Lesson 2 - Directions
Object Pronouns
What is it?Grammatically, there are two kinds of Object Pronouns: Direct and Indirect. The Direct Object is the main object in the sentence, e.g. he is eating it now - i.e. he is eating the apple now. The apple is the direct object of the sentence. The Indirect Object Pronouns are used when they refer to the receiver of the direct object, i.e. she gives him a book. The book here is the direct object, but him is the Indirect Object, the receiver. The Rules
The Direct Object is the object of the sentence
The Indirect Object is the receiver of said object On the face of it, in Danish we don't distinguish between the two kind of object pronouns - opposed to German where we have ihn (direct object pronoun for 'him') and ihm (indirect object pronoun for 'him'), so we can concentrate on only learning one list.
The ExamplesIn Danish the Indirect Object comes before the Direct Object. Unless, of course, we add the proposition for or til. Please consider the following sentences:
* Occasionally, ommitting for or til sounds quite unclear and clumsy if you use pronouns for both objects, as in Hun læser dem den (She's reading it to them). Instead, you would say out the actual object: Hun læser dem en bog (She's reading them a book). This makes the sentence much better! Or even better, say: Hun læser en bog til dem. |