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- Topic: Polish >
- "Mój szef to dobry człowiek."
31 Comments
Oh, it would have helped me to remember that "człowiek" is the singular of "ludzie" if the word in English was not "man". I actually disagree with the above, "person" sounds like the appropriate translation for "człowiek", as well as "people" is the equivalent of "ludzie". Then I guess "osoba" would better translate to "individual" on these lines...
At some point we decided to accept 'person' here and generally be less rigid about it, if it feels natural in the English sentence.
But generally, translating those words: człowiek, osoba, man, person, human - is a major pain in the... brain. They just don't correspond well.
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Whether you say man or person here, seems to me to mean the same thing, which i would have considered "osoba". But what is it trying to say specifically by choosing "człowiek"?
Why is 'człowiek' Nominative? I thought that masculine personal nouns in the Accusative take the Genitive ending, and it should therefore be 'człowieka'?
Yeah, it would be a correct Accusative, but if you translate "X is Y" sentence into Polish as "X to Y", then both X and Y are in Nominative.
Alternatively you can use a form of "być" and put Y in Instrumental: "Mój szef jest dobrym człowiekiem".
Thanks, Jellei. Prompted me to remember that bit about Instrumental use when it mentions 'to' + Nom. Many thanks.
Of course! I got confused by the picture of Tommy Lee Jones when learning the word "szefowa" in the lesson and just instinctively associated that word with a man! :D Thank you.
My boss is a good person is what is called for. There are too many anomalies in the English language that are used when the proper meaning is called for. Person covers both sexes and tells you it's human.
That's too far from the original sentence. "nice" is usually translated as "miły", and person is not exactly the same thing as a human/man.
"guy" would rather be "facet". We usually don't accept such colloquial answers.
Good person is a fne way to express what they are, whether male or female.
"mężczyzna" is a male, adult human being, while "człowiek" is any human being and English often translates it as "man".
It is rather unusual to say that someone "to dobry mężczyzna" (is a good male human), we use "człowiek" then.
Is it really used like that in English? "Chief" sounds to me like the leader of an Indian tribe, not of a company...
It is still used, but contextual. If you go to the butcher or the baker or whatever, it isn't uncommon to refer to the person behind the counter as chief. It is largely Italian, Portuguese, Greek and Balkan immigrants who use it here.
I would add that we do call each other chief but as an informal sign of respect. It is also used indirectly in bosses job titles such as "chief executive".
Chief is the same but it has lost his use in the English language but still in use in many other latin languages like mine "Portuguese"
