Questions & Answers about Ich fühle mich heute schwach.
Why does mich appear in the sentence? Isn’t fühlen normally a transitive verb?
In German, sich fühlen is a reflexive verb used to express how one feels (emotionally or physically). It always takes a reflexive pronoun in the accusative case. Since the subject is ich, you need mich:
Ich fühle mich heute schwach.
Literally, “I feel myself weak today.”
What case is mich, and why not mir?
Because sich fühlen governs the accusative case for its reflexive pronoun. For the first person singular:
– Accusative: mich
– Dative: mir
Here you always use the accusative form mich.
Why is the adjective schwach not inflected (no ending like -e, -er, etc.)?
Schwach is used predicatively, not attributively. Predicative adjectives (those that follow a linking verb or a reflexive construction) never get adjective endings. Examples:
– Ich bin schwach.
– Ich fühle mich schwach.
Why is heute placed between mich and schwach?