Hello everyone,
and welcome back to the most epic German grammar course on the web.
Today, with the second part of our look at
Passive Voice in German
In part one, we laid quite a bit of groundwork. We learned what passive is and what it’s used for, we learned about passive in English and the colloquial get-passive, we learned that passive is more like a spectrum and we talked about how to actually spot one.
Because… you know, before we have to worry about how to build passive voice in German, we have to know when we need one.
Actually, that’s the most important part, so let’s recap that bit real quick.
Hooray.
Recap of Passive Voice – Part 1
Take this sentence:
- I was disappointed a lot last year.
And now ask yourself: Is this passive?
If we’re just speaking English this matters exactly ZERO. No one cares. But it does matter if we want to translate the sentence to German.
And the best approach for us to figure out what we’re looking at is: using questions. Like… what question does a sentence or phrase answer to.
And the two questions that can help us clear things up with Passive are the following:
- What is/was being done to [X]?
- How is/was [X]?
If a phrase in a given context answers to question 1, it’s passive voice.
If it answers to question 2, we’ll just grade it “not passive”.
or actually, let me rephrase this:
If a phrase in a given context FEELS like an answer to question 1, it’s passive voice.
If it feels like an answer to question two, then it’s not passive.
Because context makes all the difference.
Cool.
So now let’s see how this works with our example:
- How was I last year?
I was disappointed a lot. - What was done to me last year?
I was disappointed a lot.
As you can see, BOTH make sense. To me, the second one feels more natural, but the first one could also work in the right context.
Context matters, and so the question test doesn’t always have “one” answer. The goal of it is rather to “amplify” how something feels.
Like… the questions help us get clarity about how WE perceive a phrase in a given context.
So, if you can “feel” passive voice then you won’t need them.
Anyway, if you want to read more about this I really recommend reading part one, especially if you haven’t read it yet.
So here’s the link.
Passive Voice in German – Part 1
And now, let’s jump in and find out how this actually helps us with passive voice in German.
When you learn about German passive voice in a course, textbook or a Youtube video you’ll almost certainly hear that there are two types of passive in German called Vorgangspassiv und Zustandspassiv.
Vorgangspassiv is built with werden and Zustandspassiv is built with sein, just like passive in English.
And trying to figure out the differences between these two types, and when to use which will be the main pain point for most of you.
I don’t think this approach is all that helpful, and I want to modify it a bit.
Here’s what we’ll do: we’ll take what the teaching mainstream calls Vorgangspassiv (the one with werden). So we’ll take that and we’ll call it:
Passive
And that other one, the Zustandspassiv, we’ll call “not passiv”.
Or wish.com-passive.
Because,here’s the thing: the “”””Zustandspassiv”””” is an absolutely useless concept. A non-cept if you will.
Because it’s not really about passive.
Why no one needs “Zustandspassiv”
We’ve seen in part one and also today’s intro, that the passive in English has a lot of overlap with descriptive statements, simply because both are formed with to be.
And we have established the question test as a way to get clarity about what we’re looking at, whenever we’re in the overlap area and our gut feeling doesn’t already tell us.
- What is/was done to X? – Passive
- How is/was X? – Not passive
The thing with the so called Zustandspassiv is simply that it only covers a portion of the NOT PASSIVE area.
Much easier as a visual so here it is:
This is a bit simplified of course, but that’s basically what’s going on.
Basically, if our gut or the question test say “That feels passive”, then we DO NOT NEED the Zustandspassiv. We need the Vorgangspassiv. Or Passiv as I like to call it. The one with werden.
Only if an example is NOT really passive voice based on our feeling or the question test, then it MAY OR MAY NOT actually be a Zustandspassiv in German.
Let me give you an example:
- The window was closed.
This is an example that can go either way. So it can be about what was done to the window (passive) or it can be a simple description of the window’s state (How was the window?).
Let’s take it as a simple description. Then, we these two options in German:
- Das Fenster war zu. (adjective description)
- Das Fenster war geschlossen. (“ZuStAnDsPaSsIv”)
Both sentences mean the exact same thing and have the exact same structure and yet, German grammar is making a distinction here and classifies the first one as a description and the second one as Zustandspassiv. Or at least that’s how several grammar teaching websites classify it.
And the big question is: how is this useful?
The answer is, it isn’t. Not for a German learner, anyway.
Making this distinction may have its place and use in linguistics, but for people who want to learn German it is absolutely useless. Worse even – it actively complicates something that doesn’t need to be complicated.
The forms of Zustandspassiv and normal description are the same and we do NOT need to tell them apart, especially since there is a LOT of ambiguity lurking there.
Literally the only distinction we need to make is this: is what we’re saying passive or not? Our gut is a great guide and if you’re uncertain, use the question test to get a better feel for the “essence” of the sentence.
And if you don’t really vibe with the questions, you can also try the get-passive that we talked about last time.
- [context blah blah context context] The window was/got closed. [blah blah some more context blah some really juicy details you only found because you read the entire blurb blah blah]
If you can swap in “got” here without the meaning changing too much, then you’re looking at passive voice.
The sentence is about what is done to something or someone.
Whenever that is the focus of the sentence we want to say or translate, then we use the Passive Voice in German – the one with werden, which we’ll talk about in a second.
And if that is NOT the focus of the sentence, then we’ll just not use passive and instead just translate it as it is.
- The window was closed for the entire morning, that’s why it’s so stinky in here.
This is pretty clearly not passive, but a statement about the state of the window. So we’ll just translate it with sein (to be).
- Das Fenster war den ganzen Vormittag zu/geschlossen….
