Ons hoef nie ongewenste klere te skenk nie.

Afrikaans normally uses double negation. That means a negative sentence often has:

• one nie earlier in the sentence
• and another nie at the end

So:

• Ons hoef nie ... nie = We do not have to ...

This is one of the most important sentence patterns in Afrikaans.
In this sentence, the first nie comes after the finite verb hoef, and the second nie closes off the whole negative statement.

A very rough pattern is:

• Subject + verb + nie + rest of sentence + nie

So here:

• Ons = subject
• hoef = finite verb
• nie = first negative marker
• ongewenste klere te skenk = rest of the sentence
• nie = second negative marker

Hoef means need to or have to, especially in negative sentences.

So:

• Ons hoef nie ... nie = We do not need to ...
• or We do not have to ...

A very common thing to remember is that hoef is often used with negation in Afrikaans:

• Ek hoef nie te gaan nie = I don’t need to go
• Jy hoef nie te werk nie = You don’t have to work

So in your sentence, hoef is the idea of needing to.

The word te is the infinitive marker, similar to English to in to donate.

So:

• te skenk = to donate

In this sentence:

• hoef is the finite verb
• skenk is the second verb, kept in the infinitive form
• te marks that infinitive

That is why you get:

• Ons hoef nie ... te skenk nie

Compare:

• Ek probeer lees / Ek probeer om te lees type structures can vary
• but with hoef, you will very often see te + infinitive in negative sentences:
  • Jy hoef nie te kom nie
  • Ons hoef nie te wag nie

So te skenk is simply to donate.

Because Afrikaans often sends the main infinitive verb to the end of the clause when another verb is already in the finite position.

Here, hoef is the finite verb and comes early in the sentence:

• Ons hoef ...

Then the infinitive phrase comes later:

• ... te skenk

This is similar to the way Germanic languages often place extra verbs later in the clause.

So the sentence structure is basically:

• Ons = subject
• hoef = finite verb
• nie = negation
• ongewenste klere = object
• te skenk = infinitive phrase
• nie = closing negation

That is why skenk appears near the end instead of right after ons.

Ongewenste means unwanted.

It comes from ongewenst = unwanted, and when an adjective comes before a noun in Afrikaans, it often takes an -e ending.

So:

• ongewenst = unwanted
• ongewenste klere = unwanted clothes

This is called the attributive form of the adjective, because it directly describes the noun.

Compare:

• Die klere is ongewenst = The clothes are unwanted
  Here the adjective is after the verb, so it stays ongewenst.
• ongewenste klere = unwanted clothes
  Here it comes before the noun, so it becomes ongewenste.

Klere means clothes or clothing.

In normal use, it behaves like a plural idea, much like English clothes. You usually would not treat it as a singular item like a cloth or a clothe.

So:

• klere = clothes

Examples:

• Ek koop klere = I buy clothes
• Die klere is nat = The clothes are wet

In your sentence, ongewenste klere means unwanted clothes.

Afrikaans often leaves out an article when speaking about things in a general or indefinite way.

So:

• ongewenste klere = unwanted clothes
• not necessarily the unwanted clothes

The sentence is talking about unwanted clothes in general, not a specific, already identified set.

If you wanted to make it definite, you could say:

• die ongewenste klere = the unwanted clothes

But in your sentence, the meaning is more general:

• Ons hoef nie ongewenste klere te skenk nie
  = We do not have to donate unwanted clothes.

Not exactly.

• gee = give
• skenk = donate, present, or sometimes pour, depending on context

In this sentence, skenk clearly means donate. It sounds more specific and a bit more formal than gee.

Compare:

• Ek gee vir jou ’n boek = I give you a book
• Ons skenk klere aan ’n liefdadigheid = We donate clothes to a charity

So skenk is the better verb here because the idea is donating unwanted clothes, not just casually giving them to someone.

No. That would be a different meaning.

Ons hoef nie ongewenste klere te skenk nie means:

• We do not have to donate unwanted clothes
• We don’t need to donate unwanted clothes

It expresses lack of necessity, not prohibition.

That is an important difference:

• do not have to = it is not necessary
• must not = it is forbidden

So this sentence does not mean donating unwanted clothes is banned. It only means it is not required.

Yes, very often.

Learners quickly notice that hoef commonly appears in expressions like:

• Ek hoef nie te gaan nie
• Jy hoef nie te bly nie
• Ons hoef nie te betaal nie

So it is strongly associated with not needing to.

You may also see it in questions such as:

• Hoef ek te kom? = Do I need to come?

But for everyday learning, it is very useful to remember hoef nie ... nie as a set pattern meaning:

• do not need to
• do not have to

Yes, that is a very helpful way to learn it.

A useful pattern is:

• Subject + hoef + nie + object/complements + te + infinitive + nie

Applied here:

• Ons
  • hoef
    • nie
      • ongewenste klere
        • te
          • skenk
            • nie

If you learn this as a frame, you can build many similar sentences:

• Ek hoef nie vandag te werk nie = I don’t have to work today
• Sy hoef nie die kos te maak nie = She doesn’t have to make the food
• Ons hoef nie vroeg te vertrek nie = We don’t have to leave early

So yes, this is a very useful sentence pattern to memorize.