De or het baan?

Forms

Singular

de baan

Plural

de banen

Diminutive

het baantje

Why de?

• No reliable spelling rule decides this one, so de baan is learned together with the word.
• Every plural takes de, so it is de banen whatever the singular takes.
• Every diminutive takes het: het baantje.

The rules for de and het, with the exceptions

Meaning in English

1. a job, professional occupation
2. a road, way, path
3. a track, lane
4. orbit (path of one object around another)
5. a job (task, or series of tasks, carried out in batch mode)
6. court, field (place for playing sports or games, in particular non-team ball games)