When people speak English but with German grammar

Native English speakers who study German frequently find themselves bamboozled by its confusing grammar rules. So what would happen if English speakers spoke English, but used German grammar and syntax to do it? Answer: everyone would be even more confused lmao!! Hence why I made this video. Enjoy!

BORING DISCLAIMER:
Firstly, I wanted to call this video 'When people speak English but with German syntax', but I thought that 'grammar' would get more views, since most people know what that is. 'Grammar' is a global term that encompasses syntax, morphology and semantics.

Secondly, it is obviously impossible to perfectly translate every word of one language into a different language, word for word, or to perfectly appropriate grammatical constructions from one language into another. I have tried here to create a translation of German that captures the right mix of authenticity, ridiculousness, and humour, while also trying to show what is happening in the German language when people speak it.

Some aspects of German (like the three genders) translate well into English, but others (like the case system) do not. I also had to decide what to do with certain non-translatable words; 'mir' (dative pronoun) became 'to me' and 'daran' (pronominal adverb) became 'therein'.

Some viewers have suggested that 'mir' should be translated as 'me', for example, 'I am me not sure'. I believe this is incorrect. In English the pronoun 'him' plays the roles of both accusative and dative pronoun, for example:

"When I saw HIM I gave HIM HIS ticket"
or alternatively:
"When I saw HIM I gave HIS ticket to HIM"

In German this would be:
"Als ich IHN gesehen habe, habe ich IHM SEIN Ticket gegeben"

Other viewers have commented that 'Ich werde' means 'I will' when the context is the future tense. This is of course correct, but werde does also literally mean 'become'. I found the German future tense very strange when I was first learning the language, so I decided to translate this word as 'become' in this video, to keep things as confusing as possible.

What is the most difficult or puzzling aspect of German grammar for you? Let me know in the comments!

[timonoschebuar]

I am german and have to make an important english exam next week. I think i lost all my grammar knowledge bc of this video. thx

Edit: Thank you so much for all the likes. I got a B, so ig this video didnt affect me at all. It was very fun watching though

[xandermylle]

This have me maybe permanent brain damage given

[Treblaine]

POV: german spy perfectly blending into British society in WW2.

[Lumberjack_Linnie]

As a German who is pretty fluent in English, this is torture, because the two languages are fighting a death match in my head right now.

[Senriam]

As an English speaker learning German, this actually cemented some things about German grammar in my brain. Actually helped me on my German oral exam.

[cyborgbob]

English when you sneeze: “bless your soul so the devil doesn’t steal it!”
Germans when you sneeze: “H E A L T H”

[Emil_Stoltz]

"But have you anywhere my coffee seen?"
Bro went full shakespeare

[theghostofspookwagen]

This sounds somewhat like Shakespearean dialogue.

[thrne_]

I'm cry-wheezing mate, it's so accurate.
The deadpan delivery.

"Thank you nice" perfectly encapsulates why I've had 3AM thoughts about why it's a weird phrase

My native language is so goofy. Stuff like this makes me appreciate it more.

[moenchii]

As a German, this feels both so right and so wrong at the same time...

[Berserkerwarrior]

So… to Germans, Yoda was the only normal one?

[beeslebub]

"I have life meats" and "He stands on the table" are now going into my personal daily lexicon, thank you very much.

[EvilGremlin]

"That is to me, sausage" is going to be my default reply to everything now

[derekarredondo]

“To scream begun has, then up stood, and out the building run is.”

[AlexanderofMiletus]

One trick I learned for German grammar: think “how would super-archaic English say this” and that’ll usually get you close enough

[rherchenreder]

This is fascinating. I'm American, and my father's family is of German and Swiss ancestry. My father told me stories of how his father, who was fluent in German and American English; had studied law and wrote papers out in German and then translated them to English for submission in his studies at Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri. As the story goes, the instructor told my grandfather that his grammar and sentence structure, while technically correct, was 'weird.' This video reawakens this family memory, thank you for providing it.

[samgunn]

Excellent. I had a German speaking flatmate once who translated ‘Gesundheit’ as ‘wellness’. Whenever anyone sneezes, I give them a hearty “Wellness”!

[jarleikkeland]

English-speakers: make laugh of "shieldtoads" and "antbears"

Also English-speakers: P I N E A P P L E

[jakubadamw]

0:25 A verb like “make” in the second-person singular could actually be “makest” in archaic English for a stronger effect of resemblence.

[kaiserhhaie]

Petition to make overmorning/overmorrow a word again in english. I hate saying "the day after tomorrow" when english literally had a word for it but it fell out of use for no appearent reason