"Mam tylko jednego cukierka."
Translation:I have only one candy.
46 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
259
In english, generally candy is thought of as american exoression. We have candy floss..the spun sugar ball you buy at fairs, otherwise it is a sweet or sweets.
It is accusative, but cukierek is of the "even more special " masculine nouns that are animated even though even though they should not.
In polish wikipedia, it says cukierkek is a
"rzeczownik, rodzaj męskorzeczowy"
....i.e. a "noun, of type męskorzeczowy"
where "męskorzeczowy" appears to mean "masculine-inanimate" (according to my humble translation skills)....
Just a case of the entry being wrong, or have I mistranslated?
In WSJP.pl its marked as of type m2, m3
"część mowy: rzeczownik rodzaj gramatyczny: m2, m3"
I looked up lekarz (m1) and psa (m2) to deduce that m1 = personal, m2 = animate (but not personal), so m3 must mean non-animate?
So it appears WSJP.pl is saying that it can be both animate and inanimate. Correct?
ASIDE: Immery, where is that PDF you linked to that defined these terms for WSJP.pl (m1,m2,m3 etc.) ? (I'm at a different PC today, i have it open on my laptop at home lol)
I looked it up and I think you are right. M1 Męskoosobowy (Masculine Personal) M2 Męskozwierzęcy (Masculine Animate) M3 Męskonieżywotny (Masculine Inanimate)
So I guess "Mam tylko jeden cukierek" is also plausible here?
cukierek is in the "it's complicated" category with pomidor, kotlet and many more. We are experiencing a shift in declension pattern of those nouns, so depending on the person speaking and situation accusative can take = nominative or =genitive.
I think "mam tylko jeden cukierek" is a good translation, but I would never say it.
Exactly. Accusative form "cukierek" is formal, used eg. in writing; the form "cukierka" is used in speech; see: http://sgjp.pl/leksemy/#478/cukierek
Unfortunately those with higher educations have to extol their knowledge on the ignorant masses. Though lacking a college degree I had used commonsense to start and operate a very successful business for 54 years, I'm sure if you log on to Google and Duda water Sports you will find remnants of it after I sold it at 78. There comes a time to call it quits and enjoy the fruits of your labors. Communication is the major factor in any enterprise and lack of it means almost certain failure. %4 years would indicate there was a modicum of truth in what I say. Incidentally I had 17 years in the printing trade offset and letterpress before starting my business and employing my associates while I worked at GE Aircraft the last 15 years as a chemical milling tech. I am very proud of the fact that during the 25 years of employment i garnered five substantial cash awards and two letters of commendation. I attribute this to working on my communication skills and presentations to staff. Communication on a ninth grade level for the sake of intelligent and understandable communication. Now I am proud to say using Doulingo I am expanding my communication skills while keeping my memory sharp and dementia at bay. all it requires is initiative. For this I thank Jellei and Duolingo, I may pass on but will not be in a vegetative state when I do. Thanks
I just asked a native Polish speaker whether "Mam tylko jeden cukierek" is okay, and all she said was "No. Because przypadki have no mercy." But.... on the WSJP dictionary, it say it's both M2(masculine animate) and M3(masculine inanimate)?
- 1686
Mrs Mop is correct. In British English, it is a sweet. You can have one sweet. You would not have a piece of sweet (unlike the US English "piece of candy" described earlier).
Hurrah! As a non-American speaker of English I really struggle with the candy translation. So can we have 'I have only one sweet' added to the accepted list, please?
Well, that works. Although I will never get used to "sweets" meaning something more specific than just "słodycze"...
Come on! Is Polish not complicated enough without adding a group of random words which act like they are animate when they are actually inanimate?
- 456
My only surprise is they don't have an entire new gender and word ending set for sugary food products! :)
As a native British English speaker, I don't usually have any problems with American English. The differences are generally well known and easily understandable but this sentence sounds really weird. Do Americans really say "I only have one candy" and does it mean what we call a sweet or can it be chocolate as well? Mam tylko jednego cukierka sounds less foreign to me but hey, I guess the UK and US will always remain friends divided by a common language
- 203
I am a native English speaker and I almost never use the word "candy", why? Because I speak British English not USA English. Its difficult enough learning Polish, without also remembering to translate in USA English!
Well... the problem is that for most of the English speaking world 'a lolly' is something completely different (or rather: more specific)... and sometimes the 'only accepted' answers get suggested and may confuse people...
Actually, I believe Poles usually use the British words for most things.
What about candy corn? This is all over the place along with hard candy and sugarless candy.
Somewhere in this morass we have overlooked communication, regardless of presentation or local use to describe candy or whatever it's called there we have gotten into a peeing contest over terminology. If you want it done right, do it yourself, if you want chaos, give it to a committee. Sounds like we have one here.
Language is extremely fluid, the English I spoke in school seventy years ago is considered archaic in these times. Fifty years from now , we not be able to understand what is being said using today's terminology. We've gone from communication to dissecting to prove our grasp of it and in the process lost what Winston Churchill said abut communicating. Legalese is one of the biggest problems, say it in such a way that the unwashed and those sans a college degree don't understand. It's easier to take advantage of them that way. Common sense and a formal ninth grade education speaking.
"A candy" or "one candy" is not a thing. You can't say that and it needs to be removed as a solution, especially as the main solution. It's completely ungrammatical.
Sorry, but there are plenty of such examples in the iweb corpus.
Also, if you suggest to remove a main translation, then you should at least provide a didactically valuable alternative.
- 1090
No, that's not right. It's only an item of confectionary if it's from the confectionary region of France. Otherwise it's just sparkling candy.
- 456
No normal British person would ever use the word confectionary in day to day language, that's even less common than they'd use candy, despite all the exposure to american English. All I've heard my entire life is a "a sweet" "sweets" "a sweet shop" "bag of sweets" etc.
- 449
Can I respectfully suggest "I have only one lolly" should be accepted as an alternative translation?
There are many native speakers of English who are not North American and who would never say "one candy". For two reasons.
First, in some English speaking countries, the word "candy" is not in general use. It might be understood from watching American films and TV, but that's about all. "Lolly" is the more common informal or conversational term, and "sweet" the more formal term.
Secondly, to the extent that "candy" is known or used, it is not a countable noun. So "one candy" sounds strange.
It be difficult to come up with translations that work for all the different varieties of English.