Breakdown of Staat de voorraad in het magazijn?
in
in
staan
to stand
de voorraad
the stock
het magazijn
the warehouse
Questions & Answers about Staat de voorraad in het magazijn?
Why does this sentence use staat instead of is?
In Dutch, we usually use positional verbs like staan (to stand), liggen (to lie), or zitten (to sit) instead of zijn (to be) to describe where something is located. Because stock or inventory is typically boxed or stacked upright on shelves, we use staan.
How would I apply this lesson's grammar to ask 'Is the stock in there?' instead?
You would replace the prepositional phrase in het magazijn with the combination of er + in. Without any other words, it merges at the end: Staat de voorraad erin?. If you add an extra word like al (already), the adverb splits, which is the focus of this lesson: Staat de voorraad er al in? (Is the stock already in there?).
Why do we say de voorraad but het magazijn?
Dutch has two words for 'the': de and het. While you mostly have to memorize the correct article with each new noun, a helpful tip is that nouns ending in -ijn are very often het words, just like het magazijn.
If I wanted to state 'The stock is in the warehouse' instead of asking a question, how would the word order change?