Grammar

PCR Lesson 5 Grammar
第五課：你媽媽是大夫嗎
  • The Demonstrative 那 [nà]: that:
    Used like 'that' in English, but for now we will use it only by itself and not with nouns. We will say things like, "That is my book." and not "That book is mine."
    那是我的書。 Nà shì wǒ de shū.
    那是他媽媽的車。 Nà shì tā māma de chē.
    那是我大夫。 Nà shì wǒ dàifu.
  • Possessive Particle 的:
    Noun (possessor) + 的 + Noun (possessed)

    In previous lessons we learned that when the possessor is a personal pronoun and the possessed a person we can omit the possessive, like in 我朋友. But when we talk about my friend's car, we must use the possessive particle 我朋友的車.

    There are no possessive pronouns in Mandarin, just the particle 的, which can be thought of as the English apostrophe-s.

    According to collectors of Chinese character frequency statistics, 的 is by far the most frequent character in daily use.

    媽媽的車
    我爸爸的大夫
    哥哥的書
    他朋友的朋友
  • Answering 嗎 Questions::
    An easy way to make a question out of a descriptive, or an identifying sentence is to add 嗎 to the end of the sentence. The simplest answer for this type of sentence is to repeat the verb used in the question, or to reply in the negative 不 and the verb.
    Question: 你哥哥很忙嗎？
    Short Answer Positive: 很忙。
    Short Answer Negative: 不忙。
    Long Answer Positive: 我哥哥忙。
    Long Answer Negative: 我哥哥不忙。
    Full Answer Positive: 很忙，我哥哥忙。
    Full Answer Negative: 不忙，我哥哥不忙。

    Question: 那是你的車嗎？
    Short Answer Positive: 是。
    Short Answer Negative: 不是。
    Long Answer Positive: 那是我的車。
    Long Answer Negative: 那不是我的車。
    Full Answer Positive: 是，那是我的車。
    Full Answer Negative: 不是，那不是我的車。