Archive for 'Grammar'
Ten Ta To Posted by Anna on Aug 6, 2008
In my last post I quoted a Japanese lady who is learning Polish in Tokyo. She kindly gave us several examples of why she likes Poland so much. And to show off her Polish grammar, she even used a variety of adjective-noun combinations. I don’t know about you, but if it was me speaking in…
Genitive Case, part 2 Posted by Anna on Jul 21, 2008
Since we’re in the midst of a little grammar kick, I thought we might as well continue. But to keep things interesting, we should let the adjectives rest for a while and talk about something else. Remember when we discussed the genitive case – dopełniacz? Yes, I know, it was a while back. So here…
Polish Adjectives, part 1 Posted by Anna on Jul 17, 2008
In my last article, while talking about “grand beaver dwelling places” (oh yes, we talk about some strange things here) I briefly touched on the subject of adjectives. So I suppose it’s only fitting to finally give those adjectives a post of their own. Polish adjectives get a bad rap among foreign speakers, but totally…
Plural, Singular or Something In-Between? Posted by Anna on Jul 4, 2008
This last post about wakacje (holidays) made me a little bit confused. OK, not a little. A lot. While writing it, I was unable to fully determine the grammatical gender of “wakacje”, and a random selection of my countrymen to whom I posed that question just looked at me with utter bewilderment. “You mean it…
Cases in Polish: Genitive Posted by Anna on Jun 27, 2008
It’s time for some grammar now, don’t you agree? And since we’ve already started with nouns and declensions a couple of weeks ago, I think we should continue. The case we’re going to discuss today is my least favorite. Why? Because on the surface, it seems deceptively easy. Almost too easy, in fact. Yet when…
Is Polish a Phonetic Language Posted by Anna on Jun 23, 2008
Many Poles will tell you that Polish is a phonetic language. In other words, you read it as you write it. Cool! Sounds easy enough, right? But hold on a sec. That’s not entirely true. While written Polish might indeed be easier to decipher than for example English (just think about the many different ways…
Cases in Polish: Nominative Posted by Anna on Jun 3, 2008
Because Polish nouns have seven (yep, you read that right – SEVEN!) cases, covering all of them in just one entry would be a bit of an overkill. To make it easy for all (but especially for me!), we’ll do them on a case-by-case basis. But first things first. What is a “case” anyway? (Warning!…