And it doesn’t matter whether this is thechnically a Zustandspassiv or a description. No one cares!
In fact, if you want to expose your teacher a bit, Zustandspassiv is a great way to achieve that.
- Das Fenster war geschlossen.
- Das Fenster war den ganzen Tag geschlossen.
Just ask them, which of these is a Zustandspassiv and why and watch them squirm before they say “That’s leading too far for today, we’ll do that some other time.”
Anyway… I hope you got to see why “Zustandspassiv” isn’t really helping anybody and no one needs it. Except the German Teaching Industrial complex and its lizard overlords who get to fill up textbooks and Youtube videos with useless “Content”.
All right.
So now that we have found that there’s only one passive for us in German, let’s learn how to build it.
The real Passive in German – “werden”
English and (trigger warning) other Latin based languages like Spanish or French build their passive voice with the verb to be, but that’s not the only way.
Some languages like Swedish or Japanese do it by adding something to the verb and Arabic does it by changing the vowels within a verb.
And German does it by using the helper verb werden.
Which might seem like a weird pick, considering werden is ALSO the helper verb for the future.
But that choice makes a lot of sense, actually.
I have explored werden in detail in an older article, so I’ll leave the links below, but let’s do a short version here as well.
As a standalone, werden means for to become and that actually makes a lot of sense once you know its origin. It comes from the unapologetically ancient Indo-European root *wer-, which is also the root of words like invert, divert, extrovert, worm or wrist and the core theme of the family is the idea of turning, bending.
Now you might be like “Wait, what does that have to do with to become?”
But just look at this example:
- The day I became 30 was the best day ever.
- The day I turned 30 was the best day ever.
The verb to turn is often used in English in a sense of evolving or growing and it makes perfectly sense of you think of a growing wine plant winding and bending its way upward and sideward.
Actually, the ending -ward with its sense of directionality might even be the closest relative to werden and its sense of to become.
They’re both about “where something is headed” in a way.
- Ich werde wütend.
- I’m becoming angry.
“I’m headed “angry-ward”.”
That also helps understand why werden is used as a helper verb for the future tense, because the future is simply the “result” of where you’re headed in the present. Like… if you’re pubward bound now, you will be at the pub in the future.
- Ich werde in der Bar sein.
- I will be at the pub.
“I’m headed “being in pub”-ward.”
And the passive also fits right in, because as we’ve learned, the passive is about what is being done to someone or something. So in essence, it’s also about the “trajectory” or “path” of an entity, only that in passive, the entity is “brought there” by someone else.
- Das Buch wird geschrieben.
- The book is being written.
“The book is headed “written-ward”. “
Here, the book is headed toward the state of being written, but it doesn’t do so by itself, and instead is brought there.
So in its essence, werden always talks about where something or someone is “growing or going toward”, only with slightly different focusses – the process (to become), the end result (future tense) or the fact of being “brought” there (passive voice).
And actually, English has a verb that unites two of those ideas as well: to get.
- The unicorn is getting bored.
- The unicorn is getting photographed for Men’s Health Magazine.
So, I hope you can see how werden makes total sense for the passive voice.
And now, the only thing missing are a few examples of how this actually looks in practice, so let’s do that.
Using the werden-passive
And there really isn’t all that much new stuff if you already know your way around modal verbs and the past tense.
To build the passive, you just use werden and the ge-form of the verb.
- Die Pizza wird gegessen.
- The pizza is being eaten.
- Ich werde auf Arbeit “Captain Pause” genannt.
- I‘m called “Captain Break” at work.
- Die Wanderer haben das Gefühl, dass sie beobachtet werden.
- The hikers have the feeling that they’re being watched.
- Das Gaslight® – ein Restaurant mit revolutionärem Konzept. Du wirst so behandelt, wie in einer toxischen Beziehung.
- The Gaslight® – a restaurant with a revolutionary concept. You are/get/are being treated in the way you are treated in a toxic relationship.
That’s my new business idea, by the way.
Imagine – the wait staff lovebombs you as you walk in, then criticizes your order, then brings you something different and gaslights you about it, then gives you the silent treatment, throws a random fit over nothing, and maybe, if you’re lucky, ghosts you for an hour. Like… the guests would say they want to leave, but they just wouldn’t leave and instead keep ordering. Or if they do leave, they’d be back after a few days.
I think that’s a guaranteed success, especially in big cities. And it could be fun to work there, as well. Like, some people could really make a living off of being themselves. Let me know if you want to invest, or franchise it.
But anyway, I’m starting to lose focus, so let’s finish this real quick.
If you want to add the “agent” to the passive, which English does with by, in German this is done with von.
- Thomas wird von Maria fotografiert.
- Thomas is being photographed by Maria.
- Der Wanderer wird von dem Einhorn verfolgt.
- The hiker is followed/pursued by the unicorn.
And of course, we need to look at the past tense as well. For which we have two options.
The first one is with the “proper” past form of werden, wurde:
- Thomas wurde von Maria fotografiert.
- Thomas was photographed by Maria.
And the other one is with the spoken past, using the helper sein.
- Thomas ist von Maria fotografiert worden.
- Thomas was photographed by Maria.
The one important “oddity” here is that the ge- that we usually have is missing.
- Ich bin müde geworden.
- I became/got tired.
- Ich bin angerufen worden.
- I was/got called.
Why is it missing?
Because flow, I guess. It fits in with a broader pattern that has the absolutely not fun name “Ersatzinfinitiv” and the core of that pattern is basically that German doesn’t like using ge-forms if there are two verbs in a row. But that’s a bit too off topic for today.
