Hello everyone,
and welcome to a new episode of our absolutely epic German online course.
And today, we’ll tackle one of the most confusing topics of German grammar
German Sentence Structure
German sentence structure seems like a twisted mess to learners, especially because very few languages can relate.
On some deep level, Japanese has more in common with German structure than English does.
But even though German sentences might seem quite weird at first and they definitely take some serious getting used to, the whole topic is actually not all that complicated.
There are essentially two key features that we need to understand and the rest is more or less a result of those.
One of them is this Vate™-stuff (“verb at the end”), which we’ve already touched on in the Essentials-lectures. And the other one also has to do with the verb.
Here are the quick links to the sections, so you can jump around, but I recommend reading it in sequence, because it builds.
- Background on Sentence Structure
- German Main Sentence – General Structure
- German Main Sentence – Verb Second
- Exceptions to Verb Second
And now let’s jump right in.
Some background on Sentence Structure
To really understand sentence structure (and later on word order) in German, it’s quite helpful to understand what a sentence actually is. And a really helpful model for that is what I call the box-model. I’ve talked about this in detail in a separate article and some of you might have already read it.
But let me go over it real quick.
A basic sentence is always a description of something happening (or being) and we get a bunch of information about that event. Some really short sentences tell us only about who does what….
- Maria is sleeping.
… others supply a whole truckload of info.
- After her date with Thomas, Maria, who is feeling a little tipsy, is talking to her friend Maggie for an hour on the phone while walking home.
The two sentences look very different, but the essence is the same: a bunch of information slots in a row. I call them boxes.
- [ box 1] [ box 2] [ box 3] [ box 4] … [ box whatever].
Some boxes contain words that connect sentences, like because for example, but most boxes contain a piece of information about what’s going on in the sentence. So one box contains the verb, one has the subject, one gives info about when, one about where, one for why and so on. Some or mandatory, others are optional. And what’s important to understand is that inside the box, there can be just one word, but also a full side sentence.
- [tomorrow]
- [After I finish the project I have been working on for a week]
Both these bits are a piece of information about “when” and you have to think of them like one solid chunk.
Cool.
So this box-view of a sentence is one of the tools we’ll use to get a handle on sentence structure and word order.
And the other thing we need an understanding that there are different types of sentences. An obvious example is the difference between questions and statements (we’ve talked about questions and their structure in a separate article). But at least when learning German, there’s another really important distinction: main sentences and side sentences.
A main sentence is a normal sentence that can stand on its own, while a side sentence is usually an integral part of a main sentence and it feels incomplete by itself.
- I ate a cake. (main sentence)
- After I ate a cake. (side sentence)
In everyday life, the second one would work as a direct reply to a question like “When will you do the 100 push-ups?” but I think you can tell that it’s kind of incomplete.
Anyway, in English you can kind of get away without knowing or caring about the difference. In German, however, that won’t work.
You see, one really … uhm… “unique” (aka annoying) feature about German is that it looooves to “mark” different functions with different looks.
And it does that also for sentences, and so main sentences and side sentences have a completely different structure.
- Thomas geht heute mit Maria ins Theater. (main sentence)
- Thomas goes to the theater with Maria today.
- Weil Thomas heute mit Maria ins Theater geht... (side sentence)
- Because Thomas goes to the theater with Maria today…
In English, the only difference is that the side sentence has an extra word at the beginning.
A German side sentence, too, has such an “intro-word” but on top of that, the verb changes position and goes to… surprise, surprise… the end. Yup, there really seems to be something going on with verbs and the end of the sentence.
Now, there’s actually another slight difference between main sentences and side sentences, and actually actually, the side sentences kind of reveal the REAL structure of German much better. Seriously, prepare to get your mind blown.
But we’ll get to all that later on in the module on structure.
Today, we’ll focus on main sentences and we’ll start with a look at …
German Sentence – General Structure
Not the most pretty chart in the world, but here you go…
We have one box, then on position two comes the verb, then come all the various info boxes that we want to convey (might be none, actually) and then comes Vate™ (verb at the end) .
