Question 1

Why is diesen lästigen Lärm in the accusative case when there is no action verb?

Accepted Answer

This is the special feature of the adjective gewohnt. It belongs to a small group of German adjectives (along with los, wert, and leid) that directly govern the accusative case. Even though the main verb is just the state verb sein (to be), gewohnt acts almost like a transitive verb and requires an accusative object.

Question 2

I've also seen this expressed with an and an umlaut. Is it correct to say Wir sind an diesen lästigen Lärm gewöhnt?

Accepted Answer

Yes! You can use the past participle gewöhnt combined with the preposition an (which also forces the accusative case here). Just pay close attention to the spelling: when you drop the preposition an, you must use gewohnt (no umlaut). Both mean "to be used to something" and are widely used interchangeably, though gewohnt without an is slightly more colloquial.

Question 3

How would I say "We are getting used to this annoying noise" instead?

Accepted Answer

To express the ongoing process of getting used to something, you use the reflexive verb sich gewöhnen an + accusative. The sentence would become: Wir gewöhnen uns an diesen lästigen Lärm. The original sentence uses sein + gewohnt to describe the fixed state of already being used to it.

Question 4

Why does the adjective lästig take the -en ending here?

Accepted Answer

Lärm is a masculine noun (der Lärm). Because the phrase is in the accusative case, the demonstrative article becomes diesen. Since diesen gives away the gender and case completely (acting like a definite article), the adjective following it takes the weak ending -en, giving us diesen lästigen Lärm.

Wir sind diesen lästigen Lärm gewohnt.

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