"No, I am not Chinese."
Translation:いいえ、中国人ではありません。
46 Comments
いいえ is no
中国人 is a chinese person
で and は are the particles (indicate what the word does in the sentence)
ありません is one whole conjugated word. あります is the positive and ありません is the negative. "ません" is the whole negative ending they just split it into ませ and ん to make sure you are paying attention and understand proper conjugation form
(If anything i said is wrong please forgive me I'm still learning myself)
I think that you can simply learn ではありません as the negative present form of です. However, this has in fact an interpretation in terms of particles https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/1j7qeb/what_does_では_mean_specifically_in_では_ありません/
I don't think it is an abbreviation, but simply different constructions for affirmative and negative forms. According to this Quora thread, people also use ではあります, but in a very particular way. https://www.quora.com/What-is-deha-arimasu-%E3%81%A7%E3%81%AF%E3%81%82%E3%82%8A%E3%81%BE%E3%81%99?srid=2Emm
From reading Reid's post, で and は are 'particles'. Not sure what they mean by that, but Reid did say that those two indicate what the specific word does in a sentence. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it as well.
You need it because it's part of the negation of です, the auxiliary verb "to be". In casual speech this would be ではない or じゃない (じゃ = contraction of では), and in polite speech ではありません.
Without で you would be saying something like "there are no Chinese people", and in a rather inpolite way as well, since ある (the basic form of あります) is used only for inanimate/dead objects, not people.
Me too. My Japanese teacher told us ' はありません' would be correct... I guess Duolingo is putting the phrases as polite as possible.
From what I recall, Dewa arimasen(ではありませ） is like a set phrase for polite negation. Just as あります is for polite positive. That's how I understand.
I think it's because you still need to establish the relationship between 中国人 and the negation. That is, ですin a negative form would be 'でわありません' or 'じゃありません'. Or じゃない if you are using an informal tone. The point is, it does not stand alone as 'ありません’. I've been taught to express that sentence in many ways, but the most aproximate to the one you wrote is 私は中国人じゃありません。
I apologize if I'm not clear enough. I'm still learning and English is not my first language. Hope this helps, anyway.
It is correct, but I think it can be ommited because it's deduced by context.
Can someone break this down for me? Especially why there is a ん at the end of it.
The ません part marks it as a sort of negation to whatever is being said. That is why its there.
I thought "arimasu" was used for animals and inanimate objects, and not ppl. Have I simply got this wrong?
Yes, you are correct. However, this isn't a stand-alone ありません; the では part makes this a negation of です.
I know right? わたし= I わたしは= I am Since the answer is (No,i am not chinese ) Why shouldn't we add watashi wa?
Help! Im confused here
いいえ、私は中国人じゃない was accepted, but not mentioned very frequently. I'm guessing "janai" is the most casual (and least polite) way of negating something
When did you see じゃない? I haven't encountered that so far in the first 8 skills.
Why is あります used instead of います? I thought the latter was used when referring to anything alive.
Why does あれ belong in this sentence also? I fail to see how that would work grammatically.
It's very nearly correct, but yes, there are 2 spelling mistakes in there: in the transliteration of 中国人 you wrote "chiyuu-goku-shin" instead of "chuu-goku-jin" (ちゅうごくじん)
I thought that あります and ありません meant "there is" or "exists"? as in there is a dog. 犬があります。
Is another way to say this, "いいえ、中国人じやないです"...? Or something close to that?
I seem to remember learning that 'じやない' is a way to say that something isn't something. An online translator seems to translate it that way, so...what's the difference? Is one of them formal vs informal or something?
I keep getting it right, but everytime I do it says "Another Correct Solution: いいえ、中国人ではありません。" I checked every symbol and I did exactly that! Do they want me to do it with the individual symbols instead of the whole 'ではありません' sentence?
It's been a loooooooong time since I took Japanese in college (and only two quarters of it), so forgive me if this is wrong, but...no.
Pretty sure you'd have to tack "あなた は" at the beginning to indicate that you're talking about 'you', talking about the person to whom you're speaking. "As for you, you are not Chinese," basically.
The audio is slightly too fast for me, can anyone give me the pronunciation for my notes?
