"The person reads a newspaper."
Translation:Die Person liest eine Zeitung.
12 Comments
Also, to translate Person to Mensch is quite strange. Mensch = Human
Annoying..
No, die Person does not have a masculine/feminine form. This is different to professions (der Lehrer/die Lehrerin) and nominalised adjectives (ein Erwachsener/eine Erwachsene).
Why not "einen Zeitung"? I thought that whenever you use a verb, you add an "n" to "ein/eine". Danke schön
No -- the direct object of a verb can have ein, eine, einen depending on the gender.
Masculine nouns take einen in the accusative singular: Ich lese einen Artikel. "I am reading an article."
Feminine nouns take eine in the accusative singular: Ich lese eine Zeitung. "I am reading a newspaper."
Neuter nouns take ein in the accusative singular: Ich lese ein Buch. "I am reading a book."
As you can see, masculine is the only gender where the accusative looks different from the nominative (ein Artikel / einen Artikel); eine Zeitung and ein Buch would look the same whether they're the subject or the object of a verb.
Why is it die person and not das person because person is a noun used for both male and female.?
It is neither of those -- it is die Person (with capital P).
The grammatical gender of a noun does not, in general, have anything to do with the natural gender of the object that the noun refers to. It's just something that you have to learn.
das Messer is neuter, die Gabel is feminine, der Löffel is masculine, even though knives, forks, and spoons are neither male or female.
Similarly, die Person is feminine (even though persons can be male or female) and das Mädchen is neuter (even though girls are female), etc.
Learn the gender of a noun together with a noun; trying to deduce it through "logic" will usually not work.
