"I do not have a sister."

Translation: У мене немає сестри.

[mrtatulas]

I grew up speaking Ukrainian as a second-generation immigrant - growing up we used to say "Я не маю _" instead of "У мене немає ___". I am curious as to whether or not this is correct. Keep in mind my family immigrated from a rural area in Western Ukraine in the 1940s so this may be outdated, but is it incorrect? Is that passive way of declaring possession the only correct way?

[Vinnfred]

Both of this forms are used in a modern Ukranian interchangeably :)

[mrtatulas]

Дякую! Я так і думав. :)

[yaniv93]

Do certain regions use one more than the other?

[Vinnfred]

I don't have any actual information on that, but "у мене є" is the same as Russian "у меня есть". The form "я имею" isn't very common in modern Russian. So I suppose that people influenced by Russian would rather use "у мене є"

[human5421993989]

In such case, you'd say я не маю сестрУ, right?

[Tielbert]

No, wrong. In this pattern you always use Genitive. If you use Accusative, you imply that you really DO something to your sister (spoiler: the word маю may sometimes mean sexual relationship, though it is more common in Russian)

[Chalseadagger]

How would you say "I do not have sisters." ?
Just curious about the declination of sisters in this case.

[Vinnfred]

Я не маю (кого?) сестер