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Until now we’ve managed to stay away from prepositions. But now the time has come to discuss this issue, because prepositions are such a vital part of a language and it’s hard to build a sentence without them.
Prepositions
Prepositions are those little words that mark places in space or time. The prepositions are best explained when envisioning a birdcage and a bird, and the ways they relate to each other:
The bird can be in the cage. (“in” being a preposition) But it can also be on top of the cage, under the cage, it can fly through the cage. Or fly out of the cage. It can be stuck between two cages or it can take a nap in front of the cage. You see that there are a lot more possibilities! All those bold-faced words are prepositions.
Prepositions are quite abstract and therefore different languages have entirely different prepositions. There is not a simple one-to-one relation between pronouns in different languages so they will have to be discussed separately.
Possession
Let us start our discussion with possession. In English we use the pronoun “of”, in Dutch we use: “van”.
| Het huis van mijn vader | The house of my father |
But like in English, Dutch also has an analogous way of expressing this without a preposition:
| Mijn vader’s huis | My father’s house |
Origin
| Ik kom uit Nederland | I come from the Netherlands |
| Ik krijg een kado van mijn vader | I get a present from my father |
Here you already see two possible translations for the English prepositions. “uit” is used with countries/cities. But “van” is a more common translation in other situations. It’s often hard to know what preposition to use, and differences between languages are huge. Often only experience and practice can help you.
Destination
| Ik ga naar school | I go to school |
| Ik ga naar mijn vader | I go to my father |
Location
We will discuss now some simple prepositions specifying a location:
| Ik ben in het huis | I am in the house |
| Ik sta voor het huis | I stand in front of the house |
| Ik sta achter het huis | I stand behind the house |
| Ik sta op het huis | I stand on the house |
| Ik sta naast het huis | I stand on the side of the house |
| Ik sta bij het huis | I stand near the house |
| Ik sta onder het huis | I stand under the house |
| Ik sta boven het huis | I stand above the house |
| Ik sta boven op het huis | I stand on top of the house |
| Ik sta tussen de huizen | I stand between the houses |
Movement
Note that when it comes to movement, Dutch sometimes uses postpositions instead of prepositions, meaning that the word comes after the complement it applies to.
| Ik ga het huis in | I go into the house |
| Ik ga het huis uit | I go out of the house |
| Ik spring over het huis | I jump over the house |
| Ik spring op het huis | I jump onto the house |
| Ik ga door het huis | I go through the house |
The Dutch prepositions above are more-or-less used in the same situation as their English counterparts.
Horizontal vs. Vertical Placement
| Het schilderij ligt op de tafel | The painting lies on the table |
| Het schilderij hangt aan de muur | The painting hangs on the wall |
You see that for horizontal placement, the Dutch use “op”, while for vertical placement they use “aan”, whereas English only uses one preposition.
Company
| Ik ga met jou | I go with you |
| Ik ga zonder jou | I go without you |
Means
| Ik ga met de fiets | I go by bike |
| Ik eet met mijn handen | I eat with my hands |
Creator
| Gemaakt door mij | Made by me |
Being with people
| Ik ben bij mijn ouders | I am with my parents |
| Ik ben bij mijn ouders | I am at my parents’ |
Time
| Ik ga na jou | I go after you |
| Ik ga voor jou | I go before you |
| Ik blijf tot vanavond | I stay until tonight |
| Ik ben hier sinds gisteren | I am here since yesterday |
| Ik ben hier voor drie dagen | I am here for three days |
| Ik kom over drie dagen | I come in three days |
| Ik schrijf je binnen drie dagen | I write you within three days |
When you use a personal pronoun after a preposition, you have to used the forms equal to those you use as a direct object, but in this case you have to use the long forms with ij and ou and can never shorten them to e!
