Accusative case facts for kids

The accusative case is a special way some words change their form to show they are the direct object of a verb. Think of the direct object as the thing or person that receives the action of the verb. For example, in "She kicks the ball," "the ball" is the direct object because it's what gets kicked. The accusative case helps us understand which word is doing the action and which word is receiving it.

What is the Accusative Case?

In many languages, words change their shape depending on their job in a sentence. This change is called a grammatical case. The accusative case specifically marks the word that is the direct object. This means it's the person or thing that the action of the verb happens to.

Let's look at an example:

• In "He sees the woman," "he" is the subject. The subject is the one doing the action.
• In "The woman sees him," "him" is the direct object. The object is the one receiving the action.

Accusative in English

In English, we mostly see the accusative case with pronouns. Pronouns are words like "he," "she," "it," "they," "I," and "we."

• When "he" is the subject, it stays "he."
• When "he" is the object, it changes to "him."
• Other examples: "she" becomes "her," "I" becomes "me," "we" becomes "us."

However, English nouns (words for people, places, or things) usually do not change their form for the accusative case.

• "The man sees the woman." (man is the subject)
• "The woman sees the man." (man is the object)

The word "man" stays the same in both sentences.

Accusative in Other Languages

Many other languages are different from English. In these languages, not only pronouns but also nouns and even the words like "the" (called articles) can change their form to show the accusative case. This helps speakers know if a word is the subject or the object, even if the word order is different.

Latin Examples

Let's look at Latin, an old language.

• "The man sees the woman" is "Vir feminam videt."
• "The woman sees the man" is "Femina virum videt."

Notice how the words change:

• For "man": "vir" is used when he is the subject (the one seeing). "Virum" is used when he is the object (the one being seen).
• For "woman": "femina" is used when she is the subject. "Feminam" is used when she is the object.

The form used for the subject ("he," "vir," "femina") is called the nominative case. The form used for the direct object ("him," "virum," "feminam") is the accusative case.

German Examples

In German, the word "the" (called an article) can change for the accusative case.

• If "the car" is the subject of a sentence, it might be "der Wagen." This is the nominative form.
• If "the car" is the object in a sentence, it changes to "den Wagen." This is the accusative form.

The noun "Wagen" (car) itself does not change in this example, but the article "der" changes to "den."

See Also

In Spanish: Caso acusativo para niños