Prepositions of Place
Prepositions of Place
Most Dutch place prepositions map cleanly onto English ones, but a handful of everyday locations take op where English insists on 'at' or 'in' — op school, op kantoor, op straat — and there is no way to derive which ones from meaning alone.
Grammar Comparison
Grammar Comparison
op where English expects 'at' or 'in'
op school, op kantoor, op straat, op vakantie
at school, at the office, in the street, on holiday
op literally means 'on', and for physical surfaces it behaves exactly like English: op de tafel ('on the table'). But a fixed set of institutions and locations also takes op — op school, op kantoor, op het werk, op straat — where English would say 'at' or 'in'. These are set phrases, and most of them also drop the article, which makes them easy to spot and worth memorizing as whole units.
in versus naar: static location versus movement toward
Ik ben in de stad. Ik ga naar de stad.
I'm in town. I'm going to town.
Dutch keeps a sharp line between where something is and where it is heading. Location takes in, op, bij and so on; motion toward a destination takes naar, which covers both English 'to' and the directional sense of 'into'. English can blur this ('I'm going in the house'), Dutch does not: Ik ga naar het huis for the movement, Ik ben in het huis for the position.
bij: a proximity word English has to paraphrase
bij het raam, bij de dokter, bij mij
by the window, at the doctor's, at my place
bij covers a range English splits across several prepositions: physical proximity ('by, near'), being at someone's premises ('at the doctor's', 'at Anna's'), and being at someone's home (bij mij = 'at my place'). Where English needs a possessive apostrophe construction — 'at the doctor's' — Dutch just uses bij plus the plain noun.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary
- English
- on / at
- English
- in
- English
- under
- English
- next to
- English
- between
- English
- behind
- English
- in front of
- English
- above
- English
- by / at
- English
- to (movement)
Finished this lesson?