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- "Как зовут вашу маму?"
31 Comments
Actually, «Вас» in «Как Вас зовут» is Accusative, not Genitive. But «Вас» is the same in Accusative and in Genitive (unlike «мамы»/«маму»).
It is.
Literally it's "How do [they] call your mom?".
By not using a pronoun, and using a 3rd person plural verb form, you create an indefinite-personal sentence. Such sentences are used when the person doing the action is unknown and unimportant, and are often translated into English with the passive, hence "How is your mom called?" or, more idiomatically, "What is your mom's name?"
is "how do you call your mom?" not correct even though that's a direct translation?
That would rather be "Как ты зовёшь свою маму?" or "Как вы зовёте свою маму?" My mom's name is Nadezhda, but I don't call her that, for sure :-)
The direct translation is "How do (they) call your mom?" But the person asking this question just wants to know her name, so it's better to use the most common English way to ask that.
What would be the singular/non formal (Ты) equivalent of this sentence? I'm a bit lost when it comes to different pronouns in different cases
@Ealantair - Forgive me, but I can't reply directly from my phone. I'm not a native speaker, but from what I know, the 《ты》form of this sentence would be, 《Как зовут твою маму》.
I wrote "how's your mum called?" Apparently it's not right. I though it would be.
In English, you would need to say "What's your mum called?" if you want to ask her name in that style. "How's she called"... is an adverbial expression, meaning with what means is she called. For example,"How do you call your mum in for lunch? Do you shout her name or do you sound the dinner gong?"
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It's in the accusative case, because her actual name would be in the nominative case.
Они зовут вашу маму Ольга Ивановна.
If we turn the question around into a statement. (and add in the "unknown they" for clarity).
STOP! Take this simple test, if you fail, then this lesson is way advanced for you and you need to challenge yourself with practice in Lesson 1. In the bracket [ Tы‚ Тоже ‚ Тим ] how many total Russian letters are there? {Hint: Tим сounts as 3 letters }
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Is 'How do they call your mom' correct? I believe that is the literal translation of this word order...
Lol!!! I thought at first the translation was "What is your name, Mother?" I realize the mistake now :)
some semantic intonation jokes
как звать твою мать - what is your mom's name
как звать, твою мать - what is your ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤ name
