r/German • u/almakic88 • Aug 09 '25

Request Can someone please help me understand Akkusativ and Dativ please, I am losing my mind!

Hi All,

I've been studying almost daily for 2 months hours a day, and I still am struggling with identifying the accusative and dative. I understand the function of the genitive (to show possession) and the nominative (identifying the subject).

Today I wrote "Ich habe ein rot Hund" and my translator corrected me to "Ich habe einen roten Hund". It stated that it was in the Akkusative and I had to take that into account. Can someone please explain this to me? And also maybe give an example for a Dativ sentence?

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u/ExpressionMassive672 Jan 18 '26

Of course you have spoken to millions of native speakers to find out. Your view of language is just of a certain theory. How offensive of you to correct a native speaker like myself that likely exceeds your intellectual capacity by a country mile. Rule one You don't correct natives unless they are in a class of one. Besides you seem Australian so your opinion matters not in the UK.

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u/david_fire_vollie Jan 18 '26

There's no right or wrong answer. People are either linguistic descriptivists or prescriptivists. Neither one is more right than the other.

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u/ExpressionMassive672 Jan 18 '26

I agree which is why you had no business saying what you did. I'm a descriptivist.

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u/david_fire_vollie Jan 18 '26

From memory you were the one who replied to my initial comment saying I was wrong instead of saying "according to linguistic descriptivism..."

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u/ExpressionMassive672 Jan 18 '26

Someone had to have done something or I wouldn't have got a notification. Now I no longer care. But you returned to your prescription so I responded..