wenn du denkst “from ways”, dann passt es besser. Denk “where is she coming from – from ways of…”
Es ist vielleicht das alte, originalere “von wegen”, bevor es seine Bedeutung verschoben hat.
Hilft das?
vielen Dank für deine Antwort :)
Jetzt macht Sinn, ist dieser Ausdruck noch gängig? Also… lohnt es sich, dass ich zu meinem “aktiven” Wortschatz einfüge?
Auf jeden Fall. Das Beispiel, was ich gemacht habe, war ein sehr realistischer Alltagsdialog. Es ist aber tricky zu benutzen.
– Er hat mich dann eine Stunde vollgeheult, von wegen Maria meckert nur und er muss immer abwaschen und so.
Das wäre so eine Art “Standard”-Formulierung. Ein bisschen wie “über” aber weniger fokussiert und weniger integriert.
So if I say “Das Buch geht XYZ an” and “Das Buch geht um XYZ” there is kind of an overlap right? Or not ?
I’m guessing its more likely if its a book dealing with a certain subject matter that the author is in a sense “tackling” – like a social issue.
“Das Buch geht die Armut an” and “Das Buch geht um die Armut” would be more or less the same?
I find neither to be too idiomatic.
– Das Buch geht die Armut an…
This sounds too proactive to me. A book cannot really “tackle” an issue, it can just talk about it. But a publisher might use that phrasing in their ad copy.
– Das Buch geht um…
I find this lazy and bad style and I prefer “Im Buch geht es um…”
Thanks for your answer. Just got back from a bike ride and started reading my book and in the first paragraph i read was “Dabei geht es in jedem Text ums Schreiben” which fits in perfectly with your use of “in”…
I think what is a bit confusing for someone coming at this word from english is concern can have a double meaning.
e.g.
The letter concerns your son.
can mean both the letter is about your son (the subject matter of the letter is the son, sounds serious) and the letter is causing your son to worry.
I think that’s why i thought maybe this was more or less a synonym for “about”.
edit : I just looked at concern my english dictionary. The first sense it gives is “to relate to (something or somebody) ; to be about ( them): The Novel concerns three soldiers“. So it seems angehen does not have any of this sense of concern right?
Hey Emanuel-
Is there any difference between these two constructions?
Jetzt gehen wir mal ran an die Arbeit!
Jetzt gehen wir mal an die Arbeit! No “ran”
If yes, what would the difference be?
Thanks!
The first version is colloquial and not all that common. “an die Arbeit gehen” is kind of a fixed phrase. “ran, an die Arbeit” does work, but “ran” by itself if “die Arbeit” is already established, would not work.
Hallo –
I was struggling with how to translate “angehen” is this sentence:
Weil nach einem Erfolgserlebnis gehen sich die größeren Ziele gleich viel motivierter an.
Because after a sense of achievement, the bigger goals start motivating themselves – sort of like spurring themselves to greater heights?
Danke…
Great question!!
This is actually a special use of the reflexive. It basically means “one can do XYY”
It’s a way to take out the actual person and make it sound impersonal.
So your example means
Note that it’s NOT specific to “angehen”, but works with plenty of verbs.
It’s quite a common phrasing in magazine style writing, because it sounds upbeat… not sure why.
Hi Emanuel-
I am fairly new to German. Not sure I get this connotation of “gehen”
Der Verkauf im Kiosk geht nur über Bargeld.
Does it mean “goes by way of”? Maybe like “goes in this direction-geht in diese Richtung”.
gracias!
One of the meanings of “gehen” in German is “to function, to work” in the sense of “working out”. That’s what we’re seeing in the example.
I’d translate it as “can only be done” but that doesn’t really matter. What matters is the idea. You’ll see this “gehen” a LOT in German :).
– Geht nicht.
This for example means “Doesn’t work.”
Hi Emanuel, thank you for the wonderful blog. It may even inspire me to write something in german some day. BTW I have almost written “It may even inspire me someday something in german to write“:)
Could you explain why “snap at someone” is NOT one of the meanings of “angehen” please (see one of the quiz questions)?
Hahaha, German sentence structure creeping in slowly :D.
That “snapping” was a mistake on my end actually. I forgot to mark it in the quizz as a correct answer. It’s fixed now. Sorry for the confusion (and for ruining your score :)
You came up with a nice example at the end. I think I got the meaning. So, does it go like this?