Here’s another example for past:
- I wasn’t asked.
- Ich wurde nicht gefragt.
- Ich bin nicht gefragt worden.
As usual with the two types of past, there isn’t really a difference in meaning between the two. I mean, there can be, if you dig deep enough in the right contexts, but for all intents and purposes, you can think of the two examples above as the same.
Both types are in use and idiomatic. The one with worden sounds a bit more “high register” and formal, but that might also just be my personal bias.
Either way, worrying about the differences is really not worth your time as a learner, so I’d recommend picking the one with wurde and just go with that.
Now, those weren’t too many examples and we actually had nothing on the passive future and passive conditional, but I think we’ll actually call it a day here and instead do the rest as part of a big exercise.
Like… the basic structures of the werden-passive really aren’t anything new, as you’ve seen, so it’s not really all that useful if I dump more examples on you.
Instead, I think I’ll prepare one of these speaking exercises, and we’ll go over all the important phrasings and build up from simple to hard together, so you get to actually practise this a bit.
So the next episode will be that exercise and then, in part 4 of this three-part series, we’ll talk about all the fringe stuff and the various differences between German passive and English passive.
But for today, we’re done :)
As usual, if you want to check how much you remember, you can take the little quiz I have prepared for you – two quizzes actually.
The first one are some general recap questions, so you can check if you remember the key takeaways.
And the second one is a little quiz on spotting passive in English, with some tricky examples. So enjoy!!
And of course, if you have any questions or thoughts about anything we talked about today, just leave me a comment and I’ll do my best to clear it up.
I really hope you enjoyed this, have a great week and I’ll see you next time.
General Recap Quiz:
Can you Spot Passive:
In this quiz, I’ll give you a few sentences in English and ask you whether you need werden or not.
Please do let me know if you had trouble with this one and which questions, so I can try and clear things up.
further reading:
- Word of the Day – “werden” (Part One)
(has overlap with this article, but more detailed. And older)
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I understand the difference between current state and a change in state (War versus Wurde). In your example:
I wasn’t asked.
Ich wurde nicht gefragt.
Ich bin nicht gefragt worden.
Would “Ich war nicht gefragt” also be acceptable? If so, is there a difference in meaning?
It means something different. Like, “I wasn’t needed” or “I wasn’t desired.”
That’s because “gefragt sein” as a phrase can express the idea of “being sought after”.
If this usage didn’t exist, then “Ich war gefragt” sounds just weird.
Your question is basically if we could use “asked” as a description of a state that someone can put you in.
Like… someone asks you and that causes you to then “be asked”. This doesn’t really make too much sense in English.
If someone disappoints you, you’re then disappointed. That works well and here, you could use “sein” in German.
But “asking” is more transient.
Not sure if that helps, let me know if you need me to rephrase it.
Your reponse is helpful. At that point in the article I lost sight of the lesson being about Passive and got too wrapped with sentence structure. Thank you.
Neither your version not the AI version are correct and both versions would be hard /impossible for a native speaker to understand.
You used completely off base vocabulary.
“beherrschen” – to rule
“sich zu erheben” – to rise
The AI use “um zu” when it should be just “zu” and it kept “erheben” which should be “ergeben”.
The key thing here for you is that “befehlen” goes with DATIVE.
– Ich befehle dir etwas.
So the person getting the order is the indirect object and the order is the direct object.
German cannot do a Passive of the indirect object. So the indirect object STAYS the indirect object.
– Ich befehle den Soldaten, sich zu ergeben.
– Den Soldaten wird befohlen, sich zu ergeben.
This is the proper sentence. The AI used “hätten befehligt werden müssen” which means “would have had to be ordered”. NOt sure why it used that tense, the conditional is not needed for your English version.
“befehligt werden” is less common and the less idiomatic choice here.
Let me know if you have follow up questions.
And be weary about grammar explanations and corrections from AI. They’re like 75% correct and then the rest is just garbage.
They’re great to just have a conversation and practice reading, writing and speaking and listening, but they’re not trustworthy enough for grammar instruction imo.
I need some help here . I was recently having a “conversation” with an AI app (Langua) about the French surrender of the Maginot Line in WWII. What I thought I was saying was “the French soldiers were ordered to surrender”, die Soldaten haben beherrscht werden, um sich zu erheben. I was corrected to say “die Soldaten hätten befehligt werden müssen, um sich zu erheben.” I don’t understand how this was a conditional , nor the use of müssen. Thanks so much.
Neither your version not the AI version are correct and both versions would be hard /impossible for a native speaker to understand.
You used completely off base vocabulary.
“beherrschen” – to rule
“sich zu erheben” – to rise
The AI use “um zu” when it should be just “zu” and it kept “erheben” which should be “ergeben”.
The key thing here for you is that “befehlen” goes with DATIVE.
– Ich befehle dir etwas.
So the person getting the order is the indirect object and the order is the direct object.
German cannot do a Passive of the indirect object. So the indirect object STAYS the indirect object.
– Ich befehle den Soldaten, sich zu ergeben.
– Den Soldaten wird befohlen, sich zu ergeben.
This is the proper sentence. The AI used “hätten befehligt werden müssen” which means “would have had to be ordered”. NOt sure why it used that tense, the conditional is not needed for your English version.
“befehligt werden” is less common and the less idiomatic choice here.
Let me know if you have follow up questions.
And be weary about grammar explanations and corrections from AI. They’re like 75% correct and then the rest is just garbage.
