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One of the challenges when learning another language is that its not
always possible to translate word for word. Sometimes, the other
language uses a different word, different grammar or even a specific
sentence structure that wouldnt make any sense in your nativelanguage.
This holds true when translating from English toGerman. In this
article, Id specifically like to draw your attention to the fact that
German doesnt have a progressive tense. So, what does that
mean? It means that you cannot express that something is
happening right now simply by using a specific verb tense, such asthe present progressive in English. For example, there is no way to
say I am reading or I am eating in German. You can only say I
read or I eat.
So, lets have a closer look and start with an example in present
tense: I am reading the newspaper. If you translate this word for
word (and thats what many German learners do) you get:Ich bin
lesen die Zeitung.
Now, that looks like an accurate translation. However, it is wrong.
What you should say is:
Ich lese die Zeitung.
https://www.italki.com/teachers/germanhttps://www.italki.com/teachers/german -
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This is literally I read the newspaper. But remember, there is no
difference between I am reading the newspaper and I read the
newspaper in German. Both are translated asIch lese die Zeitung.
Heres another example: It is raining. The translation that I hear a
lot is:Es ist regnen.
Again, this is an accurate word for word translation. However, its
unfortunately not how you should say it. In correct German, Its
raining translates to
Es regnet.
Alright, great. Weve looked at this phenomenon in the present
tense. Now, lets check out some examples in the past tense. This is
important because we also have the past progressive tense (also
known as the past continuous) in English, which similarly doesnt
exist in German.
Lets look another example: He was cooking in the kitchen. And
heres a possible translation:Er war kochen in der Kche.
Well, what do you think? Is this correct? Thats right, its not. He was
cooking in the kitchen translates to:
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Er hat in der Kche gekocht.
Why? Because in German there is no progressive verb tense, suchas in was doing or were doing. When an action happens in the
past, you simply use the past tense. In spoken German, this is
usually called thePerfekttense, which is formed by
usinghabenorseinplus the past participle. This gives youEr hat
in der Kche gekocht.
Heres another example: They were watching TV, when he called. Aword for word translation would look like this:Sie waren fernsehen,
wenn er angerufen hat.
But of course this is wrong, and now you know that in this context,
you should just use the past tense in German. Therefore, the correct
translation looks like this:
Sie haben ferngesehen, als er angerufen hat.
In the above example, you should also note that there are actually
three ways to translate the word when in German. Generally,alsis
used instead ofwennwhen talking about an action in the past. This
is what is happening in the above example.
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So, you might now be thinking: OK, I get it. There is no continuous
verb tense in German. But what do Germans do when they want to
strongly emphasize that somethings happening right now? Well, the
answer is that there is a work-around. We use the adverbgerade,which can be translated as at the moment or currently. This
adverb is usually placed after the verb. Here are some examples
followed by their English translations:
Kannst du mich spter anrufen? Ich esse gerade. Can you
call me later? Im eating (or as we literally say in German, I eat
at the moment).
Ich trinke gerade eine Tasse Kaffee. Im drinking a cup of
coffee.
Wir spielen gerade Basketball. Willst du mitspielen? Were
playing basketball. Do you want to play?
So, to summarize, it is not possible to indicate that an action is
continuous in German just by using grammatical structures.
Therefore, I am doing something would be translated as the
equivalent of I do something in German. Furthermore, I was doing
something would be translated as the equivalent of I didsomething. Having said that, there is in fact a way to express that
the action is taking place right now, and thats done by placing the
adverbgeradeafter the verb.
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So, now youre familiar with one of the big differences between
German and English. You have also seen some specific examples
demonstrating that its not always possible to translate word for word,
and that its simply best to adopt the structure of the target language.
If you have any questions, please feel free to post them in the
comments and Ill be more than happy to help.