"To jest wasz pies."

Translation: This is your dog.

[margotgm]

when to use wasz rather than twoj?

[mihxal]

"Wasz" is "your" for plural "you" (more than one person's)

"Twój" is "your" for singular "you" (one person's)

[kjsoda]

Why isn't it "To jest wasz psa?" Shouldn't dog be in the instrumental since it's the object of jest?

[Jellei]

No, that's a simple "This is X" sentence so X (your dog) is in Nominative.

[kjsoda]

Follow Up Question: Are there other exceptions for when być (and its various conjugations) do not lead to a instrumental object or is it only in "This is X" sentences? For instance, one does use the instrumental in "Y is X" sentences so long as jest is used instead of to, correct? (Also, thank you for always having such speedy and helpful replies, Jellei.)

[Jellei]

I hope the link that immery posted will clear all the doubts, but I just wanted to quickly notice that "wasz psa" mixes cases and none of them is Instrumental. Instrumental would be "waszym psem".

[immery]

https://www.duolingo.com/comment/16373167

[CrocodileIcefish]

So this is like y'all's dog?

[Jellei]

Yeah.

[kkupus]

Could I use "That" as a translation of "To"

[immery]

You should be able to, as " to jest" means both this is/that is; and "to są" means these are/those are.

It is possible that "that" may not be added to a list of possible translations, you should report if that happens.

[kkupus]

Thank you for your help.

[Jellei]

Works now.

[2Jake2snake]

How is the word for "dogs" "pies" "psy" and "psa" depending on the case?

[Jellei]

Well, cases are quite complicated. The main, Nominative forms are "pies" (singular) and "psy" (plural). The Accusative forms are "psa" (singular) and again "psy" (plural), as not masculine-personal plural has the same form in Accuative and Nominative.

[A.M.Colle]

Why does y'all's not work?

[IBSDFamily]

Why wouldn't pies take on the genitive case(psa i believe) since this denotes possession?

[Jellei]

You took it a bit too far, "wasz" is just a possessive pronoun. Actually possession works more or less like in English, you either have "your dog", or, let's say "Adam's dog" - and this construction is called Saxon Genitive.

So while "your dog" is simply "[twój/wasz] pies", "Adam's dog" will be "pies Adama", putting Adam in Genitive. Oh, yes, it's not the 'owned thing' (pies) that takes Genitive, but the owner.

[Alex999436]

Learned a lot from these comments... And here I was going to complain that duo didnt accept my emoji

[abcdef933419]

Could I use this exact phrase when asking a question to someone (but with a questioning tone)