They’re great to just have a conversation and practice reading, writing and speaking and listening, but they’re not trustworthy enough for grammar instruction imo.
I love this section; incredibly helpful. My English speaking brain is struggling with a future passive scenario , like „ you will always be disappointed“. Sie werden immer enttäuscht sein? Sie werden immer enttäuscht geworden ? Neither of the above?
It depends a bit on what you want to say. If you’re talking about the state of being disappointed, then it’s this:
– Sie werden immer enttäuscht sein.
If you want to talk about the ACT of getting disappointed again and again, you’d say
– Sie werden immer enttäuscht werden.
“enttäuscht” can be thought of as adjective in both scenarios. Like “old” would be.
So the question is which verb you need in future tense, to be or to become.
Does that help?
That helps enormously ! Thanks so much and I hope you had a great time in Italy.
Perfect. Thanks!
Hi Emanuel, please answer this :)
how we built passive voice
– when there is niemand, jemand
-when sentence starts with ques word
-when instead of specific sub we have ‘man’
also, I’ve tried so many relative clauses sentences still haven’t got the gist like what’s the standard way of making those sentences? or we have to construct according to the “how it sounds a good way”
like this sentence
Wir sind nach Agra gefahren. Wir waren von der fahrt sehr begeistert.
Here, nothing is common, how we make relative clause?
If there’s nothing in common, why would you want to make a relative sentence?
Relative sentences are a tool to attach additional information to an element in your sentence.
– The big blue pillow, which I bought at Target, is very soft.
The core sentence is “the pillow is very soft” but I have a bunch of additional information about the pillow that I want to squeeze in.
That’s what relative sentences are for.
– Sie wurde von niemandem gesehen.
– Von wem wurde das gemacht?
– Der Text musste dreimal verbessert werden.
– Uns wird nur selten geholfen.
Let me know if you have specific questions about these.
As for relative sentences… have you read my articles about it?
I don’t know I’m making lots of mistakes while making passive sentences.
if ques word is there perfekt clause, we change it to past right?
– Wir haben gestern einen film gesehen.
– Ein film wurde gestern gesehen.
Instead of akkusative object we have “man”, we use ” es” there ?
– Hier dürfen sie nicht rauchen
– Heute hat man mir nicht gedankt.
Why ‘es’ is required, please explain the construction here.
yes, I’ve read the article, slowly I’m making the progress :( B1 level ist nicht einfach
Sorry, but you seem to be asking 5 different things at the same time. You need to help me understand what it is that you’re not understanding about each example that you give. I can’t help you when you ask like this.
What do you mean by “instead of accusative object, we have “man”, we use “es”?
What are you asking there?
Then you give two examples without “es” and then you ask why “es” is required. Then you ask me to explain “the construction”, but construction of WHAT? Of all your four examples?
Sorry if this is a bit blunt, I really want to help you, but I can’t when your question is just a stream of thoughts.
I’m sorry that did sound blunt. the exam is tomorrow
present perfect is changed into past form?
Wir haben gestern einen film gesehen.
Instead of akkusative object we have “man”, we use ” es” there ?
Man hilft mir nicht
Man hat die tur aufgemacht
or no akkusative object
Die leute antworten mir freundlich
Hier dürfen sie nicht rauchen
when niemand, jemand is there
niemand hat sie hier gesehen.
I hope it makes sense now
also, the notification bell icon is not showing when I receive the reply.
Not really!
present perfect is changed into past form?
Wir haben gestern einen film gesehen.
Which present perfect are you talking about?
Instead of akkusative object we have “man”, we use ” es” there ?
Man hilft mir nicht
Man hat die tur aufgemacht
What does the accusative object have to do with “man”? Where is the “es” you’re mentioning.
Please be specific IN the comment, I do not see the full conversation when I am answering these.
or no akkusative object
Die leute antworten mir freundlich
Hier dürfen sie nicht rauchen
What is your question here?
I honestly do not understand what you’re asking me.
when niemand, jemand is there
niemand hat sie hier gesehen.”
Again, what are you asking?? “Wenn niemand, jemand is there”… what does that mean?
I think you need to invest a little more time into asking these things and imagine that on the other hand there is someone who has ZERO clue about what you’re struggling with.
If you rush your questions and make half or more of the question implicit, I have next to no chance to ever understanding what you’re looking for.
And just to be sure… I WOULD answer if I could, but I honestly do not understand any of the four things you’re asking.
Hey Emanuel, nice article but I still fell like I need a clarification. If a native english speaker told me “The window is closed” he could mean two things:
If a german native speaker told me “Das Fenster ist geschlossen” could that in any way, shape or form mean that someone is closing the window (rather than the window just being there, closed and nothing more). Or is the “werden” version absolutely necessary in order to express that thing.
No, “Das Fenster ist geschlossen.” is a description of a fixed state. It’s like saying “The window is blue.”
This state can of course be the result of someone’s actions, but that’s not what you mean, I think.
If you want to talk about a currently ongoing process of the window being closed, you do need “werden”.
Well, thanks for the lighting-speed answer. But I mean, what’s the point of classifying something as “Zustandspassiv” anymore. Both “Das Fenster ist zu” (description) and “Das Fenster ist geschlossen” (Zustandspassiv) talk about a fixed state. Why is the second sentence not classified as just another description? “Zustandspassiv” does feel like a useless, made-up term.
Well, one section of this article is about exactly that.
There are reasons that may matter to linguists but for learners, I find the concept pretty useless as well.
