Polish/Basic grammar

Introduction to verbs and conjugation Perfective vs Imperfective Each Polish verb is either perfective or imperfective. Basically, perfective verbs imply completion, while imperfective verbs imply an ongoing action with no sense of completion. Perfective verbs are sometimes created by adding a prefix (do-, na-, od-, po-, prze-, przy-, s-, u-, w-, wy-, z-, za-) to an imperfective verb, but not always - the prefix might also change the meaning slightly (e.g., "pisać" means "to write" and "napisać" - "to have written", but "przepisać" means "to rewrite" or "to copy the writing"). Example: czytać The verb czytać has a very typical conjugation. Many (but not all) verbs ending in -ać conjugate in this way. czytać, meaning "to read", is an imperfective verb. For now, we only look at the present tense: Subject Pronoun (optional) Conjugated verb Translation 1st person ja czytam I am reading / I read 2nd person ty czytasz You (singular) are reading / You read 3rd person on / ona / ono czyta He/she/it is reading / He/she/it reads 1st person, plural my czytamy We are reading / We read 2nd person, plural wy czytacie You (plural) are reading / You read 3rd person, plural oni / one czytają They are reading / They read In modern Polish, there is no grammatical difference between "W tej chwili czytam książkę." - I am reading a book right now - and "Codziennie czytam gazetę." - I read (the) paper every day. Exercises Polish/Exercises - Introductory conjugation Przeczytać means "to have read". Polish does have an equivalent of the present perfect, but it may seem a bit unclear to an English speaker. Don't worry, there is a hidden logic to it. Remember that perfective verbs imply completion, so Przeczytam książkę means "I will read the book (and finish)." In other words, "I will have read the entire book (in the future)." Note that, like in Spanish and Italian, subject pronouns (ja, ty, on, my, wy, oni) are usually omitted because they are redundant. Let's try conjugating this verb (Click "▼" to check your answer): I will have read (the entire book) Przeczytam To one person: You will have read (the entire book) Przeczytasz She/he will have read (the entire book) Przeczyta We will have read (the entire book) Przeczytamy To a group of people: You will have read (the entire book) Przeczytacie They will have read (the entire book) Przeczytają kupować Other ować verbs will follow this pattern. kupować (to buy) is an imperfective verb. This is how you conjugate it: Subject Pronoun Conjugated verb Translation 1st person Ja kupuję I am buying / I buy 2nd person Ty kupujesz You (singular) are buying / You buy 3rd person On / Ona / Ono kupuje He/she/it is buying / He/she/it buys 1st person, plural My kupujemy We are buying / We buy 2nd person, plural Wy kupujecie You (plural) are buying / You buy 3rd person, plural Oni / One kupują They are buying / They buy As you can see, it's quite regular. Exercises Polish/Exercises - Introductory conjugation Let's try conjugating a verb of the same type. However, our chosen verb narysować (to have drawn a picture) happens to be a perfective verb. Therefore, when you conjugate it, you get the future tense. Ok, let's start conjugating. I will have drawn Ja narysuję To one person: You will have drawn Narysujesz He will have drawn On narysuje We will have drawn Narysujemy To a group of people: You will have drawn Narysujecie They will have drawn Narysują Introduction to declension Polish has seven cases. Here's the basic idea - you should be familiar with it if you studied Latin at school: The nominative case (lat. nominativus, pl. mianownik) - this is the "basic" form of a noun you'll find in the dictionary. In a sentence it serves as the subject: The man went to the store. The genitive case (lat. genetivus, pl. dopełniacz) - this is the possessive case (in English you just add 's. Believe me or not, the 's is the vestige of more complicated declension English used to have). Besides, the genitive is used for the direct object in negative sentences: A country's citizens must defend its honour. I did not buy the car. The dative case (lat. dativus, pl. celownik) indicates the indirect object of a verb (To whom? or For whom?): We told her the truth. The man gave his daughter a book. I made them dinner. The accusative case (lat. accusativus, pl. biernik) - in sentences, noun in accusative is the direct object of an action: I bought the car. The instrumental case (lat. instrumentalis, pl. narzędnik) tells us with which? or how? an action is performed: He shot it with the gun. The locative case (in Latin this case merged with ablativus, pl. miejscownik) indicates a location of something/someone: I live in China. The vocative case (lat. vocativus, pl. wołacz) is for directly addressing a person: Professor, are you O.K.? Exercises Exercises - What case should I use? Which case should we use for the word or words in red? He lured the animal with bait. nominative He lured the animal with bait. accusative He lured the animal with bait. instrumental We told her the whole story. dative We told her the whole story. accusative I wrote a long letter to my aunt. accusative I wrote a long letter to my aunt. dative He did not win the race. genitive I found the kittens a new home. dative The tiger lives in a zoo. locative That's the neighbor's cat. genitive You idiot, why'd you do that! vocative His computer is very old. nominative We gave him the money. dative