Die veiligheidsgordel is belangrik.

Die is the Afrikaans definite article, meaning the.

A useful thing to know is that Afrikaans does not change the definite article for gender, and die is also used with plural nouns. So one small word covers a lot of jobs that English handles with the and some other languages handle with several different forms.

Afrikaans, like Dutch and German, very often writes compound nouns as one word.

So veiligheidsgordel is a compound noun made from:

• veiligheid = safety
• gordel = belt

English often writes similar words as two words or sometimes hyphenates them, but Afrikaans usually joins them together into a single compound.

That s is a linking s inside the compound.

It is not an English-style possessive apostrophe, and it does not mean plural here. It simply helps link the two parts of the compound:

• veiligheid
• gordel

This kind of linking sound is common in Afrikaans compounds, but it is not always fully predictable, so it is often best learned as part of the whole word.

Is is the present-tense form of to be, just like English is in The seatbelt is important.

In this sentence, it links the subject Die veiligheidsgordel with the description belangrik.

A very important Afrikaans point: in the present tense, is is used much more broadly than English is. Even with plural subjects, Afrikaans still uses is:

• Die veiligheidsgordels is belangrik = The seatbelts are important

So Afrikaans does not switch to are the way English does.

Here, belangrik is a predicate adjective: it comes after is and describes the subject.

After is, Afrikaans adjectives usually stay in their basic form:

• Die veiligheidsgordel is belangrik

When an adjective comes before a noun, it often takes -e:

• ’n belangrike reël = an important rule

So the form belangrik here is correct because it comes after is, not before a noun.

Yes, in this simple sentence the word order is very close to English:

• Die veiligheidsgordel = subject
• is = verb
• belangrik = complement/adjective

So the structure is:

Subject + is + adjective

That is one reason this sentence feels quite familiar to an English speaker.

You would use the indefinite article ’n:

’n veiligheidsgordel is belangrik.

A useful spelling note: ’n is normally written in lowercase, even if it begins a sentence. The next word gets the capital letter:

• ’n Veiligheidsgordel is belangrik.

Also, ’n is pronounced as a very weak sound, like a schwa, not like a full English an.

Usually, you make the noun plural and keep the rest of the sentence very similar:

Die veiligheidsgordels is belangrik.

Notice two things:

• veiligheidsgordel becomes veiligheidsgordels
• is stays is, even though the subject is plural

That second point often surprises English speakers.

A few helpful pronunciation points:

• die sounds like dee
• is sounds like iss
• the g in veiligheidsgordel is not a hard English g; it is the throatier Afrikaans sound
• in belangrik, the stress falls on lang: be-LANG-rik

So even if your accent is not perfect yet, getting dee ... iss ... be-LANG-rik roughly right will already make you much easier to understand.