Hey Emanuel, I‘m a bit confused on why we use the Vorgangspassiv with a few intransitive verbs. Like I came upon „verfahren“ (in the sense of dealing with), which builds its perfekt mit sein and is also intransitive, but is still somehow used with the „werden“ passiv. Very confused.
Hi, I’d love to help but I’m not sure where you’re coming from. I’m not talking about intransitive verbs at all here and I don’t understand what that has to do with Passive at all.
Well, yes, it wasn’t in the article, and that’s why I was confused that you didn’t mention it. I’ve always read in grammar books that an intransitive verb can’t build the passive.
Oh, interesting.
That is absolutely wrong.
Was that a book about German grammar or English? Because maybe in English it’s impossible, but in German it’s definitely possible.
Thanks a lot for your answers. If I‘m understanding this correctly, the examples you gave are examples of the „Impersonal Passive“, right? „Hier wird gewandert“ works but „es wird (von ihm) gewandert wouldn’t work? That’s what I‘m a bit unclear on.
Apologies for the incorrect assumption; I was misremembering. Don’t even remember where I read it, but thank you for clearing that up!
„Impersonal Passive“ … not sure what you mean by that. Do you mean just a passive that doesn’t mention who does it?
– Das Buch wird gelesen.
This would then also be an impersonal passive, right?
– Es wird gewandert.
This does work, as does the version with “von ihm” (though that sounds super technical). The “es” is NOT a subject here though, it’s just a dummy filler to fill spot 1. It disappears as soon as you add something.
– Morgen wird es gewandert.. WRONG
– Morgen wird gewandert
I’ll talk more about these phrasings in part 3, which will come out soon.
In *Hammer‘s German Grammar and Usage*, the „impersonal passive“ is described as a passive with the es construction.
Looking forward to part 3!
All right, I now looked it up and it is indeed the passive without a subject. I think using “es” as the defining element is hugely misleading though, as this “es” is just a dummy that can also be there if we’re having a subject.
– Es wurde Thomas ein Buch gegeben.
The name “impersonal passive” is misleading too.
I think it should be called “subject-less passive” because that’s what it is.
– Im Urlaub wird entspannt.
Part of the reason I started this website actually is my hatred for the “teaching establishment” and stupid, misleading terms like “impersonal passive”, especially if the come with misleading explanations :).
also for the “Ich bin müde geworden“ or the “Ich bin angerufen worden” i think the ge- might be removed because in angerufen it already shows that its past tense so you don’t need to show past tense again in geworden. Maybe. i’m not too sure but that’s how i logicalized it.
It might also be just a result of how the ge-past form developped historically, and people just got stuck with the specific rhythm. But it can totally help to think of it in terms of avoiding double marking.
how can you tell the difference in the sentence “Ich werde auf Arbeit “Captain Pause” genannt” meaning like “I will be called ‘Captain Pause’ at work” (as in, I will actively slack of so that it will be my nickname) and the passive version of “i am called”
If you want to mark it as explicite future, you either need to add an indication of time or you need to use future tense.
– Nächstes Jahr werde ich auf Arbeit Captain Pause genannt, da bin ich mir sicher.
– Ich werde Captain Pause genannt werden.
The second option sounds a bit pompous.
Ahh gotcha. Thanks!
I was surprised to see you mention Arabic here! Have you studied it before? :)
It’s almost always safe to presume, if one’s not an Arab nor living in an Arab country, they have no clue of Arabic whatsoever. But we do have an alphabet that looks bizarre to anyone who doesn’t speak Farsi or Urdu, so that’s understandable.
Oh absolutely not and I have no intention to. I’m currently learning Bulgarian and then Russian would be next. And if I were to learn a REALLY DIFFERENT language, then it would be Japanese.
But I do sometimes check how a grammar concept varies across languages and Arabic, being such a big branch, it’s interesting how things work there.
That’s what I thought. :)
We have a A LOT of grammar stuff, that’s for sure. But a German guy looking up Arabic grammar concepts in English? Well that’s something else :D
A quick tip in case you’re interested: You wrote here that Arabic changes vowels in the passive voice. That’s not exactly true. We change the movement of the letters as we call it, aka their pronuciation. But the letters themselves are 100% the same in most cases, vowels and constants.
And since one word could have more than one pronunciation, we have little signs for each letter that help us read them correctly, in case we need them. The process of adding those signs is literally called to shape the letter.
Ah, nice, thanks for the clarification :)
Bitte :)
Hey Manuel! Could you please make the post available for download as well?
Thanks in advance!
Ops, sorry, I forgot!!
A basic version should be up now. I need some more time for the nicely formatted one.
How do you download this?
You click the “pdf”-button above the comment section.
OK, so I’m playing tortoise to everyone else’s hare in this series about the passive voice, but for some reason it just hasn’t been resonating with me until the last day or so. I think I misread a few of the logical implications in the first article, and they haunted me through this one until today’s reread. All of which is interesting to pretty much *nobody*, so I’ll move right along!
Most importantly the “passive is werden passive and screw the Zustandspassiv (for the most part)” is actually really liberating: almost every example of the Zustandspassiv that I’ve tripped across has been something of a headscratcher, but *only* when they’ve been labelled as examples thereof. Otherwise I’d have just skipped right on by, sucked the meaning out of them without a second thought, and been on my merry way. The label just made me stop, convince myself I was obviously missing something fundamental, and thereby caused an additional three of my hairs __grau zu werden__. So thanks very much for the “get-out-of-passive-jail-free” card.
