Breakdown of Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt, die wir gemeinsam lesen.
Questions & Answers about Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt, die wir gemeinsam lesen.
Lehrer / Lehrerin is a gendered noun pair:
- der Lehrer = (male) teacher
- die Lehrerin = (female) teacher
The ending -in is added to many profession or role nouns to form the feminine version:
- der Arzt → die Ärztin (doctor)
- der Student → die Studentin (student)
- der Lehrer → die Lehrerin
The article must match the noun’s gender, so we say die Lehrerin (nominative, singular, feminine).
Hat ausgewählt is the present perfect tense (Perfekt) in German:
- auxiliary haben (conjugated: hat)
- past participle ausgewählt
In everyday spoken German, the Perfekt is usually used instead of the simple past (Präteritum) for most verbs:
- Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt.
≈ Die Lehrerin wählte eine Kurzgeschichte.
Both are grammatically correct.
Differences:
- Hat ausgewählt – very common in spoken German, neutral in style.
- Wählte – more common in written narratives, literature, and formal writing.
So the sentence uses the normal conversational past.
Kurzgeschichte is a compound noun:
- kurz = short
- die Geschichte = story
Put together: die Kurzgeschichte = short story (as a literary form).
In German, it’s very common to combine words into one compound noun instead of writing them separately.
Also, all nouns are capitalized in German, so Kurzgeschichte starts with a capital K.
Eine is the indefinite article; die is the definite article.
- eine Kurzgeschichte = a short story (not specified which one yet)
- die Kurzgeschichte = the short story (a specific one already known in the context)
In the sentence, the teacher is selecting one short story out of a group, not referring to a previously known specific story. So eine is appropriate.
The word die here is a relative pronoun, not the normal article die and not the personal pronoun sie.
It refers back to Kurzgeschichte:
- Kurzgeschichte is feminine singular: die Kurzgeschichte
- In a relative clause, the relative pronoun must match the gender and number of the noun it refers to. So we use die (feminine singular).
We do not use:
- sie – that would be a personal pronoun: Sie lesen sie (You read it / them).
- das – that is the neuter relative pronoun (used for das Buch, das Kind etc.), not correct for a feminine noun.
So:
- die wir gemeinsam lesen = that (which) we read together, referring to die Kurzgeschichte.
In die wir gemeinsam lesen, die is:
- gender/number: feminine singular (matches Kurzgeschichte)
- case: accusative
Inside the relative clause, look at the verb lesen:
- wir = subject (nominative)
- lesen = verb
- die (Kurzgeschichte) = direct object (accusative)
So die is accusative feminine singular, functioning as the object of lesen.
You can test it by replacing it with the full noun:
- … die Kurzgeschichte, die wir (die Kurzgeschichte) gemeinsam lesen.
→ we read the short story = direct object → accusative.
Because die wir gemeinsam lesen is a subordinate clause (specifically, a relative clause) introduced by the relative pronoun die.
In German:
- Main clauses: the conjugated verb is in second position.
- Wir lesen gemeinsam.
- Subordinate clauses (introduced by dass, weil, die, die, welche, etc.): the conjugated verb goes to the end.
- …, weil wir gemeinsam lesen.
- …, die wir gemeinsam lesen.
So in die wir gemeinsam lesen, lesen correctly appears at the end of the clause.
In a subordinate clause, the conjugated verb must be final:
- …, die wir gemeinsam lesen. ✅
- …, die wir lesen gemeinsam. ❌ (ungrammatical in standard German)
The adverb gemeinsam (together) belongs in the middle field of the clause (between subject and final verb), so the natural order is:
- subject: wir
- adverb: gemeinsam
- verb (at the end): lesen
So wir gemeinsam lesen is the standard word order.
You can say both:
- die wir gemeinsam lesen
- die wir zusammen lesen
Both are correct and both mean that we read together.
Nuance:
- zusammen = very common, neutral everyday word for together.
- gemeinsam = slightly more formal or “cooperative” in tone; often used to stress a shared activity or purpose.
In this sentence, either is fine; the meaning hardly changes.
German often uses the present tense to talk about the future if the context clearly refers to something that will happen later.
So:
- die wir gemeinsam lesen
can mean that we will read together, if it is clear from the situation (e.g. the teacher has just selected it for a future class activity).
You can use a future tense:
- die wir gemeinsam lesen werden = that we will read together
This is grammatically correct, but often not necessary. In everyday German, the simple present (lesen) is preferred when the future meaning is obvious.
Wir and uns are different cases of the same pronoun:
- wir = nominative (subject)
- uns = accusative or dative (object)
In the clause die wir gemeinsam lesen:
- wir is the subject of lesen → nominative case → wir is correct.
- If we needed an object pronoun, we would use uns, but here the object is die (the short story), not us.
So:
- Wir lesen die Kurzgeschichte. → wir = subject, die Kurzgeschichte = object.
- Therefore: die wir gemeinsam lesen, not die uns gemeinsam lesen.
Auswählen is a separable verb:
- prefix: aus-
- verb stem: wählen (to choose)
In the infinitive: auswählen (written together).
In the present tense main clause:
- Die Lehrerin wählt eine Kurzgeschichte aus.
(prefix aus moves to the end)
To form the past participle:
- Insert ge after the prefix: aus + ge + wählt
- Result: ausgewählt
Then combine with haben:
- Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt.
The participle ausgewählt is written lowercase because it is a verb form, not a noun.
Yes, that is grammatically correct.
Differences:
- Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt, …
→ Perfekt (present perfect), very common in spoken German and neutral overall. - Die Lehrerin wählte eine Kurzgeschichte aus, …
→ Präteritum (simple past), often used in written narratives, stories, and more literary contexts.
The meaning is essentially the same: both describe a completed selection in the past. The relative clause die wir gemeinsam lesen can stay in the present for a future action, as explained earlier.
Yes.
In German, all subordinate clauses, including relative clauses, must be separated from the main clause by a comma.
- Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt, die wir gemeinsam lesen.
Here:
- main clause: Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt
- relative clause: die wir gemeinsam lesen
The comma marks the boundary between them and is obligatory in standard German spelling.
Indicators that die wir gemeinsam lesen is a relative clause:
- It starts with die, which here functions as a relative pronoun referring back to Kurzgeschichte.
- The conjugated verb lesen is at the end of the clause (typical of subordinate clauses).
- It directly follows the noun it describes (Kurzgeschichte), and adds extra information about it.
If it were another main clause, it would look like:
- Die Lehrerin hat eine Kurzgeschichte ausgewählt, und wir lesen sie gemeinsam.
- Starts with wir,
- verb lesen in 2nd position,
- uses sie as a personal pronoun instead of die.
So structure and pronoun type show that die wir gemeinsam lesen is a relative clause.