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Negation in German I'm feeling kind of confusing when it comes to the negation in German. The followings are some examples. " Ich besuche nicht meinen Lehrer." or " Ich besuche meinen Lehrer nicht." "Ich gehe nicht zu Tisch" or "Ich gehe zu tisch nicht." So I'm not sure about the position of nicht. In addition, sometimes I have trouble choosing nicht or kein to negate. "Ich habe keine Haustiere" or "Ich habe Haustiere nicht" Thanks for reading my questions and helping me : )

Answers · 9

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First of all, "nicht" negates the sentence; "kein" negates nouns. The normal position is the one in "Ich besuche meinen Lehrer nicht." Just a negative sentence. In "Ich besuche nicht meinen Lehrer." you actually did something else: If you move "nicht" directly in front of a sentence part, it negates only this part. It's "not my teacher" - but this strongly sounds as though you ARE visiting someone else! Since you went to the trouble of making sure that you negate only this one part of what you said. Aaaah, but: "Ich gehe nicht zu Tisch" This is just a normal negation. That's because "zu Tisch gehen" belongs together. !! "Nicht" stands at the end of a sentence, BUT it stands in front of items that belong to the verb. !! This is the same with most statements about places. "zu Tisch gehen" -> "Ich gehe nicht zu Tisch" "Fußball spielen" -> "Ich spiele nicht Fußball." "Auto fahren" -> Ich kann nicht Auto fahren." / "Ich fahre nicht Auto." "anziehen" -> "Ich ziehe diese Hose nicht an." (after "diese Hose", because it not part of the verb, but before "an".) Technically, this is about infinite parts of the verb, that is, parts of the verb that are not conjugated. Therefore, it's the same for "sehen wollen" -> "Ich will ihn nicht sehen." ("wollen" is conjugated, "sehen" not. Compare: "Wir wollen ihn nicht sehen." "sehen" is an infinitive.) Same game for verb tenses, like past: "glauben" -> "Er hat mir meine Geschichte nicht geglaubt." This is why "Ich gehe zu Tisch nicht." does not even exist. And "Ich gehe nicht zu Tisch" is the neutral word order, it is no negation that focusses on "zu Tisch"! In sentences that are short and very basic, use kein when you can. "Ich habe keine Haustiere." But as the other answer said, if you make it more complicated, "nicht" can become an option again. "Haustiere habe ich nicht." -> Because my aim was to move "Haustiere" in the first position, I had to kick out "keine". Or move it: "Haustiere habe ich keine."
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" Ich besuche meinen Lehrer nicht." but: Ich besuche nicht meinen Lehrer, sondern meine Tante. "Ich gehe nicht zu Tisch" "Ich habe keine Haustiere"
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Gern, viel Spaß beim Deutschlernen.
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@Stephan It helps a lot. Vielen Dank!!
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Ich besuche nicht meinen Lehrer. - like u dont visit him in this situation. Ich besuche meinen Lehrer nicht. - more generally meaning Ich gehe nicht zu Tisch - ok Ich gehe zu Tisch nicht. - wrong, u cant say this Ich habe keine Haustiere. - ok Ich habe Haustiere nicht. - wrong Haustiere habe ich nicht. - you can say this instead. hope this helps

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