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- Topic: Polish >
- "Personel pracuje."
43 Comments
This translation is incorrect in English. "No-one who speaks English would ever say the staff is working -meaning one person .Staff refers to a group. They would say the staff are working ,the employee is working,the staff member is working etc.
I totally agree. In the UK, we say "the staff work" or "the staff are working".
"The staff is working" means something along the lines of the stick, that is called a staff, is working.
1041
I would. But I would never say something like "the staff are working", so it's probably a regional thing.
Maybe "the staff work" is a better translation, because "staff" is a collective noun, and is singular (though I'm sure I've heard both)
In the UK, it is more common to hear "the staff work". We see collective nouns as a plural noun most of the time.
In the UK, "the staff work" or "the staff works" technically make sense, but only in the general sense ie they work sometimes / they have a job, which is obvious by the fact that they are staff.
We'd say 'the staff are working' to refer to staff who are working right now.
Which is accepted. But American English is usually the default here, and it helps understand the Polish version.
Very similar to the French word ''Personnel" which of course means staff :). Kind of glad that Polish has French vocabulary, makes things easier.
Around XVI to early XX century France was very influential. From that period comes most of the loanwords. Some of them actually still retains their original spelling despite not conforming to the Polish orthography rules.
Can Duoling clarify if "personel pracuje " means one person is working or the entire staff group is working .
"Personel" means a group of people, but such words are usually grammatically singular in Polish. It cannot just mean one member of staff.
"Staff is" vs "Staff are" seems to be mostly American vs British thing, although it may be also a personal preference. Anyway, it's not that "staff is" is incorrect for all English language natives.
I made "Staff are" an equally good 'best answer'.
That's not entirely true. I'm American and I've heard both. I debated which to use the first time encountering this sentence in Polish on Duolingo, and chose "The staff is" as opposed to "The staff are".. So for some reason, this native American English speaker decided it was the better answer. Admitting, it could go the other way.
Ditto. Also american english does use staff usually as a singular collective noun. Examples: The staff is on holiday. My staff is great. The staff is eating cake.
Therefore, The staff is working is the proper American English.
Let's see if I dig out my 'Warrnier's Handbook' as I would assume staff should be in the collective noun section.
Look at that : "5k. Collective nouns may be either singular or plural.
A collective noun names a group: crowd, committee, jury, class. A collective noun takes a plural verb when the speaker is thinking of the individual members of the group; it takes a singular verb when the speaker is thinking of the group as a unit.
The audience were entering the theater. [The speaker is thinking of the individuals in the audience.]
The audience was one of the best. [The speaker is thinking of the audience as a whole, single unit.]
The team have voted eighteen to three to buy new uniforms.
The team has won the semifinals."
Well, ha. I only remembered it acted as singlular.... I wonder if that is what I learned in grade school, and thus that stuck better. Apoarently I do not review my grammar enough
Thus, "The staff is/are working". Could both be considered correct depending on the speaker, but I assume it is thought of here as a single unit working all at the same time 9-5 and therefore "is" wins out.
Does anyone really see them as separate individuals in this sentence in order to use "are"?
pracowac -> pracuje, mowic - mowie. Do all verbs with infinitive in -ovac behave like this?
-ować conjugation IV
- ić (mówić)conjugation VIa
they both end with "ę" in present first person singular
- 1433
If "is" and "are" are treated equally then should there not be an option to use "are" in the word selection
If the option is correct, then it's correct and accepted... what's the problem?
Why isn't "The employee is working" accepted? Is there a different Polish word that means "employee"? (The Polish verb is singular so this made the most sense to me when translating to English. Otherwise I would say the staff are working, but then it is plural.)
Whether "staff" is treated as singular or plural, that depends on whether you speak American or British English. Both variants are accepted. "personel" means exactly the same as "staff" in American English, it's a singular noun describing numerous people.
"employee" is "pracownik" (male) or "pracownica/pracowniczka" (female).
Incorrect English as staff is a collective noun. What on earth is meant here?
It is correct English. Please take a look at the explanations in this comment section.
https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/12644363?comment_id=39187221
https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/12644363?comment_id=17777393
Even though the word „personel” might refer to many people in a given situation, it is always treated as singular, so you can't write „personel pracują”.
