Posts tagged with "Grammar"

Polish Possessive Pronouns – are they really that difficult?

Posted by Anna No Comments
Jun 30 2009

Are Polish possessive pronouns really that difficult? I need an honest opinion here.

I have always thought they were one of those relatively straightforward bits in our convoluted language. But it turns out I might have been either mistaken or overly optimistic.

Yesterday I was asked this very complicated question:

Ok, so you say “moja książka” (my book) and “jej książka” (her book). But then you say: “On zgubił moją książkę.” (He lost my book) and because in this sentence “moja książka” is in the accusative (he lost kogo? co?) it became “moją książkę”. And when you say: “On zgubił jej książkę.” (He lost her book) only “książka” morphed into the accusative form, but not “jej”. Why is that?

And my answer: Because it’s Polish, that’s why.

But seriously, this is one of those instances when I realize that Polish possessive pronouns and their declensions can be totally incomprehensible even to the most dedicated learners (and to many Poles, too).

So, in order to make my life easier (because someone out there was bound to know the correct answer), I thought I’d ask this question to a couple of my native Polish friends. But ahem, their responses were not exactly all that helpful:

Friend #1: Dude, you’re right. This is weird. And how come I’ve never noticed this myself?
and
Friend #2: Because, duh, that’s how it is. Can’t you just tell your readers to memorize everything and stop bugging me?

I’ll ignore friend #2 for now, but yeah, friend #1 was right. We always tend to think about possessive pronouns as behaving kind of like adjectives. However, some of them think they’re special, or something.

Take a look:

  • my – mój (singular, masc.), moja (singular, fem.), moje (singular, neuter), moi (plural, masculine-personal), moje (plural, all other)
  • your – twój, twoja, twoje, twoi, twoje
  • his – jego
  • her – jej
  • our – nasz, nasza, nasze, nasi, nasze
  • your – wasz, wasza, wasze, wasi, wasze
  • their – ich

And see this? Those guys that have only one form – jego, jej and ich don’t decline. The nouns they describe decline as usual, but those pronouns themselves – don’t.

All others that have all the “adjective-looking” forms behave like good little adjectives should.

And to the question of “why is that?” my answer still stands – because it’s Polish, that’s why!

Concise Polish Grammar – A Handbook for Foreigners – book review

Posted by Anna 6 Comments
Jun 12 2009

I finally managed to get my hands on “Concise Polish Grammar – A Handbook for Foreigners” by Magdalena Foland-Kugler (ISBN 978-83-89913-51-7) published by Exlibris.

I haven’t read this book from cover to cover yet, just briefly paged through the sections that interested me the most. What immediately jumped out at me is the fact that the examples in this book are not translated into English.

Yes, I get it, if someone is reading a Polish grammar book, he/she should have some sort of basic vocabulary already mastered. But on the other hand, if you’re preparing a Polish grammar book for English speakers, why do you treat the examples as if they were written for Poles?

The book was written by a native Polish speaker in Polish, and then translated into English. As such, it has a point view of a native Pole, as well. And unfortunately, because of that and despite its best intentions, it is barely adequate for a non-native speaker. However, it’s a very good reference for a Polish person who wants to learn Polish grammar in English. Though I’m sure this is not what the author had in mind.

The book is not totally useless, though. The grammatical tables are simple and concise, to the point of being too simple at times.
I have a feeling that the author was given a certain number of pages for this project and desperately tried to cram as much information onto them as possible. Unfortunately, our wonderful Polish grammar doesn’t take too kindly to cramming and the book is simply too short (142 pages and that includes the preface and index!) and too basic.

As most grammar books the world over, this one is also written in grammaticalese, and woe upon those who attempt to read it not knowing what analytical gradability is, for example.

I find this book to be an easy read, and the explanations – clear and adequate. But then again, I don’t have to translate the examples to understand what is being said, and I know a lot about Polish grammar already.

However, my resident non-Polish speaker hated it and even though I had ordered him to read it, he only got as far as chapter seven before demanding “that Bielec book.”

Who’s Who in the Family

Posted by Anna No Comments
May 22 2009

Today’s post is about something that even I have problems with. Brother’s wife wife’s brother and sister’s husband and husband’s sister and sister’s daughter’s best friend’s neighbor’s son. Or something like that.

Either I’m monumentally stupid, or it’s really easy in English. Just stick “in-law” at the end of anything you’re not quite sure of (when talking about the “other” side of the family) and voila, your work there is done. So, whether you’re talking about your wife’s sister or your brother’s wife, you simply say “my sister in-law”, right?

Well, it’s not quite so easy in Polish (why would it, it’s Polish after all!) and all these people have their own individual names.
So, to be sure I get it right (because I hardly ever get it right) I consulted a book and my aunt. And while sometimes even Polish dictionaries can’t agree on what is correct, I know for a fact that my aunt is never wrong.

OK, so here’s the list (according to the book and my aunt):

  • brother’s wife – żona brata – bratowa
  • sister’s husband – mąż siostry – szwagier
  • wife’s brother – brat żony – szwagier
  • wife’s sister – siostra żony – szwagierka
  • husband’s sister – siostra męża – szwagierka

And there’s more:

  • sister’s daughter – córka siostry – siostrzenica
  • brother’s daughter – córka brata – bratanica
  • sister’s son – syn siostry – siostrzeniec
  • brother’s son – syn brata – bratanek

And now for the fun part, because we all love our in-laws, right?

  • daughter’s husband – mąż córki – zięć
  • son’s wife – żona syna – synowa

and

  • wife’s (or husband’s) father – ojciec żony (lub męża) – teść
  • wife’s (or husband’s) mother – matka żony (lub męża) – teściowa

When it comes to people like mother’s brother or father’s brother, back in the olden days (like about 20 years ago) they were called “wuj” and “stryj” respectively. But now, they’re just called “wuj”, or diminutively “wujek”, regardless of whose brothers they are.

