Breakdown of Wanneer doet hij de boodschappen?
hij
he / it (referring to a 'de'-word)
doen
to do
wanneer
when
de boodschappen
the groceries
Questions & Answers about Wanneer doet hij de boodschappen?
Why is the verb doet instead of doen?
Doen (to do) is one of the important irregular verbs. For the he (hij), she (zij), and it (het) forms, we use doet. The pattern for a single person is: ik doe (I do), jij doet (you do), and hij/zij/het doet (he/she/it does). Plural subjects simply use the full dictionary form doen.
Wait, English uses the word 'does' twice in this sentence. Why doesn't Dutch?
English uses 'to do' as an extra helper word just to form a question, like 'When does he do...'. Dutch never uses helper verbs this way. You just swap the subject and the main verb. The literal Dutch structure is 'When does he the groceries?'.
Why does doet come before hij here?
In Dutch questions that start with a question word like wanneer (when), the verb must take the second position, right after that question word. So the normal statement order of hij doet (he does) flips to doet hij.
Is boodschappen doen a set phrase?
Yes! While English speakers usually say 'to go grocery shopping', the Dutch say boodschappen doen (literally 'to do the groceries'). De boodschappen refers to the groceries themselves, and you use the verb doen to talk about the act of going out to get them.
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