Dragon27 wrote:jeff_lindqvist wrote:The way I remember it from my German classes:
definite article → weak declension
indefinite article (+mein, dein ..., kein) → strong declension
To me, this makes sense. The definite article is already "strong" (or informative) enough, so the adjective can remain weak.
You should slightly revise your memory. Indefinite article (+mein, dein ..., kein) is mostly "strong" too (in the declension table only 3 out of 16 cells are without endings), so the adjective after it is mostly weak (also known as "mixed" in grammar manuals). Strong adjectival declension is when there's no articles (or possessive/negative pronouns, etc.) whatsoever before the adjective.
edit:
I said "revise your memory", but I didn't think that it could have been how they actually taught you. Is that actually true (that they used to teach that after the indefinite article the declension of the adjective is strong)? This terminological convention doesn't make sense to me, tbh.
Ah... Strong, weak and mixed... That definitely rings a bell -- I read that back a long time ago (when I was reading about German -- I never got fat enough to put it in my language list).
Thanks for that -- I engage in conversations specifically to further my own understanding, so am usually very pleased to be shown how and where I'm wrong. I haven't deleted my previous post, but just struck out the text to show it's not to be taken as information by anyone else.