Learn the basic rules of Chinese sentence structure
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Intro |
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| Michael: How are sentences structured in Chinese? |
| Dehua: And are the rules rigid? |
| Michael: At ChineseClass101.com, we hear these questions often. |
| Ben Lee, a foreign-exchange student, is walking through central Beijing with his friend, Lu Liu, when he sees someone that he thinks is a famous celebrity. |
| He gestures to his friend, Lu, and says, |
| "I know him! That's Jet Li!" |
| 李 本: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| Dialogue |
| 李 本: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| 刘 璐: 我也知道他！(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā!) |
| Michael: Once more with the English translation. |
| 李 本: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| Michael: "I know him! That's Jet Li!" |
| 刘 璐: 我也知道他！(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā!) |
| Michael: "I know him too!" |
Lesson focus |
| Michael: Let's look at the structure of Ben's first sentence: |
| Dehua: 我知道他。(Wǒ zhīdào tā.) |
| Michael: The sentence starts with the subject, |
| Dehua: 我 (wǒ), |
| Michael: meaning "I." This is followed by the verb |
| Dehua: 知道 (zhīdào), |
| Michael: meaning "know," and then by the object |
| Dehua: 他 (tā), |
| Michael: meaning "him." Together, the whole sentence is |
| Dehua: 我知道他。(Wǒ zhīdào tā.) |
| Michael: "I know him." |
| Michael: From this example, we can see that Chinese has an SVO sentence structure, just like English. The letters in |
| SVO stands for the parts of speech: subject-verb-object. |
| Michael: Now let's look at Lu's reply: |
| Dehua: 我也知道他。(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā.) |
| Michael: Its English translation can be either "I know him too" or "I also know him." Notice that when compared to Ben's sentence, there is an extra element, |
| Dehua: 也 (yě), |
| Michael: meaning "too" or "also." This word is an adverb, which in Chinese, should often be placed before the verb. |
| Michael: Let's consider another simple example: |
| "Today is my birthday." |
| Dehua: 今天是我的生日。(Jīntiān shì wǒ de shēngrì.) |
| Michael: Let's compare this to the sentence, "Today is my birthday too": |
| Dehua: 今天也是我的生日。(Jīntiān yě shì wǒ de shēngrì.) |
| Michael: Once again, the only difference between these two sentences is the addition of the adverb |
| Dehua: 也 (yě) |
| Michael: before the verb |
| Dehua: 是 (shì). |
| Michael: In spoken Chinese, the SVO sentence structure can be somewhat flexible, and you would very often hear the object said first. In this regard, the sentence structure could be seen as object-subject-verb. |
| Michael: Let's look at the conversation again. As mentioned, Ben said |
| Dehua: 我知道他 (Wǒ zhīdào tā) |
| Michael: following an SVO sentence pattern. If we instead move the object to the front, we would have |
| Dehua: 他，我知道。(Tā, wǒ zhīdào.) |
| Michael: The meaning here remains the same, but there is more emphasis on the object when it is placed in the front. |
| Michael: The same can be done to what Lu said. |
| Dehua: 我也知道他。(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā.) |
| Michael: Moving the object to the beginning of the sentence, we would have |
| Dehua: 他，我也知道。(Tā, wǒ yě zhīdào.) |
| [Recall 1] |
| Michael: Let's take a closer look at the dialogue. |
| Do you remember how Ben said, "I know him! That's Jet Li!" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Dehua: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| [Recall 2] |
| Michael: Now let's take a look at his friend's reply. |
| And do you remember how Lu said, "I know him too!" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Dehua: 我也知道他！(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā!) |
| Practice Section |
| Michael: Let's review the conversation in detail: I will say the English translation, and then you try to say the equivalent Chinese. Dehua will then model the correct answer and you can repeat after her, with the focus on your pronunciation. |
| How do you say, "I know him! That's Jet Li!" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dehua: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| Michael: Did you get it right? Listen to Dehua again and repeat. |
| Dehua: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dehua: 我知道他！他是李连杰！ (Wǒ zhīdào tā! Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié!) |
| Michael: Let's move on to the second sentence. |
| How do you say, "I know him too!" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dehua: 我也知道他！(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā!) |
| Michael: Did you get it right this time? Listen to Dehua again and repeat. |
| Dehua: 我也知道他！(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā!) |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dehua: 我也知道他！(Wǒ yě zhīdào tā!) |
| Cultural Insight/Expansion (Optional) |
| Michael: In addition to that of statements, it may also be useful to know the word order of questions. |
| Unlike English, where questions must start with a question word, in Chinese, the word order of questions remains the same as that of statements. |
| Michael: Let's look at a sentence from the conversation. |
| Dehua: 他是李连杰。（Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié.） |
| Michael: "He is Jet Li." |
| This statement starts with the subject, |
| Dehua: 他 (tā), |
| Michael: which is followed by the verb, |
| Dehua: 是 (shì), |
| Michael: and then by the predicative, |
| Dehua: 李连杰 (Lǐ Liánjié). |
| Michael: In order to ask a who-question, we are going to need the question word |
| Dehua: 谁 (shéi). |
| Michael: To ask the question "Who is Jet Li," as in who in a group of people is Jet Li, we just need to replace the subject in the prior statement with the question word: |
| Dehua: 谁是李连杰？(Shéi shì Lǐ Liánjié?) |
| Michael: The response would then be the initial statement: |
| Dehua: 他是李连杰。(Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié.） |
| Michael: If we would like to ask "Who is he," we would instead replace the predicative with the question word: |
| Dehua: 他是谁？(Tā shì shéi?) |
| Michael: An example response to this question could be |
| Dehua: 他是李连杰。(Tā shì Lǐ Liánjié.) |
| Michael: Notice that, in this case, the question did not start with the question word. |
| Michael: As you can see from these examples, in Chinese, a question and its response share the same word order. |
Outro |
| Michael: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them! |
| Dehua: 再见！ (zàijiàn!) |
| Michael: See you soon! |
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