Oh and then may well come a bonus round.
This is the basic scheme and to further explore this, we’ll divide it into three topics:
- verb second
- position number one
- the ending and the bonus
First, we’ll talk about “Verb second”, check out what that really means in practice and see if there are any exceptions.
Then, we’ll explore which elements can be in position one and more importantly, what happens to them if we put them there.
And lastly, we’ll take a look at the end of the sentence. We’re already vaguely familiar with the Vating™ (“verb at the end”-ing) but a more systematic look won’t hurt and we definitely need to explore that weird bonus round a bit more, because that raises a LOT of questions for learners usually.
Actually, there’s a fourth topic, the order of the info-elements. But we’ll talk about that in a separate series on word order, once we’re done with the broader strokes of structure.
Anyway, let’s now take a closer look at like THE defining feature… the verb second.
V2 – The Verb Comes Second
And that’s already one fundamental difference between German and English. English is commonly categorized as a SVO-language, just like Spanish or French. That stands for subject-verb-object-language and it means that the verb typically comes after the subject.
Here’s an example..
- [Ich] [lese] [ein Buch] .
- [I] [read] [a book].
1 2 3
Looks like German is the same, but it is NOT.
German is actually considered a V2-language. That stands for “verb second” and by the way… that’s actually a feature that comes from the Germanic language family. English is kind of the odd man out here.
Anyway, in a German main sentence, the verb always comes in the second position and that’s just different than English.
- [Nach der Arbeit] [bin] [ich ] [ nach Hause gegangen] [gegangen].
- [After work] [I] [went] [home] .
1 2 3 4 5
- [Weil ich sehr großen Hunger hatte,] [bin] [ich] [nach Hause] [gegangen].
- [Because I was really hungry,] [I ] [went] [home].
1 2 3 4 5
The first example looks like German and English are the same, but the latter two really show the difference. In English, the verb comes after the subject and there might be something before that. In German, the verb ALWAYS comes in the second position.
And it doesn’t matter what the first element is.
Which brings us to something that courses and textbooks often call inversion.
Like… you might say this:
- 1 2 3
- Heute ich gehe …
- Today I go…
which is a really common mistake and your teacher might tell you that you forgot the “inversion”.
Inversion means that the verb and the subject have to switch places.
- 1 2 3
- Heute ich gehe… (WRONG… before “””inversion”””)
- Heute gehe ich… (RIGHT… after “””inversion”””
Thinking of it this way is fine for a beginner, but you shouldn’t get too hung up on it because that’s not really what’s going on under the hood. Like… Germans don’t think of this in terms of switching places. They just put the verb second right away.
And also, while the subject will OFTEN come next to the verb, it doesn’t always have to.
It can lag a little…
- Gestern hat mir Maria ein Buch gekauft.
- Yesterday, Maria bought me a book.
… or it can come almost at the end.
- Gerstern wurde in Berlin von einigen betrunken Leuten ein UFO gesehen.
- Yesterday, a UFO was seen by some drunk people in Berlin.
We’ll learn more about what happened here in the series on word order.
But yeah, I think all I’m trying to say is that you shouldn’t think of a German sentence as an English sentence that you just have to modify a little by doing some inversion and moving parts of the verb last. I mean, you can, but that’ll be a LOT of modifications. German and English have fundamentally different views on sentence structure and word order.
That said, though, it can be really helpful to practice with the “inverted” versions of common phrasings…. hab ich, will ich, kann ich and so on.
Actually, let me make those into a little haiku
Manchmal bin ich müde.
Im Deutschkurs kann ich schlafen.
Dann will ich Kaffee.
Beautiful.
But seriously, maybe make a little list or a few poems like this and say them a few times each day like a little poem. Understanding the rule and doing it when writing is one thing, but when you talk, it’ll come out the way you say it in your mother tongue. You really need to get used to the flow of this.
It’ll take a while, so don’t get frustrated if you keep getting it wrong. Even people who are more or less fluent who do mess it up sometimes.
