Breakdown of De tatoeëerder zal een mooie bloem naast je navel tekenen.
een
a/an
de bloem
flower
mooi
beautiful
naast
next to
zullen
shall / will
tekenen
to draw
je
your (unstressed)
de navel
the navel
de tatoeëerder
the tattoo artist
Questions & Answers about De tatoeëerder zal een mooie bloem naast je navel tekenen.
How would I use right dislocation in this sentence to emphasize the flower?
You would replace the object (een mooie bloem) with a pronoun in the main clause, and move the full noun phrase to the very end of the sentence, after a comma. It would look like this: De tatoeëerder zal hem naast je navel tekenen, die mooie bloem. You use the pronoun hem because bloem is a de-word.
Why does tatoeëerder have those two dots (a trema) on the 'e'?
The trema indicates where a new syllable starts. Without it, the consecutive 'e's would blend together visually into one sound. It tells you to keep the vowel sounds distinct, dividing the pronunciation as ta-toe-eer-der.
As a quick refresher, why is tekenen placed at the very end of the sentence?
This is because zal is an auxiliary (helping) verb. In Dutch main clauses, the conjugated verb (zal) takes the second position, and any other verbs, like the infinitive tekenen, are pushed to the very end of the sentence.
Could I use jouw instead of je for "your navel"?
Yes, you could use jouw navel if you wanted to place special emphasis on your navel as opposed to someone else's. However, in everyday situations where no contrast is needed, the unstressed je is much more common and sounds natural.
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