Hy verstaan die gevolg.

In Afrikaans, most verbs do not change for person in the present tense.

So you get:

• Ek verstaan — I understand
• Jy verstaan — you understand
• Hy verstaan — he understands
• Ons verstaan — we understand

Unlike English, Afrikaans does not usually add an -s for he/she/it.

Die is the definite article, so here it means the.

A very useful thing about Afrikaans is that die is used much more simply than English learners often expect:

• no grammatical gender
• used for singular and plural
• the form stays the same

So:

• die gevolg — the consequence / the result
• die gevolge — the consequences / the results

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

So gevolg is not treated as masculine, feminine, or neuter in the article system. You just use die for the noun.

This is why the sentence is simply Hy verstaan die gevolg and not something with different gendered articles.

Gevolg can mean consequence, result, or sometimes effect, depending on context.

In many situations, consequence is a very natural translation, especially if something happened because of an earlier action.
In other contexts, result may sound more natural.

So Hy verstaan die gevolg could mean:

• he understands the consequence
• he understands the result

The exact English choice depends on the situation, even though the Afrikaans sentence stays the same.

Yes. In this sentence, the basic word order is:

• Hy — subject
• verstaan — verb
• die gevolg — object

So it follows the normal pattern Subject + Verb + Object, just like English:

• He understands the consequence

That said, Afrikaans often follows a verb-second pattern in main clauses. For example:

• Nou verstaan hy die gevolg — Now he understands the consequence

Here the verb verstaan still comes early in the clause.

A rough English-friendly pronunciation is:

• Hy — a bit like hey
• verstaan — fur-STAHN
• die — dee
• gevolg — roughly khuh-FOLK

A few notes:

• The g sound in Afrikaans is usually a guttural sound, not the English g in go.
• die as the article is pronounced dee, not like English die.
• Stress falls mainly on -staan and -volg.

Hy is the normal subject pronoun meaning he.

So:

• Hy verstaan — He understands

If he were the object, Afrikaans would use hom instead:

• Ek sien hom — I see him

In your sentence, hy is the subject, so hy is the correct form.

Afrikaans usually uses a double negative with nie ... nie.

So:

• Hy verstaan die gevolg nie would be incomplete in standard Afrikaans
• the correct form is Hy verstaan nie die gevolg nie

That means:

• He does not understand the consequence

This nie ... nie pattern is one of the most important grammar features in Afrikaans.

You would use ’n for a/an:

• Hy verstaan ’n gevolg

But in natural English, understand a consequence is often less idiomatic than understand the consequence or understand the consequences. So while ’n gevolg is grammatically possible, the definite form die gevolg often sounds more natural if a specific result is meant.

The plural is gevolge.

So:

• die gevolg — the consequence / result
• die gevolge — the consequences / results

A full sentence would be:

• Hy verstaan die gevolge — He understands the consequences

No. In Afrikaans, common nouns are not capitalized just because they are nouns.

So gevolg stays lowercase unless it begins the sentence.

That is different from German, where all nouns are capitalized. Afrikaans is closer to English here.