Word formation
Compounds, separable & inseparable prefixes, derivational suffixes — how German builds new words from parts you already know.
German stacks nouns together freely. The last noun determines gender and meaning category; preceding nouns narrow it down:
das Haus (house)
das Krankenhaus (hospital — sick-house)
die Hausaufgabe (homework — house-task)
der Hausmann (househusband)
das Rathaus (town hall — council-house)To decode a compound: Split from the right. The rightmost noun is the head. Everything to the left modifies it.
Bundesstraße = Bund (federal) + Straße (road) = federal road
Handtasche = Hand + Tasche (bag) = handbag
Fahrradweg = Fahrrad (bicycle) + Weg (path) = bike path
Krankenversicherung = krank (sick) + Versicherung (insurance) = health insurance
Datenschutzerklärung = Daten (data) + Schutz (protection) + Erklärung (declaration) = privacy policyCompounds sometimes use a linking element (-s-, -e-, -n-, -en-, -er-): ``` Arbeit + s + platz = Arbeitsplatz (workplace) Kind + er + garten = Kindergarten Land + es + hauptstadt = Landeshauptstadt (state capital) ```
No rule for which linking element — must be learned per compound.
In your corpus
Real compound words from the corpus, decomposed into their actual parts — not textbook examples you may never meet.