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- Topic: Esperanto >
- "Ili sin komprenas reciproke."
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But wouldn't "Ili komprenas reciproke" mean the same thing?
Edit: I just realized the reason for "sin". Kompreni is transitive, and needs an object, which is "sin"
So, could another version of this sentence be "Ili reciproke komprenas sin"?
Yes, "Ili reciproke komprenas sin" sounds even more normal.. Same with "Ili komprenas sin reciproke".
Without reciproke, would this sentence mean "They understand themselves"? And is there any other way to clarify that they understand each other?
Well, I always use "Ili komprenas unu la alian". Literally, "Ili sin komprenas" means they understand themselves. So basically a russian and an englishman talks and they don't speak each other's language, then you could say "Ili sin komprenas" - meaning that they understand what they say but we have no info whether they understand each other or not.
"Ili komprenas unu la alian" = "(ili) Unu komprenas la alian"... So, yes! It's mutual.
Maybe you could say "Ni komprenas ilin kaj ili komprenas reciproke" like...they understand [some third party] back.
Something like: They understand mutually.
Still you need "themselves" i.e. sin (si, sin, sia... mi, min, mia...)
Is "sin" the reflexive pronoun for "ili"? My gut feeling is that this is the same as " ils se comprennent", where "se" in French is the reflexive pronoun for ils.
Si is the third-person reflexive, both singular and plural. It takes the "-n" here because it's being used in the accusative. (It can also take an "-a" when used as a possessive.)
I cannot understand this at all. The initial "r" of "reciproke" is just not pronounced. It sounds like "komprenas alciproke"
what is the need of reciproke here? does "Ili sin komprenas" not mean the same thing?
"Ili sin komprenas" would mean something like "They understand themselves".
What's the difference between 'sin' and 'mem'? According to the dictionary hints, 'sin' means themselves, but wouldn't 'ili mem' mean the same?
