# startete als Kulturstadt 2003



## screamerer

Hallo, Guten Tag, ..

Would you please take a look at the following statement:
"*Die österreichesche Stadt Graz startete als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival in einer alten Fabrik.*"

What does _startete_ there mean? The city "Graz" has existed long before that time, so it can't be referring to the time in which that city started or came to existence.. .

It also can't mean that "Graz" was the first to receive that title, as there had been other cities at that time which had already achieved it.. .


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## elroy

I think it means that it kicked off its year as European Capital of Culture with a big theater festival in an old factory.

In other words, the theater festival was the first (major) event Graz hosted as European Capital of Culture.


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## screamerer

elroy said:


> I think it means that it kicked off its year as European Capital of Culture with a big theater festival in an old factory.
> 
> In other words, the theater festival was the first (major) event Graz hosted as European Capital of Culture.


I think that's it .. . Let's just wait a little and see if any of our German friends approves (_*of*_? )  that.. .

Thank you.


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## HilfswilligerGenosse

"startete" can sometimes mean "participated", e.g. in the sentence _Der BVB startete (=participated) in der Europa League._... but I would approve of screamers' alternative too...


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## manfy

Elroy is right!
In this sentence, the connected verbal phrase is "als etwas starten", thus "als Kulturstadt 2003" is part of the predicate (I think!), and not a grammatical object like in "A starts B", "He starts a fire", etc.


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## perpend

So, if I understand:
"starten als etwas"
"kick off as something"

... startete als Kulturstadt mit ....
... kicked off as the 2003 Culture City with ...

EDIT: I think the German may be better with "einleiten" statt "starten", oder? I wonder what the source is.


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## elroy

perpend said:


> ... startete als Kulturstadt mit ....
> ... kicked off as the 2003 Culture City with ...


 Hm, that doesn't sound very natural to me in English.  But it does express the meaning.





> EDIT: I think the German may be better with "einleiten" statt "starten", oder? I wonder what the source is.


 "Einleiten" is transitive (one always leitet _something_ ein), and I don't think the meaning would fit either.  To me, "etwas einleiten" means to introduce something.  It's often used in discussions of grammar ("das Relativpronomen leitet den Nebensatz ein," for example).


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## perpend

I think you can "commence something" ... "etwas einleiten", im Sinne vom OP.

Not sure.


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## elroy

What would the object be?  _Die österreichesche Stadt Graz __leitete seine Zeit__ als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival in einer alten Fabrik ein_?  Are you suggesting something along those lines?


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## perpend

Nee, mehr so in der Art: Die österreichische_ Stadt, Graz, leitet Kulturstadt 2003 mit .............. ein.
_
Just my opinion and understanding.


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## elroy

"Kulturstadt 2013" is a title, not an event.  Graz _was _the Kulturstadt in 2003.  That's why you would need to add something like "seine Zeit" if you wanted to use "einleiten" (assuming "einleiten" is usable here, which I'm curious about now!).


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## Perseas

Are the verbs _starten_, _anfangen_ and _beginnen_ interchangeable in this sentsence?
... Graz startete als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival ...
... Graz begann als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival ...
... Graz fing als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival ... an


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## berndf

Perseas said:


> Are the verbs _starten_, _anfangen_ and _beginnen_ interchangeable in this sentsence?
> ... Graz startete als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival ...
> ... Graz begann als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival ...
> ... Graz fing als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival ... an


No. This usage is idiomatically fixed. The verb _starten _has a sports connotation that is relevant to the expression.


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## Schlabberlatz

elroy said:


> That's why you would need to add something like "seine Zeit" if you wanted to use "einleiten" (assuming "einleiten" is usable here, which I'm curious about now!).


You could use "einleiten" here, and your sentence is fine, but it would have to be "*ihre* Zeit".


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## John Lemon

As a native speaker of German, this looks kind of oddly worded to me even through my "marketing speak" glasses. screamerer, did you get the phrase from this questionnaire of sorts? It pops up on page 7 of the PDF file.

http://modszerver.babits.pte.hu/wp-content/pdf/kurzvortrag_tanari.pdf

Reading to the entire blurb, the sentence seems to translate roughly to: "When it was Graz's turn to become 'the Culture City', it kicked off 2003 with a large theater festival in an old factory ...", and so forth.

