"你是哪国人？"
Translation:Which country are you from?
67 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
⬜ (imagine this is a land) + 王 (king)=国 (country/nation/kingdom). Imagine that a king ruling inside a piece of land is a kingdom or country.
This is a simplified character. The traditional form is "國".
The "玉" inside the simplified character means "jade," which is a kind of gem representing emperor.
And the jade is on the king's belt, then you know a couple of characters in one.
Personal perspective (I am a native Chinese speaker using duolingo just to see what its Chinese program is like): If you are meeting someone for the first time and want to ask them which country they are from, "你是哪国人？" is a bit too informal (because of 是) and slightly awkward-sounding. I recommend "你来自哪个国家？" , where 来自 means "come from" and 国家 means "country."
What's the difference between 哪 and 哪个 ? I couldn't really find an answer online is the latter just a more formal way of saying which? Thanks.
In some cases, measure words like 个 can be omitted if what ever is being stated is understood or if another measuring word is in place (like 些)
Na3 sounds so much like da3 here. The audio for this character is unclear to me in all contexts.
Is there a good source to learn the Pinyin so that we can learn the spellings for words such as "na3," "shen2me," etc. I see these used in the comments but haven't figured it out yet.
https://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/dictionary.php is pretty reliable. also, Google Translate shows the Chinese pinyin in small text underneath the Chinese characters when translating.
140
Why is here no question particle needed? Will every Chinese speaking person understand this without the "ma"?
吗 "ma" is only for yes/no questions. So we could ask: 你是中国人吗？= Are you Chinese? (yes/no)
But this Duo sentence cannot be answered with yes/no. So instead, we use 哪 "na" (what/which). If you add a "ma" here, people will be confused because it would mean "Are you from which country?" :-)
THANK YOU! -the male robot voice (used on the course question) sounded like it was saying "Nǐ shì dǎ guó rě," but the female voice on the comments sounds normal; would it be correct to say it like that as well?
The question word is na3. When you use determines like na3 or shen2me, there often times isn't a question particle from my understanding.
In the tips and notes section of this lesson it says that you need a measure word after 哪 in order to mean "which" so why is this correct without a measure word?
It would appear to be an idiomatic expression which doesn't require one. There are many exceptions to this rule. You will see a lot of question words without counter words. It's just another quirk of the Chinese language.
As used in the lessons so far, měi (美) = "beautiful". Note the use of the third tone.
For example, měiguó (美国) = United States (literally, "beautiful country").
You might also see 美 used as an abbreviation for America.
.美国 ( Meiguo / Mĕiguó ) (English translation: "America") It's the closest phonetic translation into Chinese characters.
Shouldn't "Where do you come from?" also be accepted? It sounds more natural to me.
I tried "what is your nationality" and it said I'm wrong... Which is dumb because the only accpetable answer to this question is [country] 人.
'Which' is inviting you to pick from a choice of two or more. 'You can have meat or fish - which do you prefer?' 'What' implies what kind, of all the millions of possibilities. You answer the door to a stranger's knock and ask, 'What do you want?' What time is it - many choices. Which country - because looking at a map or list of the 150 countries in the world you would choose one. Also from the accent you guess they are American or British and ask which country. What is your nationality sounds like an interrogation at immigration.
It accepted it for me on this question but marked it wrong on another identical question. Consistensy is a problem with Duolingo
I am a native Chinese speaker. I type Where are you come from and it said it's wrong, but it's should be right because is the same thing isn't it?
It's either "where ARE you from" (to be from) or "where DO you come from" (to come from)
I'm sorry if I'm being inappropriate, but since this skill is about countries and the 3 options given so far don't apply to me. I know my answer to this question would be 我是荷兰人 but I don't know the pinyin, tone or meaning of the individual characters which might come in handy with other words.
Google translate can help. With the forward or reverse translation you can see and hear pinyin. Highlighting in iOS safari won’t show pinyin but will speak phrases
It makes sense to me to use 哪 here (thanks to other helpful commenters), but the last question had 马 (mǎ) at the very end of the sentence to ask about nationality. Is there a difference I'm missing?
This is below level 1 lesson for learning Chinese expressions for nationality. Also, this would be the very first occurrence of word da3 in Duolingo Chinese course. Please, try to provide comments which would help us beginners to learn Chinese correctly, and stop showing better knowledge of that languague. The purpose of Duolingo is learning, not personal advertising.
Hello, I typed the exact same answer as the one displayed as the correct solution, yet it was not accepted. I was using Pinyin. I believe that the question mark sign was not the one the server expected. In the next attempt, I shall try using no question mark at all, or perhaps a 吗; I understand that sign indicates a question. As it stands, there must be a software error.
I was mistaken! It seems as though I typed the wrong character for 哪; it did not have the square-shaped sign in the beginning.
Sorry, they do accept both "which" and "what" . I had made a separate mistake.
Someone else said it earlier but I'll restate it. 吗 "Ma" is for yes or no questions. 哪 "Na" means "what or which", so questions that require specificity. 哪 "Na" is better suited for the question.
Could we say which nationality? Since the reference is the person not the country?
- 88
So is "what county are you from?" and "what's you nationality?" the same question in Chinese?
I ask because I noticed 人 in the sentence. Usually I would reply "I'm from (country)" to the first but "I'm (nationality)" for the second. Would it be correct to state the first of these as a reply to the question in Chinese or the latter or do both work?
Why is it sometimes "What country is/are sb from" and sometimes "Which country is/are sb from" while there is only one Chinese expression?
So to translate it right you would start at which lol... thats cool... " which country people you are?" Lol
Do = 做 , Are = 是 ... 《你是哪国人？》 is refering to one's nationality in particular. So even if you meant "where do you come from", that's still not accurate. That would be 《你从哪里来？》