The upside is, though, that it’s still perfectly understandable if you forget to put the verb second.
Cool.
So that’s one of the key rules for a German main sentence: the verb is always the SECOND ELEMENT. Verb Second. V2 … like… you can form a v with two fingers, as a mnemonic.
Or how about this little rhyme:
Yo, yo, yo.. German learner in the buildin’
and when I’m buildin’
a German sentence
the verb is always second
I reckon….
yeah.
Ugh… eternal cringe!!
Seriously though, if we have a rule like “the verb is always second” of course that raises the question: are there any exceptions or is it really always always.
But before we look at that, it’s time for you to get active and recap and practice a little.
And now, on to everyone’s favorite feature… exceptions.
Exceptions to “verb second”
And the big surprise is… there kinda sorta low key aren’t any.
Whoooaaaaat?!
Yup, you read that right. The “verb second”-rule really is a rule for once.
However, there are a few things that might look like exceptions to the untrained eye, and you’ll run into them sooner or later, so let’s take a look at what they are and why they’re totally not exceptions.
The first one are combinations with und and oder. Like this one:
- Thomas und sein bester Freund gehen in eine Bar.
- Thomas and his best friend go to a bar.
If you’re new to language learning and thinking about it analytically, this might well look like two elements to you – Thomas (1) and his best friend (2). So that would mean that the verb is in position three instead of two.
But that’s where thinking in terms of questions is really helpful.
The phrase Thomas and his best friend forms one piece of information, one box that contains the answer to “Who is going to a bar?”. And that’s what matters for sentence structure.
Here’s another example, this time with oder (or).
- Heute direkt nach der Arbeit oder spätestens, wenn ich zu Hause bin, muss ich den Flug buchen.
- Today directly after work or at the latest, when I am at home, I have to book the flight.
Damn, looks quite complex, right. But in essence, we’re given two options of time so we kind of have two “elements” but in terms of information, they’re both part of the same box – the when-box. And so the verb is still very much where it’s supposed to be – in position number two.
Cool.
Now the second non-exception is already little trickier.
Take a look at this example…
- Gestern bei der Party habe ich Maria kennengelernt.
- Yesterday at the party I met Maria.
The part before the verb is “Yesterday at the party” , so we have an indication of time AND indication of place. So it’s perfectly reasonable to say that we have two pieces of information here before the verb; two boxes.
The thing is… it doesn’t feel like two boxes to a German speaker. Yes, talking about how something feels is a thing now.
It feels like one box that’s answering the question “whern“… like… mix of where and when. You know… like… what Einstein said, that time and space are connected, or whatever. When they’re apart, they’re two distinct elements but when we put time and space information next to each other they might kind of fuse a little.
The phrase “yesterday at the party” can be used to answer either one of those questions.
- “When have you met Maria?”
“Yesterday at the party.” - “Where have you met Maria?”
“Yesterday at the party.”
And that’s why it feels like one unit to a German and it only takes one position in the sentence.
So once again… no exception.
And if you’re like “Hmmm, that low key does feel like an exception that was rationalized away.” then you’ll absolutely LOVE the last non-exception.
Which goes as follows: there are a few small connecting words that count as position 0.
Here’s an example…
- “Here… take an apple.”
“But I am not hungry.”
But means aber in German and if we take it as the first element, we should have the verb after it…
- “Hier… nimm einen Apfel.”
“Aber bin ich nicht hungrig.”… WRONG
But the proper way is this:
- “[Aber] [ich] [bin] nicht hungrig.”
0 1 2
but aber doesn’t count. And the same goes for oder (or) and und (and) if they connect sentences as well as for denn, which is an option for because.
- When you’re there, let me know and I’ll drop by.
- Wenn du da bist, sag Bescheid, und ich komme vorbei.
Wenn du da bist, sag Bescheid, und komme ich vorbei. WRONG
Actually, sometimes mistakes like this one happen when our brain, eager to apply the new rule, over-corrects. But yeah, the und here counts as position zero, and so the verb still sits in position two, as per usual. So no exception!
