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- Topic: German >
- "Wir werden uns anmelden."
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1839
What, exactly, is the difference between "anmelden" and "eintragen"? The two words appear to be synonymous here.
On another thread/question I asked in detail about these "separable" verbs... and got a great reply. It went something like this:
• Verbs that have a prefix of ab-, an-, auf-, aus-, bei-, ein-, los-, mit-, nach-, her-, hin-, vor-, weg-, zu-, zurück- in their infititive are separated. E.g. "aufgeben" - "Ich gebe auf" (I give up) • Verbs that start with be-, emp-, ent-, er-, ge-, miss-, ver-, zer- are never separable. E.g. "beweisen" - "Ich beweise es." (I prove it.)
But for a really good insight into these verbs--and their many subtle distinctions, try this link:
http://marathonsprachen.com/german-verbs-with-separable-prefixes-trennbare-verben/
Oh... and something I learned the hard way... if you're on a PC, it's best to open any link in a "new window"... as many times just clicking on the link will LOSE your progress in whatever lesson/quiz you are currently taking.
Viel Glück
There's got to be something about that "an" added to a verb... I don't quite get it. "melden" we were told means to get in touch with or notify... but throw "an" in there and now it means to register? and how is this different from eintragen? Just a bit confused on this.... maybe taking it too fast.
They mean different things, though.
"We will log ourselves in" has "ourselves" as the object -- we're not going to log Suzy in, we're going to log ourselves in.
"We will log in ourselves" has "ourselves" as a kind of extra subject -- it means that it's not Suzy who is going to log in (on our behalf) but instead, we are going to take care of that task ourselves.
The German sentence only means the first of those.
I think this is a more common usage when there's a logbook for people to write their names and the time in when they walk in the door. If it's unattended, you would say "we logged ourselves in."
It's not what you'd say to log onto a system; the system logs you in.
(Yes, I know I'm responding to an old post, but more people will come through...)