Health & Body
Health & Body
Describing pain in German routes through the dative case: instead of 'having' an ache the way English does, you say the pain 'happens to' you while the body part itself does the hurting.
Grammar Comparison
Grammar Comparison
weh tun + dative: pain 'happens to' you
Mir tut der Kopf weh. (My head hurts — literally 'to me the head does pain')
My head hurts.
English treats pain almost like possession: 'I have a headache', 'my head hurts' — the sufferer is grammatically active. German instead puts the person in the dative (mir) as the one something happens TO, while the body part (der Kopf) becomes the grammatical subject that 'does the hurting'. Word order is fixed: dative pronoun first, then tut, then the body part, then weh at the very end — Der Kopf tut mir weh also works, but Mir tut der Kopf weh is more common in speech.
Body parts take the definite article, not a possessive
Ich habe Kopfschmerzen. Mein Bein tut weh, wenn ich laufe.
I have a headache. My leg hurts when I walk.
When you use the dative + weh tun construction, the body part takes der/die/das rather than 'my' — the dative pronoun (mir) already establishes whose body part it is, so a possessive would be redundant, and is in fact ungrammatical there. This mirrors the pattern from reflexive dative verbs like sich die Hände waschen.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary
| German | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| der Kopf | dair kopf | head |
| der Bauch | dair bowkh | stomach |
| der Rücken | dair RUE-ken | back |
| der Hals | dair hahls | throat / neck |
| der Arm | dair arm | arm |
| das Bein | dahs byn | leg |
| Mir tut ... weh. | meer toot ... vay | My ... hurts. |
| Ich habe Kopfschmerzen. | ikh HAH-beh KOPF-shmair-tsen | I have a headache. |
| krank | krahnk | sick |
| gesund | geh-ZOONT | healthy |
| der Arzt / die Ärztin | dair artst / dee AIRTS-tin | doctor |
| die Apotheke | dee ah-poh-TAY-keh | pharmacy |
| das Medikament | dahs meh-dee-kah-MENT | medicine |
| sich erkälten | zikh air-KEL-ten | to catch a cold |
| Ich fühle mich nicht gut. | ikh FUE-leh mikh nikht goot | I don't feel well. |