And yes, I know it sound like something a bunch of high paid lawyers came up with, just so we can’t call this an exception. But hey… lawyers gonna law.
Cool.
So this was out look at the three main things that might make you go like “Wait, I learned the verb should be second?!” and I hope you could see that it kinda sorta always is.
And I think that’s enough for the verb.
And it’s also enough for today, I’d say :).
Next time, in the second part, we’ll explore the beginning and the end of a German main sentence and in the third part, we’ll then get to side sentences and a big big reveal about German.
As usual, if you have any questions or suggestions about this so far, just leave me a comment.
I hope you liked it and see you next time.
Want to keep reading?
Here’s episode two:
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By the way, personally I look at aber, und, oder, and denn as grammatical units (conjunctions\boxes) that can join main clauses together and they are a separate box when connecting two main clauses, that is “[ich esse sehr viel] [denn] [ich habe immer Hunger]”. Whereas other conjunction-like words are thought of as forming a subordinate clause and being part of the box: “[ich esse sehr viel,] [weil ich immer Hunger habe]”. This viewpoint works with “verb second” rule, because you can say “weil ich immer Hunger habe, esse ich sehr viel” but one cannot say “
denn ich habe immer Hunger, esse ich sehr viel“.Nice, I like it!! Makes sense to see them as separate from the actual sentences. LIke a “link” between them so to speak.
Referring to an example:
– Gestern bei der Party habe ich Maria kennengelernt.
Können wir sagen, dass die Party natürlich einen Termin hat?
So this is adding in the time-box, or adding more information to it.
Or we cannot generalize this principle
Since the verb comes after it, it’s here regarded as a complete “time”-box and “bei der Party” specifies “gestern”.
In practice, however, it’s a time+place box. And you can flip it around and also split it up
– Gestern habe ich bei der Party ….
– Bei der Party gestern habe ich…
Grammatically, they’re all different, but the message is of course the same.
It’s quite common that time and place blend a bit like this :)
Let me know if that helps.
I saw such sentence”Das wetter in Deutschland ist schlecht.”in my learning material. Is the “ist” here in second place?
Great question!!
Yes, it’s in second position because the first element is “das Wetter in Deutschland” (was).
Your thinking makes perfect sense though, you could also treat “in Deutschland” as a separate element.
– Das Wetter (was) ist in Deutschland (wo) schlecht (wie).
Hello Emmanuel. I am having difficulty understanding where I’m going wrong in the unicorn quiz question. The other questions were clear, once I read them carefully but this one puzzles me.
Does Vate™ have an offical pronunciation yet? If not, might I suggest that it rhyme with “maté” instead of “vape?” :D
Hmmm, fancy :). I like it!
Or “vat”, with the “e” being silent :)
what do the numbers mean im more confused than before
The numbers are the slot number in the sentence. Each slot takes one element and an element can be one word or an entire sub-sentence.
Wenn ich zu Hause bin, muss ich den Flug buchen.
couldn’t we use “Wann” here? (here both mean *when* so what is the difference)
No, you can’t use “wann”.
You can find all you need to know in my article about it :)
https://yourdailygerman.com/difference-wann-wenn/
Is it possible to download this article ?
Should be up now.
How do you tell the difference between a side sentence that is in front of the main sentence and a side sentence that is in position 1? E.g.
“Weil ich Essen esse, habe ich kein Hunger”
Vs
“Weil ich Essen esse, ich habe kein Hunger”?
Case 2 does not exist. A side sentence is an integrated sentence, it cannot just stand around there.
You could put a full stop and call it poetic license.
Ich habe keinen Hunger.
But that’s bending grammar.
Does that help?
So if a side sentence moves to the front of a sentence, it moves to position 1, always? And so what was in position 1 must find a new place on the sentence.
Pretty much, yes.
A side sentence is just a “box”, like other elements as well.
Have you read my article on “box model”? There are a lot of examples in it that nicely show the dynamics.
