Breakdown of Bitte buchstabiere deinen Namen.
Questions & Answers about Bitte buchstabiere deinen Namen.
Yes. The du-imperative can appear with or without the final -e:
- Buchstabiere deinen Namen. (more common in writing)
- Buchstabier deinen Namen. (very common in speech)
Both are correct; with verbs ending in -ieren, keeping the -e is especially common.
Because Name is masculine and it’s the direct object (accusative). With masculine nouns, the possessive dein- takes the ending -en in the accusative:
- masculine accusative: deinen Namen
- feminine accusative: deine Adresse
- neuter accusative: dein Handy
- plural accusative: deine Unterlagen
Name is a “weak” (N-) noun. In the singular it adds -n/-en in every case except nominative:
- nominative: der Name
- accusative: den Namen
- dative: dem Namen
- genitive: des Namens
With a possessive, it’s still accusative: deinen Namen.
All are fine; tone shifts slightly:
- Bitte buchstabiere deinen Namen. (neutral–polite; common)
- Buchstabiere bitte deinen Namen. (neutral request)
- Buchstabiere deinen Namen, bitte. (tagged-on “please,” a touch more insistent or coaxing)
No comma is needed in the first two. A comma before a final bitte is optional if you treat it as an afterthought.
It’s informal (du). The formal version is:
- Bitte buchstabieren Sie Ihren Namen.
Note the verb form buchstabieren with Sie, and Ihren (capitalized) for the formal “your.”
Use the ihr imperative and eur-:
- Buchstabiert euren Namen, bitte.
Note the spelling change: euer → euren (the stem eur- + ending).
Yes:
- Informal: Kannst du bitte deinen Namen buchstabieren?
- Formal: Könnten Sie bitte Ihren Namen buchstabieren? (even more polite with “könnten”)
- Bitte buchstabiere deinen Vornamen. (first name)
- Bitte buchstabiere deinen Nachnamen / Familiennamen. (last name) Formally: … Ihren Vornamen / Nachnamen.
- Bitte: short i and e; roughly “BIT-te.”
- buchstabieren: “Buch” with the harsh German ch (like in “Bach”); the “st” here sounds like “sht”; stress on the “-bie-”: buch-shta-BIE-ren.
- deinen: “ei” like English “eye.”
- Namen: long first “a”: “NAH-men.”
It’s not separable. The past participle is buchstabiert, and the auxiliary is haben:
- Ich habe meinen Namen buchstabiert.
- buchstabieren = to spell (say the letters): “Kannst du deinen Namen buchstabieren?”
- schreiben = to write: “Schreib deinen Namen hier.” These are not interchangeable.