A small handful of typos etc…
==================
we’ll so that some other time => we’ll *d*o that some other time
lizzard => liz**ard
thechnically => t**echnically
Ersatzinfinitv => Ersatzinfinit*i*v
sounds a tad bit more => sounds a tad ** more (“a tad” is just another way of saying “a bit”. You might say, for example, that a critical review of a novel is “a tad over the top”, or a steak is “a tad underdone”)
One last thing: in my book the paragraph
==================
__So in its essence, werden always talks about where something or someone is “growing or going toward”, only with slightly different focusses – the process (to become), the end result (future tense) or the fact of being “brought” there (passive voice).__
==================
is PURE GOLD, and by itself worth much, much more than the price of admission!
I have been wanting to write about Passive for years, and the main thing that was always in my head was how much I hate the giant focus on those “two different passives”.
So this angle is at the core of the series and honestly, this disdain for how it’s taught may be the main reason why I wrote it.
I did hate-watch some Youtube videos on the topic before, just to hype me up.
But it’s very well possible that this was a bit too extreme. I’m leaning heavily into my narrative, but maybe a bit less would have been easier to follow.
So I’m really happy to hear that it grew on you and that it feels liberating. That really was the main puprose… to take the academic tension out of something rather simple.
Hey man, I just wanted to quickly “check on you” :).
It’s been a while since you’ve commented and I do notice it if my regulars go MIA.
And since someone barked at you last time for the effort of correcting mistakes… I hope that didn’t make you stop. (I don’t think so, but you never know).
No need to reply, I hope you’re doing swell.
Haha, thanks for checking. I’m doing OK, just been a bit flat with the German learning side of things of late, so not “forcing the issue”: instead it’s been a bit of “sometimes tedious, yet somewhat practical” vocabulary learning with Anki, and the odd podcast or two to keep things afloat. I don’t think it had anything to do with being barked at, at least not consciously, but the ways of the unconscious are both strange and manifold!
Fear not (or *fear*, as the case may be), I’ll be back on board fairly soon. I’ve been slowly digesting the articles behind the scenes and scribbling away a little, so all that will doubtless emerge at some stage, accompanied by the usual smattering of vaguely related nonsense ;-)
Awesome :D!!
Let that German simmer then, like a good stew, and I shall wait for the return of the king (of camp)!
The Gaslight… Just sounds like regular service around here
Oh no, my business idea :D
As ever a wonderful article! I really don’t know if I could get through my German language course without you! And I wouldn’t have you if it weren’t for the rest of the lovely community here. I am currently on a very low income and was not able to afford the monthly subscription, but thanks to the kindness of Emanuel and the glorious people who pay a little extra each month I am able to read to my hearts content. So a really genuine heartfelt thank you to all of you
Willkommen :)!!
Recently a student asked about the difference in German between:
“Morgen werde ich nach Helgoland fahren” vs. “Morgen fahre ich nach Helgoland”
I thought for several minutes and replied that while both sentences mean essentially the same, the distinction is almost lost in English, although the first sentence implies a farther off goal than the second.
“Morgen habe ich ja die Absicht, dorthin zu kommen [..nur vielleicht nicht]” in sentence one, as opposed to “Morgen steige ich einfach ins Auto und gebe halt Vollgas, bis ich mein Ziel erreiche!” in sentence two.
It’s a subtle distinction in English, yet more emphatic in German, don’t you think?
English has more options for how to express the future, with a range of nuances.
…sounds like a spontaneous idea (“I think I’ll drive…”).
…sounds either like a non-native speaker expressing a plan, or someone insisting despite opposition on what they intend to do, or maybe someone being a bit more formal and suggesting their part in a larger plan…?
…sound pretty interchangeable to me. Maybe the “going” version is a little more about the drive to Helgoland as a complete action being the intention for tomorrow? Whereas “I’m driving” is more flexible and could emphasize the action or the time. It would also fit best in the context of “I can’t do XYZ with you tomorrow because I’m driving to Helgoland.”
…is all about saying what is on tomorrow’s itinerary. It sounds very clearly pre-planned.
Wait, so “I drive to Helgoland tomorrow” is actually proper English?
I feel like I got corrected a few times for not using future tense.
Exactly, it isn’t! That much English grammar I know LOL
“I drive to Helgoland [..every day]” – als fortlaufende Taetigkeit!
“I’m driving to Helgoland tomorrow” – ein einmaliges Ereignis!
“I’ll drive to Helgoland tomorrow”. – zielgerichtetes Vorhaben!
It’s absolutely idiomatic (*at least for AE*), if you understand that it has a marked connotation.
I’d say that when you’ve been corrected, it’s because you used “I drive” when “I’m driving” would have fit the situation. If you’re using a present tense with future meaning, the continuous “I’m doing X tomorrow” is what you need for the vast majority of cases, and you should probably more or less forget about “I do X tomorrow,” haha.
But I’d absolutely use it if I were discussing my calendar with somebody I’m trying to make an appointment with:
A time frame as soon as “tomorrow” might be unusual for this usage, but definitely not unheard-of. To flip it around a little bit:
…would actually be just as idiomatic as “What time are you leaving” to me, and
…would be far and away the most idiomatic option for asking about a planned arrival time.
Even though a second language speaker, I would have said
“I’m flying to Warsaw on the 17th..”, however in making a sort of laundry list, I suppose I could say, “I fly to Warsaw on the 17th, meet Jacek for dinner that evening, then fly back to Helsinki…..” for instance.
It sounds rather slangy to me though:-)
I’m not sure I’d say “slangy,” exactly, but yeah, it definitely fits the “laundry list” vibe. Or maybe it’s best to think of it as sort of narrating future events as if present.
