5.5 Talking about Your or Mine(Grammar)

Hallo Linie,

Thank you for your question! I can understand that this can be confusing. Unfortunately there is no definite answer to this. Yes, if you look at some of the sentences individually it appears that sometimes they could be either or such as:

“Ihr Freund kommt aus Deutschland.” could mean “Their friend (masc.) is from Germany.” or “Her friend (masc.) is from Germany.” or “Your (formal) friend (masc.) is from Germany.”

Most of the time the context will help you understand who is being talked about, e.g. when listening to or having a conversation. Using the sentence from above, part of a conversation could go like this:

"David und Sophie haben einen Freund. Ihr Freund kommt aus Deutschland.” - “David and Sophie have a friend. Their friend is from Germany.”  or 

“Tina vermisst ihren Freund. Ihr Freund kommt aus Deutschland.” - ”Tina misses her friend. Her friend is from Germany."  or 

Person A: “Wer ist der Mann neben Frau Müller?” - “Who is the man next to Miss Müller?”

Person B: “Das ist ihr Freund. Ihr Freund kommt aus Deutschland.” - ”That is her friend. Her friend is from Germany."  or 

“Frau Müller, Ihr Freund kommt aus Deutschland, richtig?” - "Miss Müller, your (formal) friend is from Germany, right?"

You will also find that “Ihr” - “yours” (formal) is always capitalised which should help you to identify it better. 

I hope this helps!

Viele Grüße

Julia