Polish Verbs of Motion Posted by Anna on Oct 16, 2008 in Grammar
Polish verbs make me cry. And I don’t mean the tears of joy here, that’s for sure.
I’ve never thought about just how evil they can be until recently. I was working on a project, which demanded expert knowledge of verbs, Polish verbs, naturally, and that was a real eye-opener for me. I’ve never realized just how many problems they can cause for a sloppy Polish speaker, even a native one. And if a native gets confused, then what about those who are learning Polish?
To get some help, I’ve been plodding through “Polish Grammar in a Nutshell” by Oscar E. Swan, and needless to say, like most grammar books in the known universe, it also fails miserably when it comes to explaining the finer points of Polish verbs. (And I also think that it switched perfective and imperfective forms of “to buy,” so be careful.)
And it all started when someone very near and dear to me wanted to know the difference between “iść” and “chodzić.” Well, he also asked about “pójść” but we’ll leave that one for now.
Frankly, I have never thought about this phenomenon, but these two verbs of motions seem indicative of what happens to Polish verbs in general.
Both “iść” and “chodzić” mean “to go.” They’re both imperfective verbs. The difference is in how they’re used.
Let’s start with “iść”:
- Idę na randkę. – I am going on a date.
Meaning, going right now, I’m all dressed up, have my high-heels on, my make-up and hair are done, and I’m going.
And now with “chodzić”:
- Tak, chodzę na randki. – Yeah, I go on dates. Says your teenager daughter to you while you watch her with a horrified expression. Like every weekend, for example, I go on dates.
See what happened? One verb is used to express an immediate action, and the other – a habitual thing that is done more or less regularly, but not right now.
There are tons of verbs like that in Polish, and sadly, you need to know both forms to make sense of what people are saying to you.
Let’s take another motion verb “to run” – “biec” and “biegać.”
Yep, you guessed it, the first one means “to run right now”, and the other one “to run.”
- Biegnę na przystanek. – I am running to the bus stop (you may yell into your cell phone to a friend who’s waiting there for you.)
- Biegam 5km każdego rana. – I run 5 kms every morning. (To which my answer is: good for you. You go run, and I’ll sleep.)
I think I should ease you into the world of verbs slowly, so we will stop here for now.
Below you have the present tense forms of “iść” and “chodzić” and “biec” and “biegać.”
- ja – idę / chodzę
- ty – idziesz /chodzisz
- on/ona/ono – idzie / chodzi
- my – idziemy /chodzimy
- wy – idziecie / chodzicie
- oni – idą / chodzą
- ja – biegnę / biegam
- ty – biegniesz / biegasz
- on/ona/ono – biegnie / biega
- my – biegniemy / biegamy
- wy – biegniecie / biegacie
- oni – biegną / biegają
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Comments:
michael:
Hi Anna,
This was a very good piece on grammer inmho, I understood it!
Can you reccommend any grammer books?
Thanks
Michael
Eva:
Hi,
To complicate it even more… “Ide na randke” can mean tomorrow or in a month or anything like it, if you add a temporal phrase. Just like in English, by the way, when it’s planned and set. It is amazing how much you don’t realize things about your native language grammar if you have never been formally taught about it. I have never though we have anything “perfective” or “imperfective” in Polish.
Also, when you consider less prescriptive grammar you can have it still more difficult because it is possible to say “Codziennie biegne na przystanek jak wariatka…” – which is kind of habitual, right?
Keep warm,
Eva
Anna:
hahaha Eva! Yes you are right, but let’s stick to the simplest of facts for now. The examples you gave that’s like teaching advanced algebra to a someone who doesn’t quite know 2+2 just yet 😉
pinolona:
I find iść and chodzić confusing because they are both imperfective and I’m not sure of the difference between iść and pojść. Are both bieć and biegać imperfective or is bieć perfective? Could I say ‘pojdę na randkę’ and would this mean that I am going on one date at a fixed time in the future e.g. tomorrow night? Can I use pojść if I’m just stepping out of the door or would that be iść? If I went on a date yesterday would I say ‘szłam na randkę’ or ‘poszłam’??
I was walking along the street and I noticed a particular shop I’d been looking for. I tried to tell my flatmate ‘I was walking’ and I said ‘Chodziłam’, but she said I could just say ‘szłam’, and that means ‘I was walking’ – at a particular time but continuously. Have I understood correctly? Help!
baduin:
“Chodzić” is a frequentative imperfective verb. It means to go or to walk repeatedly (for example to go somewhere every day, or to walk up and down the street, etc).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequentative
“Iść” is an imperfective form. It means to go, without specifying whether you reach your goal. It can have past, present, and future tenses.
“Pójść” is the perfective form. Perfective forms generally mean to finish doing something. They always refer to a single moment of time, never to a continuous action. Because of that they can have only past and future tenses. (Because the exact moment of finishing doing something is too short to allow you to speak; before you end to speak, your finished action is already in the past).
“Pójść” however is a bit different. It is a perfective form which means “to start to go”. It is also a single moment, and so there is no present form. “Pójść” is the form generally used in the future and past tenses. “Iść” in future and past is used only in the continuous sense “I was going there as…”.
“Wyjść” is an imperfective verb, meaning “to leave”. Its meaning is very near “pójść”, but it is not used as the future/past tense of “iść”. Its meaning stresses the “leave somewhere aspect”, not “start to go somewhere aspect”. Despite that, “wyjść” and “pójść” are often replaceable. Since it is imperfective, it has a present tense “wychodzę”, which means either “I leave every day” or “I’m going to leave in a minute”.
As in most languages, the present tense can be used to signify a planned action in the future. In Polish it can also mean “to be going to do something in a minute”. So, “idę do pracy” can mean “I am leaving for work now”.
The typical perfective form of “iść” would be “dojść”. This means “to reach”, “to walk and arrive somewhere” and is used rather more rarely, and never as the future/past of “iść”.
There is also “dochodzić” form. It is build like a perfective form of the frequentative verb “chodzić”, but actually it is the imperfective form of “dojść”. It can mean “to be arriving, to be just to arrive”.
All those verbs have also multiple secondary meanings, of course.
Anna:
Hi P!
Take a look at the new post (verbs of motion, part 2) – just for you! 🙂
luke:
Hey there are errors in Dr. Swan’s grammar books and in his online dictionary. Just shoot him an e-mail telling him the error and he’ll be very thankful. I found an error in his dictionary too.
Gernot Klein:
As a German speaker, I find the aspectual distinctions of Polish/Russian verbs of motion somewhat similar, though hardly identical, to the ‘resultative’ German prefixes BE- and ER- for many verbs, ‘steigen’ vs. ‘BEsteigen’, ‘gehen’ vs. ‘ERgehen’ etc…
Would appreciate comments from the others on this point. (in English, German or Polish) By the way, I’m in seventh heaven since finding this site!:-)
Annie:
This grammar section is great! I’ve been looking everywhere for some plain English explanations of things like cases and the two types of verbs. This is so helpful! Thank you 🙂
Gernot Klein:
I see the difference between Polish and German verbs of motion (English I can’t judge, of course!):
Jade do Warszawy. = Ich fahre gerade nach Warschau.
Jedzdze do Warszawy. = Ich fahre taeglich nach Warschau.