I’d also say it maybe sets those events apart from your personal agency, if that makes sense. Like, the flight to Warsaw is happening, irrespective of whether I want or choose to make that flight – it’s a datum to deal with. Similarly:
“Is/are playing” would be fine, but simple present absolutely works.
It is! Just like berlingrabers said. And to make it even more fun, you can have an adverb in position 1.
– Tomorrow I fly back home.
Yes, right.
I feel like works in a specific context… where you’re telling someone the details of your plan, because you want to get einverstanden about the timelines.
– Tomorrow I get home from work at 5:00. I park downtown about 6:00 and pick up the tickets from the theater. We meet at the restaurant at 6:15. etc.
You might see it in popular culture where some criminals are going over the details of their plan the night before they execute it. (Or good guys, I guess.)
It’s kind of like transplanting yourself into the future and giving it a “dry run.”
Any time this would work you could also just say “I’ll” or “I’m going to.”
Gosh, now I’m having a vague flashback to the book of 500 French verbs I was studying last summer, which enumerated bajillions of usages of the English present tense that I’d never thought about before… can’t check it though, but why do I feel like there’s probably a specific French tense for this? Lol
Love it!! Such an intuitive way to describe it.
To me, the version with the actual future tense sounds a bit more formal, and I guess that would fit well in a scenario where you’re not just downright excited about the trip. So I think I’d agree with what you said :).
Just to make sure for some students reading this who’re not yet advanced… the example in the comment is a future tense, and not passive voice.
Right now i’m still a college student so i don’t really have the fund for membership yet, that is why i’m really thankful for the sponspors and Emanuel for the chance of being a member! i’m really really appreciate it ^^
I’d love from you an exhaustive run-down of the uses of “werden”, and especially on what I find most confusing:
Passive: Perfect, Pluperfect, Future 1 (Present), Future 2 (Past/Perfect);
Konjunktiv 2-Passive: Present/Future, Past, Future 2 (Pluperfect);
Passive-Modal: Present, Past, Perfect, Pluperfect, Future 1 (Present), Future 2 (Pluperfect)
Gibt es da eine innere Logik oder gar eine Eselsbrücke?
My plan was to intergrate it into the exercise because it felt like it would be too much for this article.
But since we’re in the comments, here you go:
The only irregularity here is that it’s “worden” and not “geworden” for the past. Other than that, the verb is “werden” with an “adjective” (the ge-form) and that then gets put into the various tense with a helper verb.
Let me know if you have questions about a specific one.
I’m very interested in these too. Obviously if you are planning on covering them somewhere else I can wait, otherwise I’d be intrigued to learn more here.
I don’t really understand whats going on here:
Ich werde von Maria angerufen worden sein.
nor do i really understand:
Ich habe angerufen werden können.
I’m actually not sure yet how I want to cover them, because they’re quite useless.
I’m definitely happy to do it in the comments though, so lessss goooo.
– Ich werde von Maria angerufen worden sein.
This is Future 2.
You can think of “angerufen worden” as an adjective, then things should fall into place.
English as a reference is a bit misleading here, because it uses “have” as a helper.
Let’s do a progression
– Ich werde von Maria gelangweilt. (Present)
– Ich wurde von Maria gelangweilt. (Past)
– Ich bin von Maria gelangweilt worden. (the other past)
In the last one, I added the proper helper in position two, and put the verb “werden” into its ge-form, with the specialty being that we have to skip the “ge-”
– Ich werde von Maria gelangweilt. (Present)
– Ich werde von Maria gelangweilt werden. (Future 1)
Future 2 is basically taking the spoken past and moving it to the future by using “werden”.
– Ich bin von Maria gelangweilt worden.
– Ich werde von Maria gelangweilt worden sein.
All that happened is that I put “sein” into the future beasically, and it moved to the rear.
Does that help?
Now the other one:
– Ich werde von Maria besiegt.
– Ich kann von Maria besiegt werden.
– Ich bin von Maria besiegt worden.
– Ich kann von Maria besiegt worden sein.
I add a modal in present tense and the spoken past helper goes to the end, is all.
Does that help?
I mean, it might be useless but it will frustrate me forever if i don’t know whats happening ; )
Ich werde von Maria gelangweilt worden sein.
So this is basically more or less like “i will be bored by Maria”
?
Is there a difference between these two , if only in tone?
Ich werde von Maria angerufen werden.Ich werde von Maria angerufen worden sein
Ps, i didn’t understand the answer to the second one at all : )
I was interested in this.
Ich habe angerufen werden können.
– Ich werde von Maria angerufen werden.
“At some point in the future, I will be called by Maria.”
– Ich werden von Maria angerufen worden sein.
“At some point in the future, I will have been called by Maria.”
“gelangweilt” wasn’t a good choice by me actually, as it is hard to diffentiate the state there.
– Ich habe angerufen werden können.
This is the past tense of “Ich kann angefuen werden”.
– Ich kann dich anrufen.
– Ich konnte dich anrufen.
– Ich habe dich anrufen können. (Ersatzinfinitv)
– Ich kann angerufen werden.
– Ich konnte angerufen werden.
– Ich habe angerufen werden können.
super danke dir!
…..Ich wurde von Maria angerufen.
More written than spoken to my ears/eyes!
One thing I haven’t seen mentioned about the agents… I was taught that the agent is introduced by “von” if it’s human (or animals) and for things you use “durch”
You can forget that! There may be a slight trend but overall, this “rule” will fall apart once you look at actual German (including written German). And it fails both ways. So “durch+person” exists and “von+thing” does too.
i think its farily common when dealing with nominalisation (b2/c1) e.g. die durch seine Eltern erworbene Krankheit des Nachbarn …
(Emanuel will correct me if i am wrong)
It is fairly common, but this particular example is not a passive voice to me.