And how for example would my father refer to my husband’s father in Polish? I have no idea. My dad has no idea either. He just said “father of my son-in-law” (ojciec mojego zięcia). Hey, works for me!

PS. And just to see if you remember your noun cases, can you tell which one we’ve been using today to describe all these people?

About the Mammas and the Pappas – in Polish

Posted by Anna No Comments
Apr 23 2009

The other day I was discussing motherhood with one of my friends. No, I am not planning to have a baby, I have two cats and I’m quite happy with them for the time being. However, my friend has a baby and we were going over the joys and perils of motherhood and the problems of fatherhood. And then we started to marvel at just how gloriously illogical this language of ours is.

Because take a look at this:

Motherhood is “macierzyństwo”. But fatherhood is not “tacierzyństwo” but “ojcostwo”.
Maternity leave is “urlop macierzyński”. And what about paternity leave? Until very recently there wasn’t even such animal in Poland. But now that there is (and will be officially official at all places of employment beginning next year for all new fathers who want to take advantage of it) what do we call it in Polish? Urlop tacierzyński.

But that’s not all. That’s just the beginning of problems with dads.
Ok, mom and dad are two of the first words that a child learns, or so I hear. In Polish those words are easy: mama and tata.

You’d think that it must be pretty hard to screw up something to easy and so basic that every Pole older than 9 months knows it, right? Wrong! Because in reality it’s not that easy, trust me.

While the plural of “mama” is of course “mamy” – every child knows that, what is the plural of “tata”? Automatically, we wanted to say “taty”. We even called a friendly elementary school teacher to see what she had to say. How does she tell the kids to ask their moms and dads to come to the meeting, for example? She tried to cheat and said: “mamy i ojcowie” (moms and fathers).

But how do you say “dads” in plural without cheating and using “fathers” instead? Does “tata” even have a plural form? Yes, it (he? LOL) does.

The correct plural of “tata” is “tatowie”. I know, you don’t have to tell me. I don’t see any logic in it either. The plural of “mama” is “mamy” but the plural of “tata” is “tatowie”. Apparently, that noun follows the same pattern as “dziadek – dziadkowie” (grandfather – grandfathers) and “wujek – wujkowie” (uncle – uncles). Yes, but those masculine nouns don’t end in “a”. And those masculine nouns that do end in “a”, such as kierowca (driver) or doradca (advisor) have plural forms eerily resembling those of “mamy” – kierowcy (drivers) and doradcy (advisors).

So, let’s review:

  • mama (feminine) – mamy (feminine, plural)

but

  • tata (masculine) – tatowie (masculine, plural)
  • urlop macierzyński – maternity leave

but

  • urlop tacierzyński – paternity leave

but

  • ojcostwo – fatherhood (also paternity), oddly enough, grammatically this noun is neuter in gender.

but

  • macierzyństwo – motherhood (also grammatically neuter)

And those are just the linguistic problems, we’re not even talking about smelly diapers here!

Polish Present Tense

Posted by Anna No Comments
Apr 21 2009

Of course, since last time I bravely announced that the next post would be about grammar, I put on my procrastinator’s hat and have been doing everything possible to put it off for as long as possible. But then today my friend said “you’re stupid, the sooner you explain this grammar stuff, the sooner you can devote your time to more interesting things – like visiting me, for example.” And then she went on and actually did the grammar explaining as well:

“It’s really simple, OK? In English they have this whole bunch of useless tenses, the one with ‘do you blah blah’ and the one with ‘ing something something’ and then the one with ‘been ing whatever, anyway you know it and besides who cares? All your people really need to know that in Polish all this nonsense turns into one normal present tense, just how gods intended it to be in the first place. End of grammar lesson, now, when do you come visit me? I kup jakieś ciasto po drodze, OK? (and buy some cake on your way)”

(Now, if all Polish teachers could be like that! Wow!)

Unfortunately, I’m sure that now “my people” are staring at their computer screens and thinking “come again? ing blah something whatever? huh?”

So, let’s go over it again. And this time let’s use a handy example. How about the one from the previous post, the one about “Ja uczę się polskiego”?

In English you can say the following things:

  • I study Polish.
  • I’m studying Polish.

and

  • I’ve been studying Polish.

And yes, “uczyć się” can be translated into English as both “to learn” and “to study” and don’t listen to Poles telling you otherwise.
In Polish the verb “studiować” (to study) is used almost exclusively when referring to higher education, as in “I studied psychology at Harvard.” – Studiowałam psychologię na Harvardzie. (no, not really, I’m not that ambitious.)


But a sentence such as: “I’ve been studying Polish for two years” can be translated into Polish as “Uczę się (języka) polskiego od dwóch lat.” So for today, we’ll stick with “to study – uczyć się”, OK?

And see what happened above?

The “been ing whatever” (I’ve been studying Polish by myself) became simply “Uczę się polskiego od dwóch lat” in Polish.

By the way, here’s a little something worth remembering. In English we say “for two years” while the Polish equivalent is “od dwóch lat”, which when translated back to English means “since two years.” Which explains why plenty of Poles say it like that when speaking English.

And how about “I study Polish when I have time.”?
Uczę się polskiego kiedy mam czas.

See, again just a regular present tense in Polish. Nothing fancy.

So how about “I’m studying Polish, be quiet.”?
Uczę się polskiego, bądź cicho.


And again the “ing something something” became the same old boring present tense in Polish.

And voila! My friend was absolutely correct. And it only took her 15 seconds to explain this issue. Man, I have a lot to learn… Now, what kind of cake should I buy? I’m thinking “drożdżowka” (yeast cake).

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