— She is coming.sie (+ plural verb)theySie kommen. The word sie is famously overloaded in German. In casual speech, Germans often switch to er or sie based on the child’s actual gender, but the grammatical rule says es. This feels strange to English speakers, but it is grammatically correct. Der Computer funktioniert nicht.
In the first example, it sounds REALLY weird, in the second one, both sound okay. And er, sie, es are pronouns, so they stand in for persons and things in our sentence. If you’re looking for my lessons, articles about topics or resources I have posted about, search here.
- It sounds weird to refer to the bartender as pretty, as only feminine things can be pretty, while guys are handsome.
- And they can handle being in the first position of a sentence.
- Another thing that’s important to know is that der and die can sound less personal and distant, while er and sie sound a bit more like people.
- Casesie (they)Sie (you formal)NominativesieSieAccusativesieSieDativeihnenIhnen
- This is pretty natural and a German would certainly use it.
If I wanted to do a slight dig I might refer to a guy as a pretty boy (like Arnold S’s girly man reference). For me – American (and older) – pretty is feminine. You can describe a guy as pretty, but then it is a “girlish” appearance (and generally not really a complement). I can find a lot of instances of “pretty guy” for instance.
In this example, I don’t feel there’s a difference between “er” and “der”, but if we make it a conevrsation then der gets a slight edge, for me anyway. I think most people would read this as “about Thomas” because the topic is more important for the verb “berichten” than the person doing it. And the only difference really is that the version with sie sounds less pointy and a bit more personal. For practice on the go, download the Deutschwunder app and master German articles, pronouns, and grammar anywhere.
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“das ist” or “es ist” – learners often wonder about the difference and the German way of doing it is a little different than English. My handmade dictionary for learners – meanings, word families, examples and all without AI slop.
er and sie vs der and die
I think the most important aspect is definitely the pointy-ness though and in the right context, that can be used to make your sentence less ambiguous. And in reverse, when talking about things, they still might use der or die, because er or sie feels a bit too much like a person. This is quite subtle, and it doesn’t always matter, but in some contexts, it can make a difference in tone.
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This explanation really clarifies the nuances between these German pronouns and articles. Listen to natives and copy sentence starts where ‘der’, ‘die’, ‘das’ appear. Avoid starting a sentence with ‘es’ when it refers to a specific thing. Whether that guy is there or not I really don’t care.
It sounds weird to refer to the bartender as pretty, as only feminine things can be pretty, while guys are handsome. The verb phrase is “berichten von”, so a native speaker would not be confused about the topic vs subject based on context, unless it’s REALLY vague. In fact, even some people from Cologne did it and it’s super odd to me because in Berlin we don’t do it. It always feel a bit strange to me (I’m English) to use er/sie to refer to objects not people, but much less so to use der/die.
Feminine Nouns → sie
— The table aphrodite casino is new. If you know a noun’s article, you automatically know which pronoun to use. This applies to people, animals, objects, and abstract concepts alike. The critical difference is the “Used for” column. Understanding er, sie, and es is essential because these three small words do far more work in German than their English equivalents.
- Today, we’ll actually look at the difference between two groups.
- Only capitalization and context distinguish them.
- Which can make you feel lost… but it can also feel like freedom.
- Sometimes you can but they feel different.
- It’s not really wrong, but it does sound a bit odd and I don’t think a German would use it.
- The fastest way to internalize the link between articles and pronouns is through repeated practice.
— You are coming.ihr (dative of sie)her / to herIch gebe ihr das Buch. FormMeaningExamplesie (+ singular verb)she / it (feminine)Sie kommt. The table is masculine, so it gets the masculine pronoun.
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And this is also a fact.I’m about to do just that, because the beer is there, and we’re pretty much done here for today. This does NOT work because es stands for the beer and but for the beginning of the sentence, you need a word with more substance. And do NOT use es at the start of a sentence. But the bottom line is… don’t stress about this too much. It’s really a difference of vibe.