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- Topic: Polish >
- "Ona jest dziewczynką."
70 Comments
I am exited for you. But as you have little time, I would inform you that duolingo is not filled with most useful phrases. If you have any questions about Polish language, Poland or WYD feel free to contact me on my board- just click my name here.
It is a shame there is so little resources for learning Polish from other languages- like Spanish. So many things are easier explained (like that nouns have gender, or that there is singular and plural you, or that verbs change with person)
I love polish because Its such a challenge, its not easy but its not that hard like all the othere language all you need is to know the genders in grammar, the formal and in formal then the rest will just take you there, I find germanic and romance language easier because its my mothere tounge, sorry if I speack like most europeans do I found it more easy to describe things to non English speaking people, I know and not blameing intentionaly anyone being stupid, I just know people are learning English wich I never understand why people even like English it is so plain and has no assent marks like polish and spanish has but any way good luck, I have been abroad since I was 2yr old to alot of diffrent contrys so I have learned the way the europeans do if you cant speak even a bit of there lingo you can at least express yourself in anothere way like body language in a safe way gets on.
I'm not quite clear about the "weird 't'." Do you mean "Ł"?
"Ł" is pronounced exactly like an English "W" as in "winter," "water," etc.
"A" is pronounced "ah" like in "father."
"Ą" is pronounced like "own" or "ohm," but without fully pronouncing the final "n" or "m" in them. It's a nasal stop, almost to "n" or "m" but stop before
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Because it's a nasalised vowel which historically had a nasal consonant after. Take the verbs for example, lubić (to like), which is from Proto-Slavic ľubiti, the third person plural in Polish is lubią, which comes from Proto-Slavic ľubętь (ljubenti), Polish keeps the nasal but loses the dental sound while Russian лю́бят (ljúbjat) keeps the dental but loses the nasal sound.
The cognate word in English is love and lofe from Proto-Germanic lubōną, and the third-person plural is lubōnþi which again has the nasal and dental (compare German with sind as the third-person plural of sein). However for all other regular verbs, like Polish, German loses the dental hut preserves the nasal sie loben.
Another example is mężczyzna which is formed from męż + -czyzna (collective suffix), but męż preserves the same nasal sound as its English cognate man.
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Thank you A LOT @Arkhaeaeon for your such interesting comment. As a beginner in Polish, I can say that we really really need etymological explanations to understand vocabulary and syntax. Have a nice day all!
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Omg Im a native russian speaker and I ALWAYS think that sentence means "She eats a girl" xD
Well, if a course of Polish for speakers of any other language than English was to be created, I guess number one should undoubtedly be Polish for Russian speakers, then perhaps Ukrainian (if the Russian one wasn't enough for Ukrainian people), but then I'd say German, even just because of all the people of Polish descent that speak little or no Polish. Anyway, it's not really likely.
In Polish the expression "on/ona/to jest [NOUN in instrumental]" means "he/she/it belongs to a group of some kind". It may be "she is a girl (and not a woman or an infant)" or "he is a man (and not a woman or a little boy)". The article "the" cannot be used here - because in such situations it is not used in English.
Of course, you can say in English "she is THE girl", but then it means a defined girl - one that was mentioned before, or one known to the persons talking, etc. But in such case, in Polish, in the place of article "the", you should use one of demonstrative pronouns, like "ona jest tą/tamtą/ową dziewczynką" or one of words that can replace a demonstrative pronoun, like "ona jest wspomnianą/wymienioną/rzeczoną dziewczynką" - or (only for not personal nouns) niniejszą/przedmiotową. It is a different structure type, and instead of stating, that somebody belongs to some group, is used to state, that someone (something) is an uniquely defined person (object), who is by the way a member of that group.
And yes, in Polish there are no articles, but there is a whole lot of words that can work similarly to either definite articles (like the mentioned above - you may also see here) or indefinite articles (like jeden/jakiś/pewien/niejaki/dowolny + their forms in other genders).
With Duolingo, when translating from Polish to English, in most cases both definite and indefinite article are accepted, but this is mostly because lack of context. And it is the context that may decide whether the lack of demonstrative pronoun should be translated as indefinite article (it is the case when the phrase is at the beginning of a book, chapter, paragraph, statement etc...) or definite article (this is the case, when a mentioned person/object is already known, hence in the course of a paragraph, statement etc.) However, in some types of phrases, there are rules to follow, and this type of structure is one of such cases.
https://www.duolingo.com/comment/16373167 -- this will tell you everything that you need, and more. Especially Parts 1 and 2.
tl;dr version: This is an "X is Y" sentence. Normally there are two equally good options to translate it, but if X, as here, is a personal pronoun, you can use only one: X in Nominative + a form of "być" + Y in Instrumental.
Окончание существительных на -ą соответствует русскому окончанию -ой (творительный падеж, первый вид склонения).
Польский глагол "być" требует от прямого дополнения творительного падежа, так же как и русский глагол "являться".
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Он мужчина - On jest mężczyzną (дословно: он является мужчиной)
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Она девочка - Ona jest dziewczynką (дословно: она является девочкой)
There is no such thing as 'Polish English', for the same reason why there is no 'Belarusian English' and no 'Azerbaijani English'. I suggest you read these articles:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_as_a_lingua_franca https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_English
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Interested false-friend. Dziewczynką means girl whereas in Russian, Женщина (zhenshchina) means woman ;) But the k means the diminutive so, litterarly, it means little woman :)