"我姓李，你呢？"
Translation:My last name is Li, and yours?
79 Comments
In English, you can use 'name' for either first or last name. "My name is Li, and you?" should be accepted.
Think of the classic example: "My name is Bond, James Bond." He does not need to say "My last name is Bond, and my full name is James Bond"!
The reason they probably won't accept that is because 性 can only mean last name, where as "name" could be either.
771
That argument makes no sense. You're saying "name" can mean last name, and 性 does mean last name, so therefore it shouldn't be accepted? What?
There's a reason it's translated like that. 姓 as a verb literally means "to be surnamed".
Therefore it's only reasonable they would only accept an unambiguous answer! For instance, in English "brother" can mean either younger or older, but they shouldn't accept "brother" as valid answer for 哥哥 because that doesn't help you associate 哥哥 with "older brother"!
Translating 姓 to "name", though possibly correct, doesn't help you associate 姓 with surname!
I don't understand the mindset of most comments here, it's a language course, not a translation course, and people seem to don't get it!
I would say 'name' could either refer to first name or, as your example, first and last. But not last by itself.
- 1497
Yes, 名字 can refer to 名 (first name) or 姓名 (full name), but not 姓 (surname).
So because of its tonality, questions in Chinese don't do up in pitch at the end? At least that's what it sounds like (and it makes sense, since each word has its own intonation) Am I right?
- 1497
No, we usually do. The pitch is just near unnoticeable in the audio, and you can see the question marker 呢 (ne) sound like né. The intonation can convey the mood of the speaker. In this case it feels soft and gentle. Quite often it is pronounced like nē (or with higher tone).
Not really. That's not a Chinese thing to do. Each word has its own tone, and if you ended a question with a high pitch, it might change the meaning of the sentence altogether.
We are not going to master Chinese if we spend too much of our Duo time discussing these matters instead of trying to get to the next level. I am fascinated with the arguments and explanations, but I think the more time we devote to studying the better. And perhaps paying attention to detail and accepting that language is an arbitrary conventional thing. I must admit that I have been held up by spending time looking at comments. I want to bring all my language levels up faster than I am achieving that now. But I must say that it is nice to see how everyone thinks and how things are explained, etc, and often enlightening.
"I'm surnamed Li" should be accepted, since "surnamed" can act as a past participle verb in English, much like "I'm named Ken, after my father" would work. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/surnamed The following are several answers I've submitted on questions like these:
"My last name is Li" = 18 characters [accepted answer, not very concise]; "My surname's Li" = 15 characters [accepted answer, but says "you missed a space" since the "'s" on surname is thought to have been a typo of "surname is" -- although contracting nouns in this way is grammatically correct]; "I'm surnamed Li" = 15 characters [marked incorrect]
Sorry to bore folks with the details -- I just thought it could be useful to Duolingo staff.
- 30
I agree. However, it is not commonly used, and in this course even some commonly used variations are not accepted as of now.
This is newbie question, but I thought that "my" in Mandarin was "wǒ" followed by the possessive "de" as in "wǒ de péngyǒu", my friend.
This lesson makes it seem like wǒ alone can also mean "my". Can someone help me to understand when wǒ should be used, and when "wǒ de" should be used?
- 1497
Simply speaking, 我 wǒ can be translated as “my” if it is a determiner of the noun after it. You may be accused of abusing the possession particle “de” 的 (so called Westernised Chinese) if you always translate “my” literally as “wǒ de”. But since you are a beginner, you can just use “wǒ de” to make your sentence simple and clear. You should understand the use of “de” over time.
You are correct about the rule for 的, but that does not apply to this sentence. In this sentence, 姓 is a verb, not a noun. 姓 = "to be surnamed". The word-for-word translation of 我姓李 is: “I am surnamed Li." There is no possessive in this sentence. The translation Duolingo is looking for is not a word-for-word translation because people don't generally talk like that in English.
- 182
it might also be helpful to note that this sentence, if translated more literally, has no mention of "my" in it. literally 我 "i" 姓 "am surnamed" 李 "Li". otherwise, i wouldn't worry about overuse of 的. adding it in for possession, while not always necessary, isn't wrong.
Does it matter how you spell "Li"? Cause I got it wrong spelling it differently.
"Li" is the correct pinyin spelling (this is the official romanization in mainland China.) However, some Chinese people, such as those whose families have been in Western countries since before pinyin was invented, may have tranliterated 李 in different ways. So there might be people with the last name "Lee" that came from the character 李。But in general Li (or really, Lǐ) is the correct way to transliterate 李.
I used the word surname and it wanted me to use last name. In English they are synonymous !
I think surname is a better answer because it eliminates the confusion of surname being first when said (or written) in Chinese and surname being last in English.
Same as in Spanish. The work "apellido" can ONLY mean last name. Cannot be used for first name at all
In the english word " whats yours" is the same as " and what is yours ?" Thats like actually formel but is this formel?
I'm a little confused by the character "我". It was used as "叫我..." to mean "Call me..." but the two characters can also be switched, as in "我叫..." and have the same meaning. I first assumed "我" meant "I" or "me" and then I see a sentence where it can also be used to mean "my." Am I missing something, or does "我" have all three translations?
I think it is used both as first person singular subject and possessor. Pluralized it appears used as "we" and "our".
Sorry. For the time being and to the best of my knowledge... I haven't, so far, the foggiest clue! Cheers! And... Good luck! If I find out soon I'll let you know!
Is the "woa" pronounced differetly when it's in a sentence with other characters?
I hear it as " [wa] shin.." instead of the "woa shin" .
- 1497
It is explained in the lesson notes (not provied in mobile apps). When 我 is not standalone or at the end of a sentence, it is pronounced shorter, like /wo/ instead of /woa/.
Don't waste time in comments, you will find many missed translations throughout, Just report it and move on.
Its a minor thing but I wish it would take note of subtle changes to the words that can occur due to autocorrect. Names like Li get changed to Lisa and its annoying to have a streak broken because of that
Me: Ok. The correct answer is "my name is ~" with confidence. true answer: My "last" name is ~ me: WTH!?
I did the mistake over three times. ugh...
Lee is pronounced something between and l and an r. Assimilation again, I imagine?
It bothers me that they don't teach you "and". I get why, but i want to know.
The question is correct but i feel like it focusing on the distiction betweeen first and last name overcomplicates things.
The new audios to not have the right answer with the word bank. I answered properly and tell me I am wrong.... it's being happening
Why does this need an exact English translation? Many translations could worm.
My is wo de in mandarin so this is wrong. De represents the possessive particle to make words like ni and wo possesive.
There is no possession in the sentence. 姓 is the verb "to be surnamed."
