Though English and German share a lot of characteristics, both languages have enough peculiarities that may cause problems in translation and understanding. These do not only concern false friends, such as gift and Gift, but also words with multiple meanings, such as wood (Wald, Holz) or Gurke (gherkin, cucumber). Besides vocabulary, this seminar will also look at other linguistic categories, such as phonology, morphology and syntax, and discusses where English and German differ from one another in order to prevent mistakes arising from misleading apparent similarities.
Textbook:
König, Ekkehard, & Volker Gast. 2012. Understanding English-German Contrasts. 3rd ed. Grundlagen der Anglistik und Amerikanistik 29. Berlin: Erich Schmidt.