Question
16 January
- Russian
- English (US) Near fluent
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English (US)
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French (France)
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Frisian
Question about German
What is the difference between nachvollziehen and verstehen ?Feel free to just provide example sentences.
What is the difference between nachvollziehen and verstehen ?Feel free to just provide example sentences.
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- English (US)
- German
nachvollziehen : geschehenes oder von anderen Überlegtes selbst durchdenken, so dass man es verstehen kann
verstehen : deutlich akustisch wahrnehmen
nachvollziehen is comprehend Ich konnte seine Argumentation einfach nachvollziehen.
Er kann ihre Meinung nachvollziehen, aber er stimmt ihr nicht zu.
verstehen is understand . Die Schüler konnten die neue Lehrerin viel besser verstehen.
Highly-rated answerer
- German
"verstehen" is a very wide expression. It can denote several kinds of understanding/hearing:
Ich kann dich nicht verstehen. (sounds strongly like the speaker is physically unable to hear the other persons voice clearly due to noise etc.; it could also denote "I can't understand why you acted like that)
Ich verstehe kein Russisch. (I never learned to speak it and thus I don't understand any russian)
Ich verstehe, warum du so gehandelt hast. (in comparison to "nachvollziehen" this sentence sounds kind of sympathetic, like "I realize why you acted like that and also somewhat agree with your reasoning")
"nachvollziehen" means that you logically thought about it and judge an action/event to be based on logic/reason/...., to you, it's somewhat logical that this happened.
As far as understanding the reason/cause of something goes, there is not much difference besides the fact that "verstehen" might be understood as expressing agreement.
When talking about history, for example, there are many cases where you might logically understand why something happened, but want to denote that you do not agree with what transpired. In such cases, "nachvollziehen" is the way to go.
Highly-rated answerer
- Russian
- English (US) Near fluent
so is it that verstehen is used when a person understands something emotionally and on a deeper level, but nachvollziehen is more about like understanding something only theoretically and not so much relating to it?
- German
@zarif09
"so is it that verstehen is used when a person understands something emotionally and on a deeper level"
That's only half of the truth. As far as meaning is concerned, you don't have to use "nachvollziehen" ever since "verstehen" covers its meaning entirely.
On the other hand, whenever you want to denote "I logically understand the reasoning behind ....., but I don't necessarily agree with it", you should not use "verstehen", since it is frequently understood as "to agree with/be in favor of sth."
Highly-rated answerer
- English (US)
- German
@zarif09 no nachvollziehen = jemandes Gedankengänge nachzuvollziehen versuchen you can follow their thought process , it can even be used to Sendung nachvollziehen so you know there your package is right now
Highly-rated answerer
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