The Basics Of German Nouns

Before you get into German nouns, there's one little obstacle you have to take a running leap over: The noun marker that precedes the noun. We use the term noun marker to refer to an article or adjective that tells us whether a noun is masculine(m.), feminine (f.), neuter (n.), singular (s.) or plural (p.). The most common noun markers are shown in the following table. The definite articles express "the" and the indefinite articles express "a," "an," or "one." 

Singular Noun Markers

	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter
the	der	die	das
one, a, an	ein	eine	ein

Singular Nouns

The nouns in the following table are easy to remember. There is an obvious correspondence between the grammatical gender of the noun marker and the natural gender of the noun.

Gender-Obvious Nouns

Masculine Noun	Pronunciation	English
der Bruder	deyR bRew-duhR	The brother
der Cousin	deyR koo-zin	The cousin
der Freund	deyR fRoynt	The friend
der Vater	deyR fah-tuhR	The father
ein Mann	ayn mAn	The man
ein Sohn	ayn zohn	The son
Feminine Noun	Pronunciation	English
die Schwester	dee shves-tuhR	The sister
die Cousine	dee koo-zee-nuh	The cousin
die Freundin	dee froyn-din	The friend
die Mutter	dee moo-tuhR	The mother
eine Frau	ay-nuh fRou	The woman
eine Tochter	ay-nuh toCH-tuhR	The daughter

In German, there are certain nouns that never change their gender, regardless of whether they refer to a male or a female person or animal. Here are a few of them:

German	Pronunciation	English
das Kind	dAs kint	The child
das Model	dAs moh-del	The model
das Individuum	dAs in-dee-vee-doo-oom	The individual
der Flüchtling	deyR fl üHt-ling	The refugee
das Opfer	dAs op-feR	The victim
das Genie	dAs jey-nee	The genius
die Person	dee peR-zohn	The person

Sex Changes

In most cases, making nouns feminine is as easy as dropping the vowel (if the noun ends in a vowel), adding -into the masculine noun and if the noun contains an a , an o , or a u , modifying this vowel: der Koch ( deyR koCH), for example, becomes die Köchin ( dee kö-Hin ). The follwing table lists some common nouns that can undergo sex changes.

Masculine Ending	Feminine Ending	English Meaning
der Lehrer deyR ley-Ruhr	die Lehrer indee ley-Ruh-Rin	The teacher
der Schüler deyR sh üh-luhr	die Schüler indee sh üh-luh-Rin	The school boy/girl
der Arzt deyR aRst	die Ärtzt indee äRts-tin	The doctor
der Bauer deyR bou-uhr	die Bäuer indee boy-eyE-in	The farmer
der Löwe deyR löh-wuh	die Löw indee löh-vin	The lion

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