Ah okay, thanks that makes sense. I have read the box articles and understood them when I read them. I just confused myself
Another question… What about questions?
Aren’t they “exceptions” to the position of the verb? Since just like English there is an inversion?
We can go there now -> Can we go there now?
Wir können jetzt da gehen -> können wir jetzt da gehen?
This is a little tongue in cheek but seriously, you don’t mention questions anywhere, unless they are covered somewhere else?
Also, I wondered if you had some insight into the origin of that inversion e.g. Does it evolve from having a question word in position 1 that then was dropped?
If you want to see all questions as exceptions to a rule, then you can do that, of course, but I think it’s more intuitive to think of them as a separate type of sentence with its own system.
I have no clue where the paradigm comes from to start the question with the verb and the inversion with the subject. It’s an interesting question actually, but I have never thought about this until now :).
Your idea with the question word does make sense, but more so in German than in English, because in English you usually don’t switch verb and subject around but in questions you do.
There has to be something else that caused this switch :)
Btw.: “gehen” is a directional verb so you can not use it with just “da”. There needs to be a “hin” somewhere in the sentence, or some other thing to fill the destination role. “da” is not a destination, it’s a current location.
Yes, that is why it was tongue in cheek. Are there other types of sentences that wouldn’t fit these rules? E.g. in some languages you invert like a question for the imperative /order as well
oops, missing the hin, thank you for the correction. I didn’t, but what if I meant, can we go whilst we are there? Or “können wir jetzt da fahren?”
So the imperative works like in English pretty much, so the verb comes first.
And then there’s side sentence with all the verbs at the end.
The only real exception are conditional statements like
About the “fahren” sentence, that works if you mean driving AT a location where you previously not drive. LIke a country for instance, where you weren’t allowed to drive but now you are.
With “gehen” the sentence would sound weird because “gehen” is so generic. Why would you not be able to do some “going” at a location.
Is the right way to understand the when and where exception to think of it as answering the question “in what setting?”
Or is it more like “yesterday at the party” as an idea is thought of as “at the party, which was yesterday, …” ?
If anything, the “at the party” is a closer explanation to the more generic “yesterday” but “in what setting” fits the vibe pretty well.
It definitely doesn’t feel like “at the party, which was yesterday”. That gives too much weight to the party.
helloo,
this is my 1st question on the Blog :)
“Wenn du da bist, sag Bescheid, und ich komme vorbei.”
Isn’t [Wenn du da bist, sag Bescheid,] in position 1 and “und” 0 doesn’t count, so “komme” should come right after und, no ? I’m stuck
thanks Emmanuel for the amazing articles, I have a Goethe exam coming soon; your Blog is very helpful :)
Good question!
The “und” connects two normal sentences here.
[Wenn du da bist (side sentence)], sag (position 2) Bescheid (main sentence) – und – ich komme vorbei (second main sentence).
As a drawing, the structure is like this:
……, —, und — .
— : main sentences
…….: side sentence
Let me know if that helps :)
Thank youuu !
I understand now :)
Aaaaaaa
beeeeeee
I have a question about “und” and “oder” being in position 0. Do I treat the second half of the sentence as a whole separate thing with its own numbered positions?
zB: Dienstag arbeite ich bis 15 und ich habe Circus Training um 20.
oder
Dienstag arbeite ich bis 15 und habe ich Circus Training um 20.
The second option feels right to me, because the word “Dienstag” is implied to be between “und” and “habe” (i.e. in position 1).
If the sentence was the other way around, I would say, “Ich arbeite Dienstag bis 15 und habe Circus Training um 20.” So again there is nothing in the second position 1 just an implied “ich”.
Which is the correct way?
Generally yes, BUT you have the option to skip elements in the second part If they have the same role in both parts.
So in your example, you can/should skip “Dienstag” and “ich”.
The first version you wrote is idomatic as well, but the second is not because a “gap” in position 1 implies that the subject was skipped, but then it comes.
