Chinese for Europeans
学生Chinese for you Introductions

Explanations and Practice

1. The basic sentence structure in Chinese is

Subject + verb +object

In this sentence: „Wŏ shì Zhōngguó rén” – the subject is „wŏ”, the verb is „shì”, the object is „Zhōngguó rén”.

Good news: „shì” will be the same, no matter what the subject is! While in English we say „I am, you are, he is...” in Chinese we do not have different verb forms for different subjects.

Since verbs cannot be conjugated or change tenses in Chinese, word order is very important. It compensates for lack of other forms. So it is very important to follow the „SVO” word order.

 

2. 你叫什么名字？Nĭ jiào shénme míngzi? is a simple phrase which can be used to ask somebody‘s name. Literally, it means „You are called what name?“

The correct way to answer is 我叫 [your name] (Wŏ jiào…)

3. Names of nationalities are formed by adding the word 人 [rén] to the name of the country. So 中国人 Zhōngguó rén literally means “a person from China”.

Exercise 1

Adjust the equivalent in pinyin.

叫 -
名字 -
他 -
是 -
哪 -
国 -
人 -
再见 -

Exercise 2

Put these phrases in the correct order to form a dialogue.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.

Evaluate and comment this lesson

average evaluation for this lesson: 8.4

Latest comments

  • Massimo Imperiali
    14.05.2020 18:05
    ok
  • Massimo Imperiali
    29.04.2020 17:22
    ok
  • Massimo Imperiali
    29.04.2020 17:19
    avanti … !
  • Massimo Imperiali
    29.04.2020 17:11
    ok
  • Massimo Imperiali
    29.04.2020 17:10
    ok
  • Massimo Imperiali
    29.04.2020 17:09
    ok
  • Massimo Imperiali
    28.04.2020 22:50
    ancora commentare ???
  • Massimo Imperiali
    28.04.2020 22:47
    ok !
  • Massimo Imperiali
    28.04.2020 22:27
    100%
  • Massimo Imperiali
    28.04.2020 22:24
    100% ok !
  • Massimo Imperiali
    27.04.2020 06:24
    ok !
  • Massimo Imperiali
    27.04.2020 06:18
    explanations … ?
  • Massimo Imperiali
    27.04.2020 06:08
    ok !
  • Massimo Imperiali
    27.04.2020 06:04
    We begin …. :) !
  • Paweł Płachecki
    19.11.2019 20:32
    Good
  • Mike Leonard
    16.05.2019 19:03
    I could type all of this in Pyinyin
  • Ma Gabriela Jerez Medina
    13.07.2018 20:34
    Corto pero muy completo
  • syed Besharat
    16.08.2017 20:09
    Very Good And Helping for Everyone.
  • Alex Bouland
    11.06.2017 14:12
    Vraagje： 你是哪国人？ Kan het ook： 你是哪国人吗？
  • Farman Ullah
    12.04.2017 10:06
    That is very Good for me and I like it
  • R A, Dr.
    26.09.2016 12:14
    你是哪国人？ - does not mean exactly "wo kommst du her"..... misleading
  • R A, Dr.
    26.09.2016 12:13
    你好， 你叫什么名字？
    Nĭhăo, nĭ jiào shénme míngzi?

    If you want to speak with the German "Sie", then you shoud use 您, namely the polite form / "您 好"
  • Ashok Kulkarni
    01.09.2016 14:50
    Very nice
  • Bernard Orzech
    18.08.2016 05:20
    我叫 znaczy moje imie, a jest przetlumaczone w punkcie 2 jako twoje imie.
  • Roberto Stradaioli
    27.07.2015 20:25
    Bene ma nn sento nulla
  • Nils Phoenix
    27.04.2015 19:24
    你好， 你叫什么名字？
  • Agnieszka Mazur
    11.03.2015 16:37
    Super!
  • JOHN RILEY
    05.01.2015 18:39
    HAO;BIEN
  • reneja marn
    30.12.2014 19:07
    super
    veliko sem se naučila
  • reneja marn
    30.12.2014 19:06
    挺好
    hen hao
  • paolo gorli
    13.05.2014 13:34
    utile come inizio!
  • Milena Koleva
    20.04.2014 21:23
    Би било добре да се даде списък на европейските националности. Искам да мога да кажа на китайски, че съм от България.
  • Tatiana Maffei
    08.03.2014 10:31
    ..Lezione molto soddisfacente.
  • Graciela Sbertoli
    05.06.2013 20:55
    Ssorry, I'm working on my iPad and it doesn't work too well. Is there another version for mobile devices? And where are the sound files? I cannot seem to be able to access them...
  • Marius Lapė
    29.05.2013 09:44
    Dialoog on hästi kirjutatud.
  • Esztora Petőfi
    16.05.2013 13:50
    A párbeszéd érdekes.
  • Vaclav Vrana
    14.05.2013 10:44
    Toto je velmi dobře prezentované.
  • Blanka Slavik
    14.05.2013 09:24
    Ten slovníček je užitočný.
  • Donata Cazacu
    13.05.2013 09:21
    Exerciţii uşoare :)
  • Андрей Врабчев
    10.05.2013 12:45
    Добри записи. Това ми харесва.

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