"My boss is a good man."
Translation:Mój szef to dobry człowiek.
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why isn't the word for man---mezczyzna acceptable? Please excuse the lack of polish characters in that word. thanks
It is accepted. However, using the word "człowiek" (jest dobrym człowiekiem) would sound a lot more natural to me. Specifying the gender sounds okay for a woman, but for a man, it's kinda weird.
ok - it explains feminism but beyond that, wouldn't the English translation be "my boss is a good person"?
I don't think we'd say that. In such a sentence it's about as natural as "My boss is a good male person".
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Ok. But with the sentence "He is a good man" you could specifically mean, that he is a good male person", right?
I don't know... I know he's a male person, I just said "he", didn't I? Or in Polish, "mój szef", and not "moja szefowa"...
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Yes, I do not mean, that it is necessary to specify, that he is male, but it is possible, that I want to tell people, that someone is not only a good person, but an example for a good man. Maybe in a sentence like: "Some of my male colleagues treat women badly, but my boss is a good man, he respects women." He is a good person, but he is also a good man, because I build a context in which there is a difference between male and female people.
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It is not that important. I just wanted to know, why "Mój szef jest dobrym mężczyzną", is wrong.
It's not wrong, but the meaning is close to "my boss fulfils the role of a man".
Isn't "jest" a valid verb here? I thought "jest" could replace "to" anytime?
Yes, it is. But with "jest" you have to use Instrumental case.
Mój szef jest dobrym człowiekiem.
My answer was "Mój szef jest dobrym czlowiekiem". It was accepted but I got the "You've got a typo" notification and instead I was offered "Mój szef to dobry człowiek". Lol, that's quite a typo. So I was wondering what's more common to say, the to construction or the jest construction?
That's the (relatively) new Duolingo's decision to correct you to the starred answer if you have a typo, which in my opinion creates more confusion. Obviously your typo was putting L instead of Ł in "człowiekiem".
Anyway... here both sound fine to me, but generally I think that the 'jest' construction is better in most cases.
Thanks for the clarification!
To be very honest, it was a typo on purpose as I only use special characters that I can enter with my keyboard. And Ł is not part of that, so it's just L. I highly appreciate that lacking special characters do not count as a wrong answer.
Alright? English is a bit weird. Why is "chłowiek" also man without hu? If man means anybody guy, what do hu and wo mean? Is woman also a man and are male persons just normal men without any specialities?
"są" = (they) are.
And then the adjective would need to change to "są dobre" (only women), "są dobrzy" (at least one man).
This makes me think of the saying, "he's good people." My boss is good people.
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Typo, "mężczyzna".
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As above: I don't think we'd say that. In such a sentence it's about as natural as "My boss is a good male person".
So it's a technically correct translation, which however is unidiomatic to the point of sounding just weird.
Człowiek has never been taught as being the word for man on this course before
It's hard to find out where exactly the given word is used how first, maybe this is the first time. But "man" is usually the most natural translation of "człowiek", unless "człowiek" is used as a word for the homo sapiens species ("On jest człowiekiem" = "He is a human").