In my opinion, this is another example of the preposition "als" being a bit too flexible for its own good in German.


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## berndf

John Lemon said:


> Reading to the entire blurb, the sentence seems to translate roughly to: "When it was Graz's turn to become 'the Culture City', it kicked off 2003 with a large theater festival in an old factory ...", and so forth.
> 
> In my opinion, this is another example of the preposition "als" being a bit too flexible for its own good in German.


I am sorry. I don't understand your problem. The interpretation is quite straight forward and I can't see anything wrong with it:
_Die österreichesche Stadt Graz startete [ihre Rolle] als Kultur*haupt*stadt 2003 mit ..._ [the text is wrong, 2003 the correct label was already _Kulturhauptstadt_, not _Kulturstadt_]
_The Austrian city Graz started its role as European Capital of Culture with..._


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## John Lemon

Well, the way I see it is that if the sentence were well-written, it wouldn't have spawned this thread in the first place.  As a number of people have pointed out, it really is somewhat ambiguous.


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## berndf

John Lemon said:


> Well, the way I see it is that if the sentence were well-written, it wouldn't have spawned this thread in the first place.


So, you are saying learners of German would ask questions about a sentence unless native speakers would have problems with it, too?


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## djweaverbeaver

I know the question is about the German, but I do agree with elroy that "to kick off" here sounds odd.  Not only is it informal, but I think it would need an object in this case to be even passable.  That's why I understand John Lemon's rephrasing of the whole think.  Nevertheless, as I've already mentioned, the question is about the German, not the English.


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## Schlabberlatz

I don’t think it’s "oddly worded" (#15), either.

A short addition to #14: if you left out "Stadt", "seine Zeit" would be correct: _Graz leitete seine Zeit als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival in einer alten Fabrik ein_
(compare this old thread: http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/münchen-ist-eine-schöne-stadt-es-gefällt-mir.3005503/)


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## Perseas

About the function of "starten":

In the sentence we discuss it is intrasitive.
In berndf's explanation "starteten" is transitive (the object is in brackets):


berndf said:


> _Die österreichesche Stadt Graz startete [ihre Rolle als] als Kultur*haupt*stadt 2003 mit ..._ _._



May I from the above deduce that "starten" is used in German mostly as transitive? (and hence some problems that showed up in the thread in relation to its interpretation).


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## berndf

I don't think this distinction transitive/intransitive is very important here. You could easily replace the object by and adverbial without changing much:
_Die österreichesche Stadt Graz startete ihre Rolle als Kulturhauptstadt...
Die österreichesche Stadt Graz startete in ihrer Rolle als Kulturhauptstadt..._


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## elroy

Schlabberlatz said:


> You could use "einleiten" here, and your sentence is fine, but it would have to be "*ihre* Zeit".





Schlabberlatz said:


> A short addition to #14: if you left out "Stadt", "seine Zeit" would be correct: _Graz leitete seine Zeit als Kulturstadt 2003 mit einem großen Theaterfestival in einer alten Fabrik ein_


 I think when I wrote "seine Zeit" I was thinking "Graz."


djweaverbeaver said:


> I do agree with elroy that "to kick off" here sounds odd.  Not only is it informal, but I think it would need an object in this case to be even passable.


 I agree.  That's why I originally wrote "kicked off *its year*" (#2).  But I think that's more than just "passable."  I feel like "kicked off the year" is perfectly idiomatic, don't you think?


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## djweaverbeaver

Yes, what I was basically trying to say is that an obect, "the year" for example, is needed for *kicked off* to work.


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## manfy

djweaverbeaver said:


> Yes, what I was basically trying to say is that an obect, "the year" for example, is needed for *kicked off* to work.


 
Come to think of it, the same is actually true in German. But it seems that this omission of the object is so common that it is sort of implied.
For instance in F1, you'd usually hear "XY startet heute in Pole-Position." and everybody would automatically understand it as "XY startet _das Rennen_ heute in Pole-Position." 
The same concept applies to the sentence in the OP.


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