de of het telefoongesprek?
het telefoongesprek
telephone call
noun · /teː.ləˈfoːn.ɣəˌsprɛk/
It is “het telefoongesprek”. The plural is “de telefoongesprekken”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: telefoongesprek
Forms
- Article
- het telefoongesprek
- Plural
- de telefoongesprekken
- Diminutive
- het telefoongesprekje
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
De hele nacht door hadden de vriendinnen telefoongesprekjes.
The friends had short conversations over the phone throughout the entire night.
Het telefoongesprek duurde een uur.
The phone call lasted an hour.
Ik moet nog een belangrijk telefoongesprek voeren.
I still need to make an important phone call.
Why this article
No rule predicts it
This one has to be memorised. No spelling pattern marks it as neuter, which is exactly why it is worth learning as “het telefoongesprek” rather than as “telefoongesprek” on its own.
The rules that do work
- • Every plural takes “de”, without exception.
- • Every diminutive ending in -je takes “het”, without exception.
- • Nouns ending in -ing, -heid, -tie, -teit or -schap take “de”.
- • Roughly two thirds of all nouns take “de”, so it is the better guess.
Other nouns whose article has to be memorised
Stop guessing de and het
Woordje has a practice mode for exactly this: it shows a noun and asks for the article, and keeps asking until you stop getting it wrong.