"It is a man."
Translation:Es ist ein Mann.
41 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
1705
Thank you. (i had the same question as Nel91) Could you tell me why 'It' can't be the subject. I translated 'It is a man' into 'Es ist einen Mann.' You say that there is no fixed sentence structure, but then why can't Es be the subject? OR, is there something obvious about this sentence that makes Mann the subject? (I'm as new as you can be to German--so feel free to explain 'the obvious.') :)
EDIT: I just read bellow to Levi's comment. The state of being a man describes 'it' and doesn't take action from it. Is that why 'it' (es) isn't the subject? Just repeating what I wrote, I'm confusing the nominative with being the subject. Any clarification would be helpful.
1705
So you're saying that 'sien' is reflexive, and whenever I use the verb 'sein' both the subject and the object take the nominative indefinite articles?
1036
SPO is short for Subject Predicate Object. In English sentences are structured in this way.
1036
You're right, the sentence "It is a man" doesn't really make sense in german. The only translation I could imagine would be "Das ist ein Mann". But that would be in english "this is a man". So even your translation "Er ist ein Mann" does actually belong to the sentence "he is a man".
1036
This is because "das" is the correct translation of "it". But then this translation does not make any sense in this context.
This is clearly only an exercise of direct translation and a example of nominative/nominative case use. For proper understanding I would recommend not to try to put every phrase here in a specific context whatsoever. Just translate the phrase. Not every sentence in Duolingo would make sense in casual daily conversation at all.
3298
@pkiddy18 : Think of it this way: It is a man. It = man. When the "equal sign" is used then it means the nominative case is used, hence the ein for the masculine (der). Hope this helps.
There is a simple rule in English and in German: "The verb 'to be' never takes an object". In other words, "I am / you are/ he, she, it is / we are / you are / they are" and "ich bin / du bist / er, sie, es ist / wir sind / ihr seid / sie sind" are always followed by a nominative case (ein Mann) and never followed by an accusative case (einen Mann). Don't ask why. That's just how it is! Languages are not always logical!
1036
It's not wrong, just unusual. Personally, I think it should even be marked as correct...