Die sin is kort.

Here die means the.

It is pronounced roughly dee, not like English die. So the whole sentence sounds roughly like dee sin is kort.

A useful extra point: Afrikaans uses die for:

• singular definite nouns
• plural definite nouns
• all grammatical genders

So Afrikaans does not have separate words like English the for different genders.

Yes. Sin is the normal Afrikaans word for sentence.

It is pronounced roughly like English sin.

You may also later see sin in the meaning sense, for example:

• Dit maak sin = That makes sense

But in Die sin is kort, the meaning is clearly sentence.

Yes. Is is the present-tense form of to be.

One important difference from English is that Afrikaans does not switch between am, is, and are in the present tense. It stays is:

• ek is = I am
• jy is = you are
• hy is = he is
• ons is = we are
• hulle is = they are

So even with a plural subject, Afrikaans still uses is.

Because kort is the adjective that describes the subject through the linking verb is.

The structure is:

• Die sin = subject
• is = linking verb
• kort = adjective

This works very much like English The sentence is short.

If you want the adjective directly before the noun instead, you can say:

• 'n kort sin = a short sentence

After is, adjectives normally stay in their basic form in Afrikaans. So:

• Die sin is kort is correct

Not:

• Die sin is korte

So in this sentence, kort does not need any extra ending.

Yes, in this simple sentence it is very similar to English:

• Die sin = The sentence
• is = is
• kort = short

So the pattern is subject + verb + adjective.

That said, Afrikaans has its own word-order rules in other sentence types. For example, if another element comes first, the verb still stays in second position:

• Vandag is die sin kort = Today the sentence is short

It is capitalized only because it is the first word of the sentence.

In the middle of a sentence, it would normally be lowercase:

• Ek dink die sin is kort = I think the sentence is short

So there is nothing special about the capital D here beyond normal sentence capitalization.

You say:

• Die sin is nie kort nie = The sentence is not short

Afrikaans usually uses a double nie for ordinary negation. In a simple sentence like this:

• the first nie comes after the finite verb
• the second nie comes at the end of the clause

That double negative pattern is a very important feature of Afrikaans.

Here are the useful forms:

• 'n Sin is kort = A sentence is short
• Die sinne is kort = The sentences are short

Notice:

• 'n means a/an
• the plural of sin is sinne
• is stays is even with the plural sinne

A small writing tip: at the start of a sentence, 'n stays lowercase, so you write 'n Sin is kort, not 'N Sin is kort.