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- "那是我们的老师吗？"
"那是我们的老师吗？"
Translation:Is that our teacher?
28 Comments
那是我們的老師嗎？
You can drop "的" here. If you want to be more polite, you can add "位(wèi)" after "那": "那位是我们的老师吗？"
位 is the classifier of people.
19
Isn't it that 个(gè) is the classifier for people (or just stuff in general, but 位 is more formal/polite? I'm still a beginner so I'm not sure.
- 283
位 is used specifically for people. I'd say you're right that it's more polite. 个 can be used for people and many other things, although NOT everything can be used with 个.
个(gè) is the classifier of many things, nonetheless,in case you forgot the classifier of "X thing" -for example 把(bǎ)- you can always use 个(gè).Even though it's more appropriate to use the proper classifier
One chinese friend told me that even them sometimes forget the classifier, so it's better to not get stressed.
You were right. I said "is this our teacher" and it said that i needed to use that. Was i right?
Using 那/那个 to refer to a person gives a pejorative connotation. It's better to use 他/她 (he/she) or 那个人/那位 ("That person"), with 那位 the more formal or polite form.
I am starting to think some more pinying would do newer learners some serious good
In my experience, the sooner you stop using pinyin the faster your knowledge of characters improves
I need pinyin for typing though. I can only write chinese characters down if I have a pinyin-chinese keyboard. The drawing keyboard is way too hard for me.
When I first started, I learned all in pinyin. I am using duolingo as a refresher and to learn characters. I agree that it would be easier for a beginner to learn using pinyin, but maybe that's simply because that's how I learned...
- 375
2020.5.28 Although there are a lot of input methods for Chinese, I believe even a lot of the native Chinese prefer to use the pinyin keyboard to write
Should you be saying that? That is refferring to an object/thing but she/he is reffering to a person. So since the teacher is human you shoukd not be saying that
That in this case is a demonstrative pronoun. Think you're telling someone else who that person is and pointing to someone far away.
That!? Teacher is that? Not very polite, I thought that is for things, not people.
Neither English nor Chinese have special demonstratives to distinguish people from objects.
- 213
The Chinese word for "that" ("那") works the same as the word "ese" in Spanish, but, there's not direct equivalent in English.
Yes, that is correct. Is that my teacher? Are those my shoes? Are you my friend? etc...
I said "is that MY teacher" when i was supposed to say " is that OUR teacher "
How different is "is this our teacher" to "is that our teacher?" I used "this" and it wasn't accepted.... Is there a reason for it?
