Sie in Deutsch

 German continues to baffle me. This time with Sie. I was surprised to learn that there are ten different meanings of the word Sie in German. Here are these ten meanings,

1. Sie -> You (in Singular form, as a subject)
2. Sie -> You (as an object)
3. Sie -> You (in plural form, as an object)
4. Sie -> You (object in plural)
5. Sie -> She (as subject)
6. Sie -> Her (as object)
7. Sie -> They (as subject)
8. Sie -> Them (as object)
9. Sie -> It (as subject)
10. Sie -> It (as Object)

Now, the question arises how to differentiate all these different meanings of sie/Sie, well, that will be clear with the 4Cs --> Capital, Conjugation, Contest, and Case.

Few easy tricks to understand this are,

•  if it's written with capital S in the middle of the sentence then it means either You (in singular) or You (in plural, as in you all)
• if it's with small s, then it could mean she/her/they/them/it

Now, another trick to identify the correct meaning of sie is to look at the verb

• If the verb used is in infinitive form, like sind, wohnen, etc. then that sie is likely to be they/them
• If the verb used is in singular form, like ist, wohnt, fragt, then it is likely to be her/it

Another important thing to look in these sentences is the position of sie, if it's subject or object.

in Sie frage ich, Sie is object, so here sie could mean her/them/it. However in, Ich frage sie, sie is the object, now because it is small letter s, it could mean either her/it.

Let's learn it by some examples,

1.Wo wohnen Sie? 

There could be following meanings for this sentence,

• Where do you (just singular you) live?
• Where do you (all, in plural form) live?

2. Wo wohnen sie?

Now, this could mean one of following,

• Where does she live?
• Where does it live?
• Where does they live?

3. Ich liebe sie.

This could mean one of the following, depending on the context,

• I love her.
• I love them.
• I love it.

4. Sie frage ich.

This could mean one of the following,

• I ask them.
• I ask her.
• I ask it.

5. Sie kaufe ich.

Now this could just mean I buy it.

Alles Gute meinen Freunden!