Breakdown of Wij begrijpen de risico's van dit project.
wij
we
begrijpen
to understand
het project
the project
dit
this (neuter)
Questions & Answers about Wij begrijpen de risico's van dit project.
Why does risico's have an apostrophe before the 's'?
In Dutch, nouns that end in a single open vowel (like a, i, o, u, or y) get an apostrophe plus 's' to make them plural. This is done to keep the vowel sounding long. If we just wrote risicos, the rules of Dutch spelling would make the final 'o' sound short. The apostrophe protects that long 'o' sound in risico.
Why do we use dit instead of deze for 'this project'?
Because project is a neuter word in Dutch (het project). When you want to say 'this' with a het-word, you must use dit. If you are talking about a de-word, you would use deze.
Can I say 'dit projects risico's' to mean 'this project's risks'?
No, that would sound very unnatural. In Dutch, you almost always use van (of) to show possession for objects and abstract concepts. The structure is literally 'the risks of this project'. The possessive 's is mostly reserved for people's names, like Anna's boek.
Is the Dutch word project pronounced the same as in English?
It looks exactly the same, but it is pronounced differently. The biggest difference is the letter j, which is pronounced like an English 'y'. It sounds more like 'pro-yekt'.