Word
Die Ärztinnen sprechen Deutsch.
Meaning
The doctors (female) speak German.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Die Ärztinnen sprechen Deutsch.
sprechen
to speak
Deutsch
German
die Ärztin
the doctor (female)
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Questions & Answers about Die Ärztinnen sprechen Deutsch.
Why does Ärztinnen have a double "n" at the end?
This is the plural form for female doctors. The word for a male doctor is Arzt. To make it female, German adds -in and an umlaut to get Ärztin. When making a feminine noun ending in -in plural, you always double the "n" and add -en, giving us Ärztinnen.
Is sprechen a regular verb? I thought it changed to spricht.
sprechen (to speak) is an irregular verb, but the vowel change only happens in the singular forms for "you" (du sprichst) and "he/she/it" (er/sie/es spricht). For plural subjects like "they" (the doctors), it goes back to the regular -e- and is conjugated normally as sprechen.
Why is Deutsch capitalized here?
In German, every single noun must be capitalized. Because Deutsch (German) is the name of a language, it acts as a noun in this sentence and gets a capital letter.
Does die here mean "the" (feminine) or "the" (plural)?
Here, die means "the" in the plural. Although the word for a single female doctor also uses die (die Ärztin), we know this sentence is plural because of the plural noun Ärztinnen and the plural verb ending in -en (sprechen).