die and dat as replacements: pointing without the noun

When you already know which thing you mean, Dutch lets the pointing word stand alone in place of the noun: Welke wil je? Die. (Which one do you want? That one.) English adds one (this one, that one); Dutch does not — the demonstrative carries the meaning by itself. These are the same four words you meet in deze, die, dit, dat, now used without a noun behind them.

Keep the form the word would have in front of the noun and drop the noun: deze/die for a de-word or any plural, dit/dat for a het-word. Deze and dit point at something near; die and dat point at something further away.

• Welke jas neem je? Deze of die? (Which coat are you taking? This one or that one?) — jas is a de-word, so deze/die.
• Welk boek is van jou? Dit. (Which book is yours? This one.) — boek is a het-word, so dit/dat.
• Deze appels zijn zoet, maar die zijn zuur. (These apples are sweet, but those are sour.) — plural, so deze/die.

In everyday speech, when you refer back to a thing (not a person), Dutch usually reaches for die or dat rather than the personal pronoun hij, zij or het.

• Waar is mijn telefoon? Die ligt op tafel. (Where is my phone? It's on the table.) — de telefoon → die, more natural here than hij.
• Heb je het pakje gezien? Dat is al bezorgd. (Have you seen the parcel? It's already been delivered.) — het pakje → dat, rather than het.
• For people you keep hij and zij: Waar is Anna? Zij komt zo. (Where is Anna? She's coming shortly.)

This is why a spoken answer to a question about a de-thing so often starts with Die...: Vind je die film goed? Ja, die vond ik prima. (Do you like that film? Yes, I thought it was fine.)

There is one setting where the de/het and plural rules above do not apply: presenting what something is with a form of zijn (to be). A sentence that names the thing — Dit is..., Dat zijn... — opens with the het-form dit or dat whatever noun comes next, including a de-word or a plural. The odd-looking part is the verb: it still counts the real noun, so a plural noun pulls zijn even though dit/dat stays put.

• Dit is mijn collega. (This is my colleague.) — collega is a de-word, but the introducing word is still dit.
• Dat zijn nieuwe schoenen. (Those are new shoes.) — the noun is plural, so the verb is zijn, yet the demonstrative stays dat.
• Dit zijn mijn kinderen. (These are my children.) — singular dit with plural zijn together.

Because English says these are and those are, learners reach for deze zijn or die zijn the moment a plural turns up. In a presenting sentence, though, that plural belongs to the verb, not to the pointing word — the pointing word holds at dit or dat. Say Dit zijn mijn collega's (These are my colleagues), never Deze zijn mijn collega's. The only time deze or die is right before zijn is when no noun follows at all and an adjective describes the thing instead: Deze zijn goedkoop. (These are cheap.) Nothing is being named there, so the near/far word behaves as usual.