Let me know if that clears it up :)
Ok I think that makes sense. So let’s say instead of me having circus training, it was you, I could say:
Dienstag arbeite ich bis 15 Uhr und du hast um 20 Zirkus-Training.
Right?
Side question: you just said you can’t skip Uhr but then you skipped it. Are you allowed to skip it because it’s repeated from the first section? And is that a spoken vs written thing? Because I’m sure people have skipped it when they’re texting me but now I’m gonna look out for it
Yup, the sentence is correct.
As for “Uhr”… you can skip it if there’s “um” in front, or colloquially, if it’s between 1-12.
Check out my article on time of day for more details on that mess :)
When do you invert the subject and verb, other than the time indication at the beginning?
Have you actually really read the article? Or did you skim it?
I’m asking because it’s a really important point that you ALWAYS invert, so if you read it and that didn’t come across, then I need to work on that.
I make sense of und and oder not counting by seeing them as joining words so after them it’s the start of a new sentence. Even when they are the first words in a sentence (because I’m old enough to have been taught not to start a sentence with a conjunction – a rule which I happily ignore!)
Incidentally, I love the new Quiz format, but the final words in green boxes are misplaced for me and I can’t read them. (Using Opera with Windows 10).
Yeah, that’s the main issue, the left button says “restart” and the right one says “show questions” (gives you an overview).
I’ll see that I can get this fixed this week, it’s annoying :)
Wow no grammer book ever menrioned that. They started with most useless things wasting time.
Like Articles and case system.
THANKYOU
Thank you! I have a question. I’m learning German with Duolingo, integrating with materials I find on the internet. I’ve found this sentence “Hat dich seit damals wirklich niemand besucht?”. I understand the position of HAT and BESUCHT, but I’m not getting why NIEMAND is right before BESUCHT. Is it a question of preference? Are there alternatives? Is there a kind of rule? My translation would be: “Hat niemand dich seit damals wirklich besucht?” Is it wrong? Thank you so much!!!
Interesting question!!
Your translation makes perfect sense. You put the subject “niemand” right after the verb, just like it is said in textbooks.
And it’s not wrong either, but having it late right before the verb is more idiomatic in this case.
The reason is that “niemand” is the “punch-line” of the whole sentence. And the punch-line comes at the end.
Usually, the subject is part of a sentence’s setup, but in this case it’s not.
I talk much more about that in my mini series on “word order” and also on the position of “nicht”. You’ll have a few light bulb moments when you read those :)
For what it’s worth, here are idiomatic options:
– Hat wirklich niemand dich seit damals besucht?
– Hat dich wirklich niemand seit damals besucht?
– Hat dich seit damals wirklich niemand besucht.
The further back the niemand goes, the more the focus it gets.
Hope that helps :)
Hi I just have a question about emphasis, if German is a head final language, why would moving something to the first position give it more emphasize. Does the rule of importance that more important things come later on only apply after the verb and the position 1 is the most important followed by the last position. Thanks.
It doesn’t necessarily give it more emphasis. Do I say that in the article (I don’t remember, it’s been a while that I’ve written it)?
But yes, this rule of importance starts working after the verb (together with a few other forces). Think of position 1 and 2 as special slots that are kind of outside the normal dynamic. That’ll make handling word order much easier.
have you read my articles on the position of “nicht” and the trilogy about “Word Order”? If not, I highly recommend those. They’ll make it more clear, with more examples.
Every time you misuse “begs the question”, I can hear my dad cringe. I personally don’t care, evolution of language and all, but I wonder… “what if he doesn’t know the super esoteric truth of that phrase?” But on second thought, you’d probably be much happier not knowing.
Oh, come on, now you have to tell me :)!! I’m super curious!!!
It’s not really that esoteric (just in case you haven’t discovered it in the meantime). Saying that an answer is “begging the question” really™ means that it “essentially smuggles in the answer via its assumptions”. ie, you’re pretty much implicitly assuming what you’re trying to demonstrate.
