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I often see sentences similar to: "Ich rufe sie sofort an."

My instinct when I say/write things like this myself would be to say "Ich rufe ihr sofort an," because in my head I think of "sie" as meaning "she" not "her." I know this is incorrect, but how do I chose the correct form?

Is it because "sie" remains "sie" in akkusativ, and only changes to "ihr" in Dativ?

user13132640
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  • Welcome to German.SE. While you have an instinct - what rule set do you use to learn German? What did you search for until now? it sound like atable referring to pronouns and cases is needed. – Shegit Brahm Oct 21 '20 at 12:14

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Is it because "sie" remains "sie" in akkusativ, and only changes to "ihr" in Dativ?

Exactly.

Each verb allows a set of objects, and you just have to know with each verb which case these objects have to be in. It's not as hard as it sounds at first, because there are some patterns to it, but it's still quite a bit to learn I guess.

jemanden (acc) anrufen - to call sb.
jemandem (dat) etwas (acc) erzählen - to tell sth to sb
jemanden/etwas (acc) beißen - to bite sb/sth
jemanden/etwas (acc) verstehen - to understand sb/sth

HalvarF
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    Supplement jemanden (acc) einer Sache (gen) bezichtigen, to clarify that this is not restricted to dative and accusative. – guidot Oct 21 '20 at 14:49