It’s more like an active participle construction with “durch seine Eltern” having the sense of “through the channel” or “by means of”.
I gave some thought to the difference between passive with “von” and “durch” and I’ve settled on this:
– “von” implies a more direct intent
– “durch” leans unintentional
– Die durch die Flut zertörten Häuser…
– Die von der FLut zerstörten Häuser…
Both are correct, but the second one is closer to the flood doing this intentionally. It doesn’t MEAN that, it’s just closer to it.
– Die Dateien werden von/durch einer/eine Software gelabelt.
Here, “von” is the better choice, at least to my feeling, because sorting this is the purpose of the software, not a byproduct.
ah ok, yeah i wasn’t thinking about passiv specifically actually.. But yeah, interesting…
The description of passiv cleared up a lot of doubts I had, thanks. But one important question, how would you translate “German Teaching Industrial complex” to German? In the past I tried “sprachlernende industrieler-komplex” but I have no idea if that works in German.
I would go for
-Sprachlehr-Industrieller Komplex
It’s not as common a phrasing in German though, as “military industrial complex” is in English. It just doesn’t roll off the tongue well.
“I was bored by the movie” to me is 100% passive because of the use of “by”- i.e. the movie bored me. However “I was bored at the movie/during the movie/whilst watching the movie” would be 100% an adjective.
“I was bored by the lake” on the other hand is probably a description, as although the lake could bore me it’s more likely I mean I’m sitting by the lake and happened to be bored. “By” has two meanings (at least).
Another vote there. Although the adverb “very” suggests “bored” is just an adjective – how I was – it can also mean HOW the movie acted on me. I was made “very bored” by the film. Because of the way “langweilen” takes an indirect object (or a reflexive form: sich langweilen = to be bored) this may not be the clearest example to use.
I modified the answers and the explanations in the quiz a bit to make it more clear.
It doesn’t matter what the German verb is here though. The only question that matters is, is the sentence I am looking at about “A does X to B” or is it about “B is like this at the moment”
Interesting example!!
Like you said, “by the lake” can be a location, or it can be the lake that bored you.
If you assume that the speaker means that they found the lake boring, would you then say it’s 100% passive the way you say that about the sentence with the movie?
Because if not, then Passive would depend on the agent (movie vs lake), which would be a whole new dimension.
Also, what about:
Does that feel like Passive voice to you? Like, does that feel like it’s about what’s happening to you rather than how you feel at the time?
I’m asking because to me, it feels VERY much like a description and I would never ever translate that with “werden”.
If you assume “by the lake” isn’t meant as a location then yes it’s 100% passive.
“I am bored by this movie” is just a bit weird but yes again passive. It’s weird because present tense passive is for repeat actions or habits, or telling a story (which would most likely be in the third person) and none of those fit. I would interpret that as a mistake and that you meant to say “bored of this movie”. However you could say “The congregation is bored by his sermon every week” and that’s definitely passive.
“I was very bored by the movie” – is just incorrect IMO. Again passive because of by, but you can’t “bore someone very”. “I was thoroughly bored by the movie” works and that definitely sounds like something that’s done to you. Just to make it more confusing a natural sentence would be “I was very bored by the end of the movie”, which is a different meaning of by and I’d definitely interpret that as a description of how you felt at the end of the movie and not that the end of the movie bored you.
I think the point here is that to me “by” is just the wrong preposition and it should be “bored of” or “bored with” if it’s a description of how you feel.
Hmmm, I feel like you’re coming at this more from the angle of grammar analysis, right?
If you leave that aside for a second, and you take the sentence “I was bored by the lake”… do you perceive this to be more about what is done to you or more about how you feel?
The reason I’m asking is because coming from a grammar standpoint is not really helping with deciding how to translate it.
If you look at it as the passive that it is grammatically, you’ll then have to make a decision which passive version to use in German and that has a lot of fringe and confusing examples lurking in the dark.
If instead you leave the grammar aside and focus on the “essence” of the sentence (is it about what’s done to me, or not), then I feel like it’s easier to translate it correctly. Maybe not this particular example, but like I said, there’s a lot of gray area.
– Dinner is served at 8.
– Dinner is served by a talking cat.
– Dinner is served, come eat.
– I was exhausted by the thought of scaling the mountain.
– I was exhausted.
– The air was exhausted through a pipe.
I feel like checking the “essence” instead of checking whether it’s grammatically a passive construction is more helpful for translating these.
Yet another (noch eine andere) vote for DEmberton’s reaction above. And yes, it is clear that diagramming the sentences (i.e. doing the grammatical analysis foisted on us in elementary and junior high school in the 1950s and 1960s) won’t help us learn German. On this topic, you have convinced me that the best way to teach us passive (of either kind), is just to throw LOTS of examples at us until we have it in our ears and our bones….
– Das Abendessen wird um 20ooUhr serviert werden.
– Dinner WILL BE served by 8pm.
– Das Abendessen wird um 20oo Uhr serviert.
– Dinner IS BEING served by 8pm.
I have changed the example in the quiz to this now:
Does it still feel 100% like a passive?
Just to make sure… the goal is NOT grammar analysis. So the point is not to check against an English passive test. The goal is to understand what the example is really about at its core – a description or a “A does X to B”. Because that’s the best guide to translating it.
American here to agree, it sounds super wrong to imagine that as a description, because of the “by”.