Which is completely different to the way the expression is typically (ab)used, where it’s taken to mean: “demands/begs_for a particular (follow-up) question to_be_asked”.
It’s definitely one of those things that gets up the nose of a lot of the dreaded “grammar mavens”. To be honest, I think this particular horse has long ago left the stable, run across several small European countries, continued through the heart of Asia, and is about to enter the outskirts for Beijing. In short, we should all just surrender and accept the second use as the (utterly) dominant one: the original is barely breathing at this point.
Wow, I can’t even say that I have understood the “real” meaning you described. And for sure I have never heard that on Youtube. And I have heard a LOT on YOutube.
Thanks for clearing that up. I’ll keep riding the new horse.
That’s definitely the right beast to mount ;-)
To be honest, I have really struggled finding a decent example of when the original/true meaning makes sense. You might hear someone try and justify why the bible is sacred to them by pointing to the fact that it’s divinely inspired, as is made clear in section xy.z, part three.
Another domain where such poor reasoning is rampant is discussions about the legality or morality of abortion, where both proponents and opponents tend to short-circuit logical demonstrations by considering a fetus or an embryo to be “human” or not at a particular stage of development, and thus their case is made by simply referring to existing laws and norms about “humans”.
Since you mentioned it… The for me most convincing argument on how to deal with the abortion question comes from Bernhard Williams, as it was framed by Vlad Vexler. Yes, Youtube.
In his commentary about Roe v Wade, he cut through a lot of the common discourse and read a passage of William about the issue. I think you might find it interesting (and I like sharing his work) so here you go :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvPjY8MtbH8
Nice pointer, thanks for that: I think the avenue Williams mentions provides a really helpful *stake in the ground* for such arguments. I actually went on a mini Bernard Williams tour yesterday, and read a couple of his other essays: he has an enviable ability to see through a really dense thicket of obfuscation and extraneous nonsense and somehow extract something useful and/or interesting from what’s hidden therein(#). Not sure if it was him or Vlad that I was being recommended above! The latter is also really interesting –it’s great to see someone thinking hard in real time– but I must confess to experiencing a strong desire for more *structure* by the end of the 20 minute presentation!
(#) Let me just open a small aside here, and blame German here for my increasing use of “therein”/”thereon”/”thereafter”/”therefrom” and similar constructions in English, whether or not they really make sense to anyone else, or even exist: the “da-” words are very lovely and well worth exporting! File under “How to low-key practise German while speaking English”.
Your use of “therein” felt 100% natural to me . And like fine essay English, but your comments always do :).
I recommended Vlad, and he read part of the essay and recommended Williams.
Lack of structure is why I stopped watching Vlad this year, and also because he is putting out just too many videos.
I originally started watching him, because he has been tracking the Russian administration in a weekly journal, he speaks Russians, comes from Russia and I think he has a good understanding of Putins mind… more so than 90% of the people talking about it anyway.
He has a chronic fatigue syndrom disease (forgot the name) and he is bedridden a lot of the day and struggling sometimes to create content. I think he’s also vain enough to humble brag about it sometimes (he’s self aware enough to know, too), but yeah, that’s why he feels a bit dissolved at times.
My favorite piece of him was a video about “expertise” where he said a quote I’ll never forget:
– The western citizen wakes up in the morning and instead of acquiring knowledge, thinks of themselves as someone who should just start creating knowledge.
The whole segment is 1000% spot on and what he says about experts, too. That they should talk ONLY about their field of expertise (publically) and say “I don’t know” otherwise.
We have this “philosopher” in Germany, Richard David Precht, who was REALLY famous a few years ago, selling millions of books. And now, in his… wait for it…. PODCAST… he talks with a famous TV host about any topic and gives people his “take”. Recently, he got a shitstorm because he Prechtsplained Jewish history to his audience completely messing up the facts.
Anyway, here’s the video… the sections about knowledge and experts are amazing, the rest a bit less so.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06hRNpGQEsY
Oh also, Vlad is a great person to watch if you want some actually informed counters to John Mearsheimer.