"她有姐姐吗？"
Translation:Does she have an older sister?
30 Comments
I gave "does she have a sister", and this was marked wrong. The correct translation is apparently "does she have sisters", but on this page I see "does she have an older sister" is also correct. I don't understand why my answer was wrong.
Your answer was incorrect because 姐姐 means 'older sister,' not simply 'sister'. In Chinese, older/younger is usually differentiated when referring to relatives. For example, older brother (哥哥) and younger brother (弟弟), older female cousin (表姐) and younger female cousin (表妹), so on.
I did the same! Not sure how "does she have a sister" would be. Perhaps 她有一个姐姐吗?
563
You can say
她有姐妹吗？
and similarly the following variations:.
她有兄弟吗？ brothers.
她有兄弟姐妹吗？ brothers and sisters.
她有一个姐姐吗? is also viable, e.g. when you see someone that looks like your friend and you ask if she has a sister.
- 639
That's not a problem with the audio. All three are pronounced the same way, though I imagine it is frustrating for some people. I suppose when used in spoken form, there would generally be context (visual, prior conversation, etc) to differentiate them.
Ok, so does "sister sister" mean "older sister" whereas "sister" means "a sister"?
- 563
No. For some reasons single character words are less popular in modern Chinese. Words have been formed by using 2 characters of the same meaning such as 朋友 friend. Each of 朋 and 友 alone can mean friend in older time. 姐姐 is just an example of doubling the same character. It does not carry any implication of single or plural.
- 19
The reason is that Mandarin Chinese had lost tones, resulting in more homophones, which needed a second character for clarification. Cantonese on the other hand keeps more tones and works with less syllables
姐 “jie" in itself means older sister, so whether it says 姐姐 or just 姐 it means older sister, but usually it's more natural for words to come in pairs in Chinese. 妹 "mei" is the word for younger sister, and the same things apply.
I think 姐妹 (jie3mei4) means 'sister' in general. In my two years of studying, though, I've never used it.
The answer
Does she have any older sisters?
should be accepted. Reported.
- 724
Unfortunately, "Does she have ANY older sister?" is not correct English. You can have "Does she have AN older sister?" or "Does she have any older sisterS?" but not "Does she have any older sister?"
You are right, there was a typo in my message.
Thank you for pointing that out.
has she an older sister? means exactly the same in english. i think this should be added to the list of correct answers!
- 986
When doing audio translation, "他有姐姐吗？" is not accepted. This should be fixed
So, is 姐姐 "older sister", "sister", "younger sister" ? Use clear sinogram ; not approximative ! We can't understand something with many meanings !
In chinese this means sisters. As for a singular sister you have to write 1 sister (Yi ge)! So automatically this senses means plural.
I gave a translation of "Does he have an older sister?", and was told that it's "Does she". But aren't she/he were the same word?
I am French, I would like to know why the both following sentences are not right. What is the difference if it isn't the same meaning? Has she an older sister? or Does she have an older sister?
- 563
It is a question about English. I am not native but I came across such discussion between natives. It seems that the form "Has she xxxx?" is not very popular, both in UK and in US. However I doubt if anyone would regard it as "wrong", just hardly people talk like that. Maybe someone native could comment about this to confirm.
Bon courage!
In my native dialect (US west coast, born '80s/'90s), "has she an..." is definitely ungrammatical/not used. For me, a sentence starting with "has she..." would have to be followed by a verb - the "already did something" meaning of "has", not the "possesses/exists" meaning. So yes, in my dialect, it's definitely "wrong" (I'd give someone a really weird look if they said "Has she hella sick rims?", for instance, and not because of the "hella sick" colloquialism or because of a formal/informal mixup).
Other dialects out there do use "Has she..." to mean "Does she have [possess/etc.]...", and I think that construction might be encountered more frequently in Britain. (I've heard it from some older Irish speakers, for instance)
- 138
I am a native English speaker from the UK - 'Has she an older sister?' is correct but it is very unusual in modern times. Almost everyone would say 'Does she have an older sister?'. You are more likely to read or hear 'Has she an older sister?' in a Shakespeare play :)
(As @EthanKamin mentioned, you could hear an older Irish or Scottish person using either sentence. As far as people from England go, I think 'Has she an older sister?' is unusual no matter what).
This was a tough one. There was nothing previously learned that would have let you know this meant older sister. I wanted to go with "sisters" and thought maybe there was a mistake with "sister" missing the "s" on the end.
- 135
I translated as "Does she have older sisters" and was marked wrong. Why can it be translated as "... an older sister" or "... sisters" but not "... older sisters"?
