"我不明白你的意思。"
Translation:I don't understand what you mean.
13 Comments
what? I gave as a correct answer "I don't know what you mean" which was accepted all the previous times and sudenly it marked it as wrong and it gave me as correct the phrase "I don't get what you mean". Since when "underdstand" is wrong? And isn't the phrase "I don't get what you mean" too colloquial?
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明白 and 懂 both mean to understand. I couldn't easily put in my own words, but I can tell their usages very well.
明白 is most commonly used in any circumstance. Different from 懂, it does not draw any deeper implication of the meaning.
懂 is used when someone understands a thing another has communicated. When watching shows and movies or listening to music, you will notice that the works use 懂 instead of 明白. Here is the part of the lyrics from Exid's Chinese version of K-pop song Up & Down (I listened to this song a lot since I am into Far East languages):
听不听不听不懂你在说什么
In case you are curious, here is the discussion from Stack Exchange site I cited.
Interesting. Didn't know this, but now that you've pointed it out it makes sense. To rephrase, 明白 is a more shallow understanding than 懂's deeper comprehension.
The difference regarding the level of understanding between 明白 and 懂 exists but very subtle, and in daily conversation we don't really make distinguish between them, so you don't really need to worry about this. I would rather say that 懂 is slightly more colloquial / informal. E.g. we would say 你听得懂中文吗？ (Can you understand Chinese when listening?) One can also say 你听得明白中文吗？ but it is less natural and sounds a bit more formal. In most cases they are interchangeable.
"I don't understand you" is what an English person would actually say; the translation given is not natural English
So what is 意思 ? It comes after the words for "your", hence does it mean something like "stuff which one says"?
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意思 means the meaning of something, like a word or phrase. So in this sentence it's referring to the meaning of what that person (你) is saying.
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I was told before by my Chinese teacher this with the "你的意思" added would be considered a little rude, less so than simply saying "我不明白." She said it would imply that not understanding the way a person is thinking. This could have just been her personal preference, but are there any native speakers that can confirm or deny this sentiment? Thanks!
