De stewardess geeft de mensen water.

The stewardess gives the people water.

Breakdown of De stewardess geeft de mensen water.

• het water: the water
• geven: to give
• de stewardess: the stewardess
• de mens: the human

Questions & Answers about De stewardess geeft de mensen water.

Why is the verb geeft used here instead of the infinitive geven?

Dutch verbs change form depending on the subject. Geven is the infinitive (“to give”). For the 3rd person singular (he/she/it), you remove -en to get the stem gev- and add -t, yielding geeft.
Example:
Ik geef (I give)
Jij geeft (you give)
Hij/zij/het geeft (he/she/it gives)

Why is it de stewardess and not het stewardess?

Dutch nouns are either de‑words or het‑words. Almost all feminine and masculine nouns take de. Since stewardess is a feminine noun (ending in -ess), it uses the article de. Only neuter nouns (like het huis “the house”) use het.

Why do we say de mensen with de? Can we drop the article and just say mensen?

Including de makes de mensen definite: “the people” (e.g. the passengers on this flight). Without de, mensen would be indefinite plural = “people” in general. Both are grammatically correct, but the meaning shifts:

• De stewardess geeft mensen water = The flight attendant gives water to people (in general).
• De stewardess geeft de mensen water = The flight attendant gives water to the (specific) people.

Why is there no article before water?

Water is an uncountable noun in Dutch. When you mean “some water” (an indefinite amount), you usually omit the article entirely. If you wanted “the water” (a specific batch), you could say het water.

Why does de mensen (indirect object) come before water (direct object)?

Dutch allows a double‑object construction without a preposition, much like English “gives the people water.” When both objects are full noun phrases, you typically place the indirect object first and the direct object second.
Structure: Subject – Verb – Indirect Object – Direct Object

Could we rephrase the sentence with a preposition, like de stewardess geeft water aan de mensen?

Yes. Dutch permits both forms:
1) Double‑object: De stewardess geeft de mensen water.
2) Prepositional: De stewardess geeft water aan de mensen.
There’s no significant difference in meaning—both mean “The flight attendant gives water to the people.”

How would you say “The flight attendant gives them water” using pronouns?

Replace de mensen (the people) with the object pronoun hen (them) and keep water as a noun:
De stewardess geeft hen water.
If you also want to replace water with a pronoun (neuter het), you say:
De stewardess geeft het hen.
(Note word order: pronouns remain in the verb cluster position.)

What is the basic word order rule illustrated by this sentence?

In a main clause, Dutch follows the Verb‑Second (V2) rule: the finite verb appears in the second position. Everything else (subject, objects, adverbials) can occupy the first spot, but the verb itself stays in slot two. In De stewardess geeft de mensen water, the subject De stewardess is first, the verb geeft is second, followed by objects.