How do you Imagine a German Valentines Day

How do you Imagine a German Valentine's Day German Customs in February-Part 2: Valentines Day - Fasching/Karneval Traditional and Religious Celebrations and Customs Groundhog Day  (Mari Lichtmess)Valentinstag  (Valentines Day)Mardi Gras: Fastnacht/Fasching/Karneval Valentinstag(14. Februar) Sankt Valentin and the lovers celebration in his name are not traditionally German, but in recent years  Valentinstag  has become increasingly popular in Germany. Originally celebrated mainly in France and the English-speaking countries, it is now common to see Valentine cards and other signs of the holiday in Germany. This trend was most likely forced upon the Germans by an increased effort to the florist-industry. Be gentle to your German lover should he not take this day seriously. German men possibly prefer to buy you flowers rather for no reason than when they are being expected to. If they buy flowers at all. The origins of Valentines Day The origins of both the man known as  Valentinus  and the celebration itself are obscure. Little is known about the Roman (or Romans) who may have been a bishop in Terni or a priest in Rome. Although several legends have arisen around the Christian martyr Valentinus, there is no historical evidence that connects him to lovers or todays Feb. 14 Valentine celebration. As in the case of other Christian celebrations, Valentines Day is more likely based on the pagan Roman fertility festival called Lupercalia that took place in mid-February. The Lupercalia only ended in 495 when it was banned by the pope. Did you know that Valentines  Day  is actually forbidden in Saudi Arabia? Fastnacht/Fasching(date varies) The German  Mardi Gras  or Carnival celebration goes by many names:  Fastnacht,  Fasching,  Fasnacht,  Fasnet,  Karneval. This is a movable feast (beweglicher Festtag) that is related to  Easter  and does not occur on the same date each year. (For the dates this year, see  Die fà ¼nfte Jahreszeit.) The culmination of the  Fastenzeit  (Lent) is always on the Tuesday (fat Tuesday mardi gras, Shrove Tuesday) before  Aschermittwoch  (Ash Wednesday). The official start of the  Fasching  season is either on January 7 (the day after Ephiphany,  Dreikà ¶nige) or on the 11th day of the 11th month (Nov. 11,  Elfter im Elften), depending on the region. A highlight before the main highlight, the Rosenmontag, is the so called Weiberfastnacht (Fat Thursday, also in certain regions in Germany its called Fetter Donnerstag) celebrated on the Thursday before Karneval. The tradition is that the women cut of the tie of any man who dears to wear one that day. Should you fancy your ties, make sure to have a cheap one in your wardrobe for this occasion. In regions where Karneval is celebrated the most, you might witness a bunch of women storming the local Rathaus (town hall) in order to cut off the mens ties. You certainly understand what a mans tie symbolises, right? Rosenmontag The Rosenmontag is the main celebration day of Carnival. That day there will be a huge parade marching through the city unless you live in Berlin or the northern parts of Germany. We are possibly not as jeck (nuts) as those southerners or simply have to drive out less demons than them. For those who miss all this kunterbunt trouble in Berlin, theres a little refuge for those from the Rhine region here in Berlin, the Stndige Vertretung. You might want to check it out next time you are in Berlin. Find out more about other  Celebrations and Customs here.   NEXT ARTICLE   Holidays in March Original article by: Hyde Flippo Edited on the 28th of June 2015 by: Michael Schmitz

Complex Sentences in English Grammar

Complex Sentences in English Grammar In traditional grammar, a complex sentence is a sentence that contains an independent clause  (or main clause) and at least one dependent clause. Put another way, a complex sentence is made up of a main clause with one or more dependent clauses joined to it with an appropriate conjunction or pronoun. The complex sentence is conventionally regarded as one of the four basic sentence structures in English. The other structures are the simple sentence, the compound sentence, and the compound-complex sentence. For an alternative definition, see  Holger Diessels remarks in Examples and Observations below.   Examples and Observations [I]n the complex sentence John left when his sister arrived, the clause when his sister arrived is a dependent clause because it is preceded by the word when, which is a subordinating conjunction. Dependent clauses are not complete sentences; they cannot stand alone as a complete sentence. For example, *When his sister arrived cannot stand alone. Dependent clauses must be attached to independent clauses in order to form a complete sentence. In the complex sentence above, John left is the independent clause.- Denise E. Murray and Mary Ann Christison, What English Language Teachers Need to Know. Routledge, 2011Martina laughed when her mother dropped a pie upside down on the floor.Because he was so small, Stuart was often hard to find around the house.- E.B. White, Stuart Little, 1945I learned a valuable lesson about cheating after I changed a mark on my report card in the third grade.- Making the GradeIf a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a dif ferent drummer.- Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854 He was like a cock who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow.- George Eliot, Adam Bede, 1859[W]hen my brother got his pants leg caught on the top of a high fence and hung upside down, weeping and muttering curses because his pants were newly torn and Mother would spank him for sure, no angel was with him.- Gary Soto, A Summer Life. University Press of New England, 1990The Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman stood up in a corner and kept quiet all night, although of course they could not sleep.- L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, 1990)Although volume upon volume is written to prove slavery a very good thing, we never hear of the man who wishes to take the good of it by being a slave himself.- Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on Slavery, July 1854 Relative Clauses and Adverbial Clauses A complex sentence has a main clause, and one or more subordinate clauses, which come in various kinds. One kind is a relative clause, as in the [bold] parts of Jack knew the kid who shot Kennedy. They can be piled up as in Jacks the guy who shot the kid who killed Kennedy...One more common kind of subordinate clause is an adverbial clause, often stating when, how, why, or if something happened, as in the [bold] parts of these sentences: If John comes, Im leaving, or He left because he felt ill. None of the examples just given were particularly exotic, and they could all easily have occurred in conversational speech. All were, in a technical sense, complex sentences, because they contained subordinate clauses.- James R. Hurford, The Origins of Grammar: Language in the Light of Evolution II. Oxford University Press, 2012 Positioning Clauses in Complex Sentences [D]ependent clauses cannot be sentences on their own. They depend on an independent clause to support them. The independent clause in a complex sentence carries the main meaning, but either clause may come first.- A. Robert Young and Ann O. Strauch, Nitty Gritty Grammar: Sentence Essentials for Writers. Cambridge University Press, 2006 The Need for Complex Sentences Most of the sentences we use in writing or in continuous speech are complex...There is a recurrent need to expound facts or concepts in greater elaboration than the structure of the simple sentence permits.- Walter Nash, English Usage: A Guide to First Principles. Routledge, 1986 Four Features of Complex Sentences Complex sentences are traditionally divided into two basic types: (i) sentences including coordinate clauses, and (ii) sentences including subordinate clauses. The former consist of two (or more) clauses that are functionally equivalent and symmetrical, whereas the latter consist of two (or more) clauses that constitute an asymmetrical relationship: a subordinate clause and a matrix clause do not have equal status and equal function (cf. Foley and Van Valin 1984: 239)...I suggest that prototypical subordinate clauses carry the following features: they are (i) syntactically embedded, (ii) formally marked as a dependent clause, (iii) semantically integrated in a superordinate clause, and (iv) part of the same processing and planning unit as the associated matrix clause.- Holger Diessel, The Acquisition of Complex Sentences. Cambridge University Press, 2004 Complex Sentences and Metaphors Complex sentences can offer dramatic development, extending a metaphor, as Melvilles Captain Ahab reminds us: The path to my fixed purpose is laid on iron rails, on which my soul is grooved to run.- Philip Gerard, Creative Nonfiction: Researching and Crafting Stories of Real Life. Story Press, 1996