Word
Han beder praktikanten om at lægge sin notesbog på skrivebordet.
Meaning
He asks the intern to put her own notebook on the desk.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Han beder praktikanten om at lægge sin notesbog på skrivebordet.
han
he
skrivebordet
the desk
sin
his/her/its own (common)
at
to
Questions & Answers about Han beder praktikanten om at lægge sin notesbog på skrivebordet.
Why does sin refer to the intern's notebook, instead of the main subject's (Han)?
Even though han is the grammatical subject of the main sentence, the infinitive phrase (at lægge...) has its own logical subject. Because praktikanten (the intern) is the one doing the action of putting the notebook down, they are the logical subject of that clause. In Danish, a reflexive pronoun like sin binds to the logical subject of its own clause, so it refers to the intern's notebook.
How would the sentence change if he wanted the intern to put his (the man's) notebook on the desk?
You would use hans instead of sin. The sentence would become: Han beder praktikanten om at lægge hans notesbog på skrivebordet. Because hans is not reflexive, it ignores the logical subject of the infinitive clause (praktikanten) and points back to the main subject (Han) or another third party.
Why is the preposition om used before at lægge?
In Danish, when you ask someone to do something, the fixed construction is at bede nogen om at gøre noget. The verb bede (to ask/request) takes the preposition om to connect it to the requested action. While English skips straight to the infinitive ("asks the intern to put"), Danish requires the preposition here.
Why do we use sin here rather than sit or sine?