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- "Produkuje krzesła."
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How do I know it's not "Produkuję krzesła"? I can sometimes tell the difference between "e" and "ę," but to my ears, there's no difference in how the e is pronounced in 1st person singular and 3rd person singular.
(C.f., the "ę" in "mężczyzna," which sounds very much like an "ę" rather than an "e")
you cannot tell the difference, because we pronounce ę very slightly or say "e". Ovrpronouncing "ę" is wrog, saying "e" is not. And I think duolingo TTS never says "ę" at the end of verb
http://www.polskieradio.pl/9/305/Artykul/275142,Wymowa-e about 2.22 there examples of pronounciation of ę 2 good 1 bad,
I almost always pronounce final "ę" slightly nasally and IMO most people seem to do the same.
That probably depends on where you live. Standard Polish pronunciation doesn't recognize word final „ę” as differently sounding from „e”.
I would listen to the radio show linked.
But for me it is hard to pronounce correctly, when I'm thinking about it.
That was interesting, although I wouldn't necessarily worry about ambiguity. The spoken language tends to be less demanding in that respect, since you also have context or can clarify if asked to. Just think about Mandarin Chinese: possibly a large part of why they did not convert their writing system into something easier is because of large degree of homonymity, and yet they somehow function with all of that when talking to each other. Similarly, that distinction in Polish can be often deducted from context, or it doesn't matter, or the sentence can be rephrased in advance, or clarified if needed.
Hearing this slight „ę” at the end might be tricky and even then not all speakers would use it. Therefore it's a good idea to learn recognizing it from context.
You can watch TV and listen to different people and in my opinion most people pronounce it differently than normal "e".
So why does the answer 'Produkuję krzesła' gets marked as incorrect? (produkuję gets underscored as 'almost correct'). Should be add to the list of legit translations then..
this sentence should not have a "listen and write" kind of exercise.
it is not a translation of "it produces"
Since the subject is unclear, "produces chairs," is the exact translation of „produkuje krzesła." I don't think it should be wrong.
And is "Produces chairs." a sentence? You can (and have to) choose a 3rd person pronoun yourself.
I think it is as much of a sentence as the Polish, as far as the subject being unclear.
-Does your friend produce chairs or fix the machines at the factory?
-Produces chairs.
Are you telling me that the Polish produkuje is any clearer on the subject of the sentence? How did they get "he" for the translation? Couldn't it be just as easily "she"? Or "it," as in a manufacturing machine?
All the answers should be accepted. In Polish such a sentence is completely correct and can be used even in formal language.
We chose to use "He produces chairs" as the main translation, but I now made "She" an equally 'best possible' translation because of course, nothing here implies it's a guy. And the same for "it", as I understand "a factory" could be referred to as "it".
One more question, and I promise I'll will leave this exercise alone. Przepraszam.
If you were to write out the pronoun "it", rather than omit it, when would you use ono and when would you use to?
Ono produkuje krzesła?
To produkuje krzesła?
In the most basic sense, the difference between to and ono is like between "this" and "it" respectively.
The pronoun ono is much rarer in Polish that its equivalent in English, because the subject has to be the neuter gender first (and inanimate objects in Polish are not limited to being neuter)… and even then Polish has a tendency to drop pronouns.
Personally I use it to clarify the subject of a sentence inside a larger paragraph, especially if it differs most from the other contenders by its gender. I prefer writing such sentences as VSO. I'll show you on a real example from my wiki:
„Lightning Dust decyduje się na użycie tornada, by odstawić konkurencję w tyle. Niestety wymyka się ono spod kontroli i balon, w którym lecą główne bohaterki, jest w niebezpieczeństwie.”
Here „ono” makes it clear, that the second sentence is about neuter tornado, not a feminine „konkurencja” (competition).
Also, like the other pronouns, it may be added to emphasize the subject stronger.
„Kryształowe Serce?! Ono jest moje!”
