Word
Meine Angst in der Dunkelheit ist völlig irrational.
Meaning
My fear in the dark is completely irrational.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Meine Angst in der Dunkelheit ist völlig irrational.
sein
to be
in
in
mein
my
die Angst
the fear
Questions & Answers about Meine Angst in der Dunkelheit ist völlig irrational.
Why does German use the prefix ir- in irrational instead of the standard German un-?
Because rational is a loanword from Latin, it keeps its original Latin negative prefix. The base prefix is actually in-, but when attached to a word starting with the letter 'r', it assimilates and changes to ir- to make it easier to pronounce. This works exactly the same way in German as it does in English!
Could I just say unrational instead?
No, unrational is considered incorrect in standard German. For these specific Latin loanwords, you must stick to their matching Latin prefixes (in-, im-, il-, or ir-). However, if you wanted to use a native German equivalent, you could say unvernünftig (unreasonable), which correctly uses the standard un- prefix.
Why is it in der Dunkelheit instead of in die Dunkelheit?
The preposition in is a two-way preposition. Because the fear exists within the state of darkness (answering 'where?' or describing a static condition) rather than moving into the dark (answering 'where to?'), we use the dative case. Since Dunkelheit is a feminine noun, its dative article is der.
What is the difference between using völlig and ganz for 'completely' in this sentence?