We're spending the first days of this semester's German class "reading" a simplified version of Verena Plank's story about the Holocaust. Prof R tells us that the story is designed to be read by children with about 800-1000 German vocabulary words. The story is accompanied by odd, cartoon-like illustrations that I find disconcerting. It seems wrong to see child-like drawings accompanying a book that includes starving children in a concentration camp, or a guard beating a man who dares to rest from his work. And, if we're supposed to understand 800+ words, why do I have to look up every other word in this story? And, really, stop with all the pronouns and articles and little nonsense words that have a different function in every possible case: den, dem, ihm, euch, sich, im, in, an, auf, aus. I translate them all as blah, blah, blah.
Apologies for that brief moment of ugly Americanism. Now back to my learning.
2 comments:
Do we need a time out, Scott?
You haven't even hit the really weird non-grammar words like "na" "nun" "doch" or "Tja".
If it makes you feel better . . .
I have been studying French since 1982. I majored in French in college. I have a Master's of Art degree in French Studies. I have been working primarily on French-speaking countries for over 10 years. All together, I have lived in France for over 7 years. I can say, without false modesty, that my French is VERY good.
And I still can't get all the prepositions right!
I am firmly convinced that, even when you're fluent in a language, it's the "little" words (prepositions, articles, pronouns) that give you away as a foreigner. If you haven't grown up hearing that food is "in your plate" (dans ton assiette), then you're going to say it's ON your plate, which any normal person can see is actually the case.
On the hand, French people might argue that any normal person can see that one rides INSIDE a train, and not "on the train" as we tend to say in English.
The beauty of studying foreign languages is that they can help give you a new perspective on "normal". :-)
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