Conjunctions
We have now shown you the most common prepositions. Try to practice a lot with them because that’s the best way to learn them. We will now move on to conjunctions. Conjunctions are the words that glue sentences together. The most obvious one we have already dealt with: “en” meaning “and”. But there are far more such words which can glue sentences together in a certain way. Like we did with the prepositions, we will discuss these through examples…
| Ik ga en ik wil reizen | I go and I want to travel |
| Ik ga of ik wil reizen | I go or I want to travel |
| Ik ga want ik wil reizen | I go because I want to travel |
| Ik ga, maar ik wil reizen | I go, but I want to travel |
These are the so-called coordinating conjunctions. The sentences that are glued together are of equal importance. There is also a second type of conjunction, which is more common: the subordinate conjunction. It also glues sentences together but the sentences are not of equal importance. One sentence is called the subordinate clause and is more or less integrated into the main clause using a subordinate conjunction. In the following example we demonstrate what a subordinate clause is by highlighting that part of the sentence:
| I go because I see you | Ik ga omdat ik je zie |
Note that the word order in the Dutch subordinate clause is different from what we are used to! This is the case in all Dutch subordinate clauses. In a normal sentence we would expect to see:
ik zie je
Which is a SUBJECT-VERB-OBJECT order which we also see in English. However, subordinate clauses in Dutch have a different word-order, namely: SUBJECT-OBJECT-VERB, as in the following example:
………ik je zie
This is obligatory and a crucial fact of many Germanic languages: subordinate clauses have different word order. Now we know about this we can start discussing the subordinate conjunctions.
| Ik ga omdat ik je zie | I go because I see you |
| Ik ga hoewel ik je zie | I go although I see you |
| Ik ga tenzij ik je zie | I go unless I see you |
| Ik ga als ik je zie | I go if I see you |
| Ik ga terwijl ik je zie | I go while I see you |
| Ik ga wanneer ik je zie | I go when I see you |
| Ik ga zodat ik je zie | I go in order to (so) I see you |
Relative pronouns
This now takes us to a similar issue where subordinate clauses are involved. The subordinate clause in this case is related to a part of the main clause or the main clause entirely. Take a look at the following example:
| Ik weet dat ik je zie | I know [that] I see you |
| Ik weet wat ik zie | I know what I see |
| De stad waar ik ben | The city where I live |
| De man die je ziet | The man who sees you |
| De stoel die groot is | The chair which is big |
| Het huis dat groot is | The house which is big |
Note that while “that” in English can often be omitted, it can never in Dutch.
The use of “dat” or “die” depends, just like with the demonstrative pronouns we’ve seen in part one, on the gender and number of the noun it applies to.
Vocabulary
| ook | also/too |
| nog [steeds] | still |
| al | already |
| alleen [maar], slechts | only, just |
| nu | now |
| de stad | the city |
| de vrouw | the woman, the wife |
Exercises
Exercise A: Translate to English
1) Hij komt ook uit Nederland.
2) Zie jij dat ik je zie?
3) Ik ben al in mijn huis.
4) Ik ga met mijn vader naar Amsterdam omdat het een grote stad is.
5) Ik zie een oude man die naar het huis rent.
6) De stoel die ik zie is niet groot.
7) Ik loop voor het huis.
8) Ik zie het gebouw na jou.
9) Ik zie alleen een man met een hond die door mijn nieuwe huis loopt.
10) Ik heb een stoel voor deze hond.
Exercise B: Translate to Dutch
1) Do you see that man with his wife?
2) I walk to the city so I can see my new house.
3) My father’s house is big although he is a small man.
4) I go to school by bike because my bike is fast.
5) He has a cat, but he wants to have a dog.
6) They go into the house that is new.
7) She goes when he goes into the house.
Solutions
We will use either the official or colloquial form of the pronouns, so multiple answer are possible.
Solutions to Exercise A
1) He also come from The Netherlands.
2) Do you see that I see you?
3) I am already in my house.
4) I go to Amsterdam with my father because it is a big city.
5) I see an old man who runs to the house.
6) The chair which I see is not big.
7) I walk in front of the house.
8) I see the building after you.
9) I only see a man with a dog who walks through my new house.
10) I have a chair for this dog.
Solutions to Exercise B
1) Zie je die man met zijn vrouw?
2) Ik loop naar de stad zodat ik mijn nieuwe huis kan zien.
3) Mijn vader’s huis is groot, hoewel hij een kleine man is.
4) Ik ga naar school met de fiets omdat mijn fiets snel is.
5) Hij heeft een kat, maar he wil een hond hebben.
6) Zij gaan het huis dat nieuw is in, Zij gaan het huis in dat nieuw is.
7) Zij gaat wanneer hij het huis in gaat.
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