Was den angehenden (soon to be/emerging) Präsidenten angeht (as far … is concerned), so hoffe ich, dass er die Dinge, die in unserem Land nicht angehen (don’t work), schnell und konsequent angeht (make them work), auch wenn ihn seine Gegner und die Presse dafür scharf angehen.
(even if his opponents and the press attack/go after him because of that)
BTW, German is famous for long and convoluted sentences (like the above), which are mostly frowned upon in English. Is it still like this, or is it changing now in Germany to simpler sentences?
Almost perfect!
“konsequent angeht” would be closer to “tackle”. The “making work” is a result of that.
But yeah, you pretty much got it :)
As for the sentence, this is normal TV news level, I’d say. Not everyone can say that on the fly without speaker training, but good debaters can and all people starting university should (in my early millenial opinion) be able to write something like that.
But German did get more simple over the centuries. Take a look at Kant or other philosophers. I cannot read their stuff without making schematics for each sentence.
Thanks, and yes, I can see it now: “tackle/ deal with”
A little side note… as much as I like English, I HATE newspaper English.
German sentences might be long, but English sentences lack verbs because of all the gerunds and nounified verbs. It feels really stiff to me.
here’s an example I made up:
“Quetionable medical advice rampant in briefings”
It feels like walking through dry steppe looking for water :D
Your example could be a title, but it is not a sentence, because it does not have a verb.
Admittedly, sometimes it is difficult to find the verb, and in that case, there is something wrong with the sentence, and it should be rewritten.
You are correct that many journalists write quite complex sentences. I guess I meant that general advice here is that if one can split a sentence into two in an easy way, then it should be done. So, I’ve looked at your sentence again, and now it does not look as complex as it did before, and I don’t see an easy way to split it. I’m sure my perception is different depending on the language.
” if one can split a sentence into two in an easy way, then it should be done”… I totally agree.
And that’s actually good advice for learners, too.
My expecience is that , as soon as people reach B1 or B2, they feel compelled to make long complex sentences because it’s german and it NEVER works :). Simple and easy is the best. Complex sentences will come by themselves, once you have to phrase a complex thought.
This confused me a little. I thought that “Dinge, die nicht angehen” meant “things that are not acceptable”. Or can angehen in terms of “to work” also refer to things that are not “Geräte”?
Did you mean to provide the German version in this section:
• How good a kisser are you?”
“None of your business.”
“Sadly.”
• “What was that look?!”
“Sir?”
“Oh you know what I mean…don’t you EVER look at me like that again just because I take decaff, you hear me young man?!!”
“Sorry Sir?”
• “Quite a project.”
“Let’s do this man, today’s the day.”
Ha.. I had to re-read that to realize what’s going on.
The idea was to introduce the three meanings without translations first, that’s why they’re missing.
BUt this article is among the oldest and REALLY needs a do-over. I am doing do-overs at the moment and I’ll add this one high up on the list. It’s really confusing to read and I can make it much better now :)
how about just writing what you mean instead of all the fluffy bullshit around it?
Well, I admit it gets out of hand at times. But many people like it and I enjoy writing that way. I’m not interested in writing dry, concise articles.
Hello Emanuel,
I would like to ask in terms of problem-hadling-ness, are “angehen” and “umgehen” exchangeable?
Thanks!
Not really.
– ein Problem angehen
This is about tackling a problem (with the goal of solving it)
– mit einem Problem umgehen
This is about handling it in sense of coping. The problem is there, you’re there, you cope, but you don’t solve it.
I think “umgehen” is actually worth a post, even though I talked about it in my article on “um-“
Thanks a lot!
Actually, you already did. There is a post about “gehen um” where you discussed “gehen um”, separable and inseparable “umgehen”. That’s why I’m a little confused after reading these two articles.
Oh even better :). I think this is the first time that I forget an article I’ve written.
:) Vielen Dank.
Ich habe irgendwo gesehen diese zwei Saetze; Ich darf keinen Ski laufen. Ich moechte nicht Geschirr Spuelen.
Sind diese Saetze richtig?
Der erste nicht wirklich. Allerdings sagen Leute das umgangssprachlich. Der zweite ist richtig und sogar besser als
– Ich möchte kein Geschirr spülen.
Das Verb ist hier “Geschirr spülen”. Es ist wie eine Einheit.
