Die geweld is gevaarlik.

Here die means the.

A very useful thing to remember is that Afrikaans uses die as the definite article for:

• singular nouns: die man = the man
• plural nouns: die mans = the men

So in Die geweld is gevaarlik, die geweld means the violence.

No. Although it is spelled the same as the English word die, in Afrikaans die here is just the article the.

So:

• English die = to stop living
• Afrikaans die = the

They are completely different words.

Yes. Geweld means violence.

It is a noun, and like English violence, it is usually treated as an abstract or uncountable idea rather than something you count one by one.

So:

• geweld = violence
• die geweld = the violence

Yes. is means is.

It is the present-tense form of the verb wees (to be). In this sentence, it links the subject to the description:

• Die geweld = subject
• is = linking verb
• gevaarlik = description

One nice feature of Afrikaans is that verbs are much simpler than in English. is stays is regardless of person:

• Ek is = I am
• Jy is = you are
• Hy is = he is
• Ons is = we are

gevaarlik means dangerous.

It comes from gevaar, which means danger.

So:

• gevaar = danger
• gevaarlik = dangerous

The ending -lik often works a bit like English -ous, -ly, or -al, depending on the word.

This is a very common Afrikaans question.

In Die geweld is gevaarlik, gevaarlik comes after the verb is, so it is a predicate adjective. Predicate adjectives usually do not take -e.

Compare:

• Die geweld is gevaarlik. = The violence is dangerous.
• die gevaarlike geweld = the dangerous violence

So:

• after a verb like is → usually gevaarlik
• before a noun → often gevaarlike

The word order is very similar to normal English word order:

• Die geweld = The violence
• is = is
• gevaarlik = dangerous

So the pattern is:

Subject + verb + adjective

That makes this sentence quite straightforward for an English speaker.

No. Afrikaans does not use grammatical gender the way languages like German or Dutch do.

That means:

• there is no special masculine or feminine form of the
• die works without gender distinctions here

So you do not need to learn a gender for geweld.

Yes, and the meaning changes slightly.

• Geweld is gevaarlik. = Violence is dangerous.
  This sounds more like a general statement about violence as a concept.

• Die geweld is gevaarlik. = The violence is dangerous.
  This refers more to specific violence, or violence already known from the context.

So both are possible, but die makes the noun more definite.

A rough English-friendly guide is:

dee khuh-VELT is khuh-VAHR-lik

A few notes:

• die sounds roughly like dee
• g in Afrikaans is a harsh throat sound, not an English g
• w in geweld sounds like English v
• v in gevaarlik is usually pronounced like f in many accents, or something close to it

So the pronunciation may sound more throaty than an English speaker expects.

Usually not very much, especially compared with many other languages.

In this sentence, gevaarlik stays simple because it comes after is.

A basic pattern to remember is:

• Die huis is groot. = The house is big.
• die groot huis = the big house

And similarly:

• Die geweld is gevaarlik.
• die gevaarlike geweld

So Afrikaans adjectives are often quite simple, but you do need to notice when the -e form appears before a noun.