All nouns, pronouns and some street names are capitalized. The German language has three articles and these show declension. In the following lines you’ll know more about German grammar.
In German, nouns are written with capital letters at the beginning. For example Kindheit, resulting in childhood. Another example is Rhythmust, which translation is rhythm. This can be seen more clearly in the following sentence: Johann hatte eine glückliche Kindheid. This translates as John had a happy childhood. You can see here that the noun Kindheit is capitalized.
When you start to learn German, to capitalize nouns may seem difficult. But then you get used to it and come to do it naturally. What you need to do is identify the nouns, which is not very difficult if you have idea about them.
Also, when it comes to pronouns, there are cases where we write these capitalized. The pronoun of familiarity dir (you) and the corresponding possessive pronoun deine (your), are written in lowercase. However, in the letters can be capitalized. For example:
Liebe Ingrid, Wie hat Dir Deine Schule gefallen? Herzlich Grüße, Dein Wilhelm
This means: Dear Charlotte, How did you like your school? Best regards, William
Here you can see that the pronouns dir (you) and deine (your) are written in uppercase.
But the courtesy pronouns Sie (you) and their corresponding possessive pronoun Ihren (your), should always be written with capital letters. For example:
Haben Sie schon Ihren Flug gebucht?
Which means: you already booked your flight?
Another case in which it is capitalized, is when it comes to names of streets, squares and bridges.
The first word of a street name is capitalized, as well as the adjective and numeral corresponding to the name. We can see here in these examples:
An den Zwei Pforte Kleine Bahnhof Straße
Which translates: At the two gates Small street from the station
Regarding the street names I would mention that in Germany the signs are very clear. For a foreigner it is not difficult to find an address with the help of this excellent signage and the existence of good plans that are available in modules of information. Even if someone wants to go walking in the woods, you can find maps of these and see that the signaling pathways is painted on the trunks of trees, so it is very hard to miss.
Let me turn briefly to the declension of the articles used in the German language. There are two kinds of articles: definite and indefinite ones.
Defined articles are three: der, die, das, and correspond to masculine, feminine and neuter genders respectively. We also have their plural, which is the article die. All these four correspond to the article the in English.
The undefined ones are: ein, eine, ein, which belong to the masculine, feminine and neuter genders too. They have no plural. These articles correspond to a, an in English.
German is a language of flexion and the articles show declension in four modes which are called: nominative, genitive, dative and accusative. These causes the articles have various endings depending on the case. For example in the case of article der, its declension will be: der, des, dem, den. In the case of article die it will be: die, der, der, die. In the case of das it will be: das, des, dem, das. And in the case of plural article die it shall be as follows: die, der, den, die. These declensions match to the nominative, genitive, dative and accusative respectively, in that order.
Regarding the indefinite article, in the case of article ein is: ein, eines, einem, einen. For eine it will be: eine, einer, einer, eine. And in the case of ein is: ein, eines, einem, ein. Also correspond to the order above.
This declension is used according to the actions that follow in a sentence. The nominative case is when the article is indicating an aspect of nomination, e.g. the car, translated: das Auto. The genitive case indicates possession or ownership. Example: the speed of the car, which translates: die Geschwindigkeit des Autos. In this case there are two articles, the first is nominativ and the second is genitive. The dative case indicates a management action, e.g. Igive the child. And it translates Ich gebe dem Kind. Finally the accusative case indicates determination or definition. Example: I give the child the ball. That means, Ich gebe dem Kind den Ball. Where the first is dative and the second one is accusative.
Enrique Bracamonte lives in Peru. He graduated as Graphic Designer at the Bergische Universität in Wuppertal, Germany. He worked for several Advertising Agencies and Print Houses too. Recently he visited a course about Religion and Culture at the University Antonio Ruiz de Montoya in Lima. His website is http://www.germanlearningsite.com