Ich mache sehr viel Spass wahrend Lernens in dieser Website. Mein Deutsch ist nicht gut aber ich habe versucht in Deutsch etwas zu schreiben. Iich habe grosse zweifel zwischen Verbrauch von “Nicht und Kein”. Ich hoffe dass Sie mir helfen konnten. Vielen Vielen Dank fur solche tolle Website. :)
Freut mich, dass es dir so gefällt. Über “nicht” und “Kein” will ich auch noch einen Artikel schreiben aber die Kurzversion ist:
Wenn man “ein” benutzen kann, dann benutzt man auch “kein”…
– Ich bin müde… no “ein”, hence “nicht”
– Ich bin nicht müde.
– Ich habe ein Buch…. this has “ein” so we need “kein”
– Ich habe kein Buch.
There are a few special cases of course but that would be too much to get into right now.
2 kleine Korrekturen:
– Ich mache viel Spaß…
man sagt
– Ich habe viel Spaß (I have a lot of fun).. oder
– Es macht mir viel Spaß (It’s a lot of fun for me)…
und dann … “der Verbrauch” ist “use” im Sinne von “consumption”. “Use” im Sinne von “using” is “der Gebrauch”
– Vielleicht können sie mir helfen (nicht mich)
Hoffe das hilft ein bisschen :)
Concerning the concern meaning of angehen, it may just be in the Appalachian dialect of USA English, but we would quite naturally say “As far as the weather goes, it was great, …”. In fact, among the West Virginia Hillbillies with whom I grew up, it would be rare to say “As far as the weather was concerned” (it might result in nasty comments about highfalutin language, and a resulting fist fight). So, this usage of angehen feels very natural to me, and gets rid of the conflation with betreffen.
As a general case, I am finding many of your examples of how German might translate literally into English “but no one would ever say that” to be things that people DO say (or DID say). Again, it is the Appalachian dialect coming into play. It is based on 17th century English, so is a LITTLE closer to the shared roots with German. I grew up hearing the older generation (I´m an old man myself) say things like “Reach me the salt.” to mean “Hand me the salt.” Much closer to some usages of “reichen” than is today´s “High Americanish”.
Off topic, how the heck would I say “hillbilly” in German? A German friend says “Hinterwäldler”, but that could include flatlanders (he is Hessian so has no concept of our special kind of mountain red neck pride). Maybe I should ask a Bavarian.
Hmm… correct me if I’m wrong but I always thought a hillbilly was specific to a region. Would you use the term for people from the Rocky Mountains, even if they match the stereotype only half? Or a person from some mountains in Great Britain sporting a thick British accent?
As you said, “Hinterwäldler” is super general so it would work for all of that but I think “Hillbilly” shouldn’t/can’t be translated. It’s like “Quakers” or “Whigs” (that very old political party of the US). It’s a name for a thing that only exists in the US and so there isn’t a translation because German doesn’t have it, so it doesn’t have a word for it.
Thanks for the insights into the Appalachian dialect by the way. I once hike the Appalachians trail… for like two hours :) (I did managed to be face to face with a bear and her cubs on that hike though)…. and as short as it was I fell in love with the region. So beautiful. So I hope I get to go back some day and spend more time there and see if I can pick up these old connections to German.
Thank you 4 solving the mystery of translating phrases with “angehen” in them! It had always been an “Arschweh”(lol) for me. Just to make sure I fully understand the different meanings of the word, I’m posting the translation of that last German paragraph here:
“As far as the soon to be president is concerned, I do hope that he will deal with the unacceptable things in our country fast and consistently. Even if it ….(Ok, I can’t, I just can’t decode this part) ….with his opponents and the press.”
That’s the attacking one… my attempt would be
– even if his opponents and the press were to give him heavy fire.
but that’s not native speaker proved :)
I can’t tell you how much you’ve helped develop my German, I mean I go to class everyday but I tend to learn more from your blog and everyone in my class already sees me as the Bright one but it’s all down to you. Keep up the good work and thank you.
I’m really happy to hear that this works so well for you. Vielen Dank! And it supports my opinion that language classes often lack some structure. Thinking back to my calsses I recall me thinking “Where are we? Why are we talking about this? Is that the complete picture? Wait, haven’t we talked about that weeks ago?” and also, stuff that should come early on comes way too late in favor of … vegetable names. But I’m starting to ramble :). Ich wünsch’ dir weiter viel Spaß und Erfolg, hier und im Unterricht
And btw, an absolutely fantastic blog! Thank you so much!
Does angehen in the sense of “as far as … concerned” overlaps with “von … her”? I mean “Was das Wetter angeht” sounds very much like “Vom Wetter her”. But is it just me stupid?
