Breakdown of Ich verstehe die Faszination dafür nicht.
ich
I
verstehen
to understand
nicht
not
dafür
for it
die Faszination
the fascination
Questions & Answers about Ich verstehe die Faszination dafür nicht.
Why do we use dafür here instead of saying für es?
Because the noun Faszination is paired with the preposition für, and we are referring back to a thing or concept. In German, when a preposition applies to an inanimate object, we combine da- and the preposition to create a da-word rather than using the preposition with a personal pronoun like es. If you were fascinated by a person, you would instead say für ihn or für sie.
Does the noun Faszination always require the preposition für?
Yes, when you want to express the object of the fascination, Faszination acts as a fixed noun-preposition pair with für. Since für is strictly an accusative preposition, any specific noun replacing the -für part of dafür would take the accusative case (for example: die Faszination für diesen Film).
If I wanted to use the adjective fasziniert instead of the noun, would I still use dafür?
No, this is a tricky spot where the preposition changes! While the noun Faszination pairs with für, the adjective fasziniert pairs with von plus the dative case. So to say that you are not fascinated by it, you would change the da-word and say Ich bin nicht fasziniert davon.
Why is nicht placed at the very end of this sentence?
When you negate an entire verb phrase rather than a specific word, nicht gets pushed to the end of the clause. It waits until after the direct accusative object (die Faszination) and the prepositional adverb (dafür) have been stated.
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