In situations when you could "this" instead of "it", Poles prefer the former. So typical simple sentences with „być”, and especially the verbless ones, would use „to”.
I understand that it's implied by context. Without context, however, this sentence doesn't make sense that the translation is "he" unless you point at the male person while speaking. In this case, it would be the same in English--context can imply a subject, otherwise you have to point at somebody hahaha
Just to add to this that "They produce chairs" should really be acceptable as a translation here as "they" works as a nonspecific pronoun where the subjects gender is not specified or unknown.
This is a complicated matter. Yes, of course English can generally use it. The problem is, such a construction doesn't exist in Polish. You can't use "oni" or "one" in such a situation. And if we accepted "they" for 3rd person singular... we'd have no way of knowing if the user consciously used singular 'they' or if they just made a mistake and didn't understand the Polish sentence. True, no subject is specified here, but the learner has to realize that this is 3rd person singular. Therefore we decided not to accept it. Frankly, the number of users asking for it is a lot lower than I would expect.
To zależy od kontekstu rozmowy - It depends on the context:
on (mój sąsiad/ zakład) - he (my neighbor)/ it (my business)
ona (moja żona/moja fabryka) - she (my wife/ it (my factory)
ono (moje dziecko /przedsiębiorstwo) - it (my child/my firm)
"Produkuje krzesła" is strictly taken out from the context. It matches perfectly correct: he/on, she/ona, it/to,ono, but also kid/dziecko. Ex. 'dziecko produkuje krzesła'. A: What does he/she/it/kid/father/mother/wife/brother/....doing? B: Produkuje krzesła./Produces chairs.
Normally, you just have to figure it out from context.
On Duolingo you can pick "he", "she" or "it" when translating to English, and it will be accepted. Unless it's a "pick all correct translations" exercise, then you have to choose all of them.
That exercise isn't there anymore, apparently Duo considered it too confusing to the learners - who reads what the task is, after all? ;)
This could mean both "He produces chairs", or "She produces chairs", but there's only "She" available in the pickup options. Please correct that oversight.
This isn't an oversight. Some sentences have hundreds of possible translations and there is no way we can fit all the possible words onto your screen.
Polish omits third person pronouns under certain circumstances.
Where is the ona and on? My answer was "she produces". But here is says "he"
It isn't there. In Polish you can drop personal pronouns, even in third person, but in third person it creates ambiguous sentences. That's why Duolingo accepts (or at least is supposed to accept) both "he" and "she" as valid translations. Normally it would be clear from the context who you are talking about.
In my version, it is 'she' , and that is the only option in the choices, yet hints say it could be he she or it !
Yes, what's the problem? You did have an option to put a correct answer, from what you wrote.
You won't necessarily have among the 'choices' words for every accepted answer.
why "she produce chairs" is right while "he produce chairs" is not right, where is the difference
Both are wrong. The correct verb is:
"He/she/it produces chairs."
"I/you/we/they produce chairs."
Why 'This produces chairs' is marked as wrong? I'm confused. I thought 'this' and 'it' used the same 3rd person. It's telling me that I should have used 'She produces chairs'. The sentence was: Produkuje krzesła
- To (jest) krzesło - This is a chair / It is a chair
- (On/ona/ono) produkuje krzesła - He/she/it produces chairs
Those words in brackets can be omitted.
In short, no. "Stool" is "stołek" or "taboret", and "armchair" is "fotel".
Krzesło is a furniture with a backrest that is generally designed for sitting at a table or a desk. They are lightweight or on wheels so that you can easily move them a little when you want to get seated, though in some special circumstances (like at hairdresser) they may be screwed into the floor permanently.
If it is heavy, more comfortable, and generally something you put in your living room, then it is "fotel". Car chairs are also "fotel", but can also be called "siedzenie". Extra car seats for little children is "fotelik".
I hope my answer was comprehensive enough.
In Russian, krieslo is a Polish fotel, and stul in Russian is the other kind of chair
That would have been: Produkuję krzesła.
What kind of exercise did you get?
