Question for the South African Members who speak Afrikaans

[Laetca]

Bit trivial, but how difficult would you say the grammar and syntaxis is for Afrikaans?
I can't seem to find decent information (that is still understandable to the mere humans on this planet) that's useful, and the course description is pretty bad.

 

[munross]

What would you like to know about Afrikaans Laetca?I'm actually Afrikaans,so I'll try and help you the best I can...

Cheers
Ross

 

[Bull]

Fire away if you need any help.

 

[Laetca]

Basically, how complicated would you judge the syntax and grammar of Afrikaans in comparison to English? I don't know if it's a good idea to take the course since I'd be getting everything confused with Dutch, but it might come in handy. The description of the class doesn't explain any main differences there might be between Dutch and Afrikaans, and basically says nothing. I know a few things, like double negation and there only being one verbform for all numbers, but there must be more examples like those that are typical for the language.
Some of those examples would be appreciated XD

 

[Boggle]

I'm probably not gonna be of much help (even though I am afrikaans) but I should say that I found Afrikaans a much harder language at school, probably because of not being interested in it that much though (since I use it everyday).

In terms of syntax and grammar I think it's harder than English, that's just how I feel anyway, English just sort of feels easier to figure out for some reason.

 

[Steve-o]

I've got an awesome trick my Afrikaans teacher showed us.
It's helps you with sentence structure and it's called the STOMPI rule. The upper case letters are for Subject Time Object Manner (aka adjective) Place Infinitive.
Now for the verb placement..
S(v1)TOMP(v2)I
Verb1 is the type of verbs like: het, is, was. I can't remember what the proper word is for those verbs. Verb2 is your "doing" verbs, like: hardloop (run), gewas (washed), praat (talk), geskop (kicked).
I'll do an example with random words and use STOMPI:
die bal, Jannie, hard, geskop, het, by die skool...
= Jannie het die bal hard by die skool geskop.
= Jannie(S), het(v1), die bal(O), hard(M), by die skool(P), geskop(v2).

It's a flawless system! I personally found Afrikaans easy to study as a subject.

 

[Laetca]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Steve-o @ Oct 12 2008, 11:22 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>

I've got an awesome trick my Afrikaans teacher showed us.
It's helps you with sentence structure and it's called the STOMPI rule. The upper case letters are for Subject Time Object Manner (aka adjective) Place Infinitive.
Now for the verb placement..
S(v1)TOMP(v2)I
Verb1 is the type of verbs like: het, is, was. I can't remember what the proper word is for those verbs. Verb2 is your "doing" verbs, like: hardloop (run), gewas (washed), praat (talk), geskop (kicked).
I'll do an example with random words and use STOMPI:
die bal, Jannie, hard, geskop, het, by die skool...
= Jannie het die bal hard by die skool geskop.
= Jannie(S), het(v1), die bal(O), hard(M), by die skool(P), geskop(v2).

It's a flawless system! I personally found Afrikaans easy to study as a subject.[/b]

Your V1 verbs are auxiliaries, at least the ones you mentioned XD
I'll remember that rule, thank you for the tip!

 

[bates]

The thing I remember was the following: For dutch speaking people it's much more easier to understand Afrikaans than the other way around.

For my personal experience I have to agree on this statement as I understood most of my mates from Kimberly and Durban.

So i think you're safe

 

[Laetca]

Understanding isn't the problem, I understand most things said, but between understanding and explaining how the grammar is structured in Afrikaans on an exam there's still a huge gap XD
Hence this topic

 

[Steve-o]

It's a bit tricky explaining a language outright, it's like, where do you start?!
It's a simple language imo, you just move the verb out and wack a "ge" to verbs in past tense, and add a "sal" or "gaan" before the verb if it's in future tense.
Ok it's not that simple, but you just have to "unlearn" a few things from Dutch as it's much simpler.
There is this Afrikaans talk radio station called RSG radio (www.rsg.co.za) where you can hear and read a bit of Afrikaans.