No, you’re totally right, there is an overlap but they’re not interchangeable at all times. “Was … angeht” can be used for plans, “von… her” can’t. “Von … her” is about the perspective you take. You go somewhere, stand there and look toward the matter at hand. “Angehen” is about what goes toward a certain matter and this is much broader. “Von … her” is always about a judgement or opinion about something…. “was … angeht” can introduce everything that is related to that.
– Was das Projekt angeht, müssen wir darüber nachdenken…
– Vom Projekt her….(doesn’t really work)
Hope that helps :)
Hey! Thank you so much, this is a truly awesome blog (and really entertaining)! I just had a quick question about one of your examples above:
“Oh ja… als ich mich vorhin beim Essen zu ihr gesetzt hab’, um ein bisschen Small Talk zu machen, ist sie mich angegangen…”
I know gehen and various other verbs of motion take ‘sein’ in compound past tenses when they’re intransitive but I thought they should take ‘haben’ when they become transitive and take on an accusative object, so I was confused that you wrote “ist sie mich angegangen” and not “hat sie mich angegangen”. I think I might have misunderstood some fundamental rule here so it would be great if you could explain what’s happening in that sentence.
Vielen Dank!! :)
Nice question.. so I did a quick Google search for “Sie ist mich angegangen” and “Sie hat mich angegangen” and it was 50 vs 4 results.
In fact, to me both versions work and I am sure I have heard it said either way. It is similar for the “angehen” as in “to concern”
Das hat mich nichts angegangen…
Das ist mich nichts angegangen…
I wouldn’t know what to choose but in that case people say “ging” anyway so crisis averted :).
The rule with transitive-intransitive is not super strict and there are exceptions… especially when you look at the verbs with a very very closely linked object.
Ich bin Fahrrad/Auto gefahren
I think to people who’s native language is English, this is pure transitive but to me it is kind of not because the object is part of the verb. Anyway…
Ich bin einen Marathon gelaufen…
Ich habe einen Marathon gelaufen…
Both are possible (600.000 results for “bin”, 1.200 000 for “habe”).
What matters ultimately is what’s the focus… is it YOUR travelling the distance or is it the “SIDE EFFECT” of your travelling the distance. The emphasis is different.And the whole transtitive vs. intransitive thing is just a side effect of that. Usually the focus is not on your travels if there is a direct object.
Ich habe meinen Bruder nach München gefahren.
But then, at other times it is
Ich bin Fahrrad gefahren.
And it doesn’t even have to be a “phrasal verb”
Ich bin den Wagen immer gerne gefahren.
You can find that, too.
So… transitive – intransitive is a guideline but it is not the underlying rule as in that a flip switches in the brain from “sein” to “haben”… the focus is what matters.
And then, as soon as the use gets abstract… well… people don’t really know and so often you’ll find either version. Hope that makes sense :)
That makes a lot of sense actually, it’s so useful to have it set out in that way. Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a detailed reply, I really appreciate it!! :D
Nescience, lol. New word for me.
As I’m a caveman, I prefer “ignorance” in that sentence.
Haha… I just took this from the dictionary. Don’t even know how to pronounce it :). There is a German word “Ignoranz” but that is way more negative than the English one…. like.. the German one will never just mean “not knowing”… it is always has this “not even trying to know better” or just “ignoring the obvious facts”. In fact it is always negative… not even so much as close to neutral, ever. And I guess that’s why I was kind of … meeehhh… because “Unwissenheit” is more like this innocent naiveté :)
Ah. Yeah, ignorant can be used an insult, certainly, but doesn’t have to be.
I would use “willful ignorance” for the bad German meaning.
That makes me think… if someone says
This was an ignorant rant.
or something similar, what mneaning comes to mind to a native Speaker of English… the neutral one or the negative one. Vielen Dank :)
Maybe a little more nuanced meaning than just neutral or negative. I would say there’s an implication of an insult there, though it’s not necessarily an insult in and of itself.
Either way, I generally wouldn’t think too highly of someone whom I leveled that comment against.
It doesn’t lean either way at all to me as a native englishman really, only from the context could you grasp whether it was the so named ‘negative’ meaning or not. I guess if you had to push me as to which way the word without context leans, i would say the non negative. Random rant/boring dribbling of useless information over. Thanks
The detailed explanation on how to use the words in the right context is brilliant! Thx