German personal pronouns
In German, as in English, the personal pronoun family comes in very handy in all kinds of situations when you want to talk (or write) about people, including yourself, without repeating names all the time.
With German personal pronouns, the biggest difference is that you have to distinguish among three ways to formulate how to say you to your counterpart: du, ihr, and Sie. Other personal pronouns, like ich and mich (I and me) or wir and uns (we and us), bear a closer resemblance to English. Note: The genitive case isn’t represented among the personal pronouns because it indicates possession; the personal pronoun mich (me) can represent only a person, not something he or she possesses.
Notice in the following table that you and it don’t change, and the accusative (for direct objects) and dative (for indirect objects) pronouns are identical in English.
| Person | Subject Pronoun (Nominative) |
Direct Object Pronoun (Accusative) |
Indirect Object Pronoun (Dative) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person singular | ich (I) | mich (me) | mir (me) |
| 2nd person singular, informal | du (you) | dich (you) | dir (you) |
| 3rd person singular (masculine) | er (he, it) | ihn (him, it) | ihm (him, it) |
| 3rd person singular (feminine) | sie (she, it) | sie (her, it) | ihr (her, it) |
| 3rd person singular (neuter) | es (it) | es (it) | ihm (it) |
| 1st person plural | wir (we) | uns (us) | uns (us) |
| 2nd person plural, informal | ihr (you) | euch (you) | euch (you) |
| 3rd person plural | sie (they) | sie (them) | ihnen (them) |
| 2nd person formal, singular or plural | Sie (you) | Sie (you) | Ihnen (you) |
German regular verb forms in the present tense
Talking and writing in German is usually a matter of knowing how to construct a verb in the present tense with the help of a noun (subject) and a few other elements. Most German verbs are regular, meaning they follow a standard pattern of conjugation.
To conjugate a regular verb in the present tense, just drop the -en from the infinitive and add the appropriate ending to the stem. In the present tense, English has only the ending -s or no ending at all (I live, you live, he lives), whereas German has four endings (-e, -st, -t, and -en).
In the following table, arbeiten (to work) represents a verb type that has slightly different endings in the du, er/sie/es, and ihr forms; tanzen (to dance) and heißen (to be called ) stand for types with different endings in the du form. Verb endings are indicated in bold.
| Person | Wohnen (to live) | Arbeiten (to work) | Tanzen (to dance) | Heißen (to be called) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ich | wohne | arbeite | tanze | heiße |
| du | wohnst | arbeitest | tanzt | heißt |
| er/sie/es | wohnt | arbeitet | tanzt | heißt |
| wir | wohnen | arbeiten | tanzen | heißen |
| ihr | wohnt | arbeitet | tanzt | heißt |
| sie/Sie | wohnen | arbeiten | tanzen | heißen |
German modal verbs in present tense
In German, modal verbs modify the main verb in the sentence. Here’s how they work: You take a plain old verb or phrase like eat, sleep, walk, plant a garden, play tennis, learn how to play chess, or do nothing. Then you think about your attitude toward these activities, and you decide you want to say I like to eat, I must sleep more, I would like to walk every day, I should plant a garden, I can play tennis well, I want to learn how to play chess, or I may do nothing. The underlined modal verbs offer you a wide range of ways to express your attitude toward actions such as eat, sleep, play, and learn.
Modal verbs such as obligation (sollen), ability (können), or permission (dürfen) usually come in second position; any other verbs get booted to the end of the sentence or clause. Modal verbs may stand alone without the main verb when the meaning of the main verb is clear from the context.
These verbs all have regular verb endings in their plural forms (wir, ihr, sie, and Sie). Most of them also have irregular verb changes, some of which you can see in the examples in the following table.
| Person | Dürfen (may, to be allowed to) | Können (can, to be able to) | Mögen (to like) | Möchten (would like) | Müssen (must) | Sollen (should) | Wollen (to want to) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ich | darf | kann | mag | möchte | muss | soll | will |
| du | darfst | kannst | magst | möchtest | musst | sollst | willst |
| er/sie/es | darf | kann | mag | möchte | muss | soll | will |
| wir | dürfen | können | mögen | möchten | müssen | sollen | wollen |
| ihr | dürft | könnt | mögt | möchtet | müsst | sollt | wollt |
| sie/Sie | dürfen | können | mögen | möchten | müssen | sollen | wollen |
