"你明白吗?"
Translation:Do you understand?
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14
It doesn't necessarily have to have happened in the past to add 了. It just indicates a completed action, so you might "have understood", but that could be right now or a few minutes ago. There is no past tense in Mandarin.
14
明白 is to understand a situation while 懂 is (hearing and) understanding the words a person says. At least in theory, native speakers may use them interchangeably
At least one source I've seen indicates that 不明白 and 不懂 are interchangeable.
"不懂 (bù dǒng) may also be swapped out with 不明白 (bù míngbai)." Source: https://resources.allsetlearning.com/chinese/grammar/Potential_complement_%22-bu_dong%22_for_not_understanding
14
I think 明白 literally means "(the situation) is clear to me, cause that would make sense; 明 means bright after all, and I think together with 白, they mean bright and clear. "understand" as one word would be 懂, but I remember reading somewhere that it means more like understanding what the person said, the words they used. I imagine 明白, or more specifically “你明白了吗?” being used after a long (or short) explanation of the situation one's in.
206
The recorded audio doesn't seem to be pronouncing the bai using the 2nd tone. Sounds more like 4th tone to me. Is there a pronunciation rule for why that might be or can I continue to pronounce mingbai using 2nd & 2nd tone?