Relevant aspects about German prepositions for Spanish speakers

Abstract

This paper aims to prove that the German preposition is a grammatical category that,from a structural-functional perspective and also from a discursive one, is nothing to sniff at. This is so due to the treatment it has received for the last 80 years or so by traditional grammar. It has been undervalued by considering it a tiny item (Hoffmann,2010: 52) with an aspect of minor category (Bednarský,2002: 85) and atony (Alcina &Blecua,1991: 496). In line with this we believe that its importance should be nuanced for the progress of the discipline. So this paper will focus on defining and systematizing prepositional constructions from a syntactic, pragmatic-discoursive perspective. This should be useful to Spanish speakers to better understand the functioning of the German language in this aspect. To fully configure its sense,our emphasis will be in the selective relations steered by the verb valency and the speaker’s intention alluding to the Spanish language.