Language / Is czarnoskóry acceptable? [21]


The media didn't mention he's skin color because it matters for them, but because it used to matter for Americans. So they were just saying: Look, America is changing.

That's all.

And a word about political correctness. We (Poles and many other nations) don't need to feel the same guilt that Americans feel because of enslaving black people in the past. So don't extend your political corectness to our language. It's your guilt and your expiation. Not ours.

Cinek

Language / 'much better' expression in Polish? [8]


What? Of course there is difference between much and more in Polish: dużo - więcej.
I think you were thinking about much / many.

Cinek

Language / Maria, what is the Polish form? [30]

No. Marynia is a diminutive of Maryna which is a dfferent name , of probably the same origin though.

Cinek

Language / "Idę do kolegi." - Polish prepositions/and translation [17]


This desn't translate as 'Ide...'
the translation will be:

Wkurza mnie kiedy on śpiewa tę piosenkę.

'Go nuts' is an idiom, and cannot be translated literally.

Cinek

Language / "Idę do kolegi." - Polish prepositions/and translation [17]

Those should be translated as: Chodzę do szkoły codziennie, Chodzę na zakupy co tydzień, Jeżdżę na nartach zimą.
I think there's no example when idę means I go. It always translates as I'm going.

Cinek

Language / Polish Swear Words [1242]


In Polish too.

Cinek

Language / What does 'inflected' mean? [4]


If words are inflected their endings change according to case, person, tense, etc. In Polish there are 7 cases and 5 persons that influence how nouns and adjectives look like i.e. they require applying appropriate endings to them. Similarily 3 tenses and things like aspect and mood influence verbs (their endings and also used prefixes).

This subject is very well explained in Wikipedia.

Cinek

Language / The meaning of some Polish Diminutives [23]

You must remember that diminutives in Polish have also additional meaning. They are used to express some kind of affection, especially when used by lovers, or when talking to children. Using them for verbs usually doesn't add any information (like fast, faster etc.) but just indicate the affection towards the listener.

Sometimes this kind of speech is also used just to sound more polite (personally I don't like it).

Cinek

Language / When do you use 'się'? And what does it mean? [37]


Yes, but there are also some verbs that require 'się' for no abvious reson. Those just must be memorized. e.g.:

śmiać się, smucić się, cieszyć się, pocić się, najeść się, napić się, wyspać się itp.

Of course one could find an explanation for them in history of the language, but it's not what an average user o the language needs to know.

Cinek

Language / Present tense, past tense, past participle in polish [34]


Gdy przyszłam, mój mąż przygotował obiad.
Zanim przyszłam, mój mąż przygotował obiad.

Some people would also say (for the latter):

Gdy przyszłam, mój mąż miał już przygotowany obiad.

but I'm not sure if this is a correct construction, since it looks more like a borrowing from German or English. However it's quite common in my area (west Poland).

Cinek

Language / When to use: Znać/Wiedzieć & lub/albo [23]


Not in todays coloquial speech, but you can find some in poetry or old songs:

Tra la la Antek na harmonii gra.
Tra la la on przebierać klawo zna.
Tra la la baw się bracie póki czas,
Skoroś dzisiaj na zabawę,
Do nas tutaj wlazł.

here: zna = potrafi

btw.

What about "znać się na czymś" ?

Cinek

Travel / Visiting "naklo nad notecia" in Poland [10]


Why not? Krajan is still being brewed there and you can buy it in every pub there (I drank it last month in Spedycja).

Cinek

Travel / Visiting "naklo nad notecia" in Poland [10]


No! The local beer is Krajan. Kujawiak is from Bydgoszcz.
I was born in Nakło and lived there for 25 years. Not very many 'must see' things there. It's just a quiet north west Poland town with big unemployment.

See photos in panoramio:
panoramio.com/map/#lt=53.1417565&ln=17.6018342&z=4&k=2

Cinek

Language / udać, udać się "confusion" [5]


Hmm, I don't know anything like that. You can use 'udać się' with a verb which means 'to succeed' e.g.:

Udało mi się to narysować - I succeeded in drawing it.

When you mean 'udać się' as 'to go' you must always include the direction, which will be a noun preceded by a preposition (like do, na, w kierunku, ku, etc.) e.g.

Udał się do domu - He went home.

You can only use 'udać' (not udać się) with a noun, which means 'to pretend' or 'to act' e.g.

Udawał głupka - he acted the fool.

Cinek

Cinek

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]


I have read this whole thread and I think your main problem is that you're trying to see a language as a set of words that can be translated one to one between diferent languages. This is definitely wrong. You must understand that a language is more like a 'way of thinking' and words are just tools to express it. There are some elements in every language which are more important and some that are less (or even not existent at all) e.g. in Polish there are things like verb aspect, noun gender, cases, making new words by prefixing, which are completely unknown for an English speaking people. And, what's worse, those things are crucial elements of the language.

So, first of all, stop translating single words and read a book which explains the phylosophy of the language (i.e. the grammar). You must be prapared for learning not new words (because they can be always easily found in a dictionary) but new logical concepts which must be 'felt' before you can start making proper use of the words.

Cinek

Language / It is not possible to translate names into English or Polish! [52]


There's also a village "Jaszcz" in north-west Poland. I also heard this word to mean 'bushes' (more often 'chaszcze')

Cinek

Language / ch - antychryst - chłeb [13]


Do you mean that Polish h sound is not a h sound ? So what is it? How much h sound in h sound is needed so it can be a h sound ?

Cinek

Language / Polish nouns of unpredictable gender [50]


I found one: Gołdap. There may be also other names of towns or villages.

Language / Polish nouns of unpredictable gender [50]


yes, this is what my reply was about :-)

Language / Polish nouns of unpredictable gender [50]


"kmieć" yes, but "berbeć" can be either a boy or a girl.


Yes, but remember that the -u words don't decline in Polish, so people woud tend to use it with a 'declinable' word (like in the 'gnu' - 'antylopa gnu' example). In such cases the auxiliary word would imply the gender.

Cinek

Language / Polish nouns of unpredictable gender [50]


ekspansywność, mość and przewielebność are feminine


kmieć, dziegieć, śmieć, Turkuć Podjadek, kapeć, pypeć, berbeć


Most speakers would say just 'anylopa gnu' which would be feminine (antylopa). But if you want to say just 'gnu' then yes, it's neuter.

Cinek

Language / ch - antychryst - chłeb [13]


I hear clearly 'h' not 'k' here. Maybe soemthing's wrong with your speakers? Are you using headphones or loudspeakers? Try with another ones.

Cinek

Language / ch - antychryst - chłeb [13]

In Polish 'ch' is always pronounced 'h' and never 'k' . If you hear something else then it is definitely a language error or just poor quality audio.

Cinek

Language / 'MOZNA' - When is this used? [27]


Not exactly. It can be used in such contexts, but for better understanding it'd translate it like: Is it allowed? or Is it possible? or Is it doable? It may also be used to answer there questions like:

(Czy) Można? (Tak,) można. Is it allowed? Yes, it is.

Gramatically, it is so called 'predykatyw' (not sure if it can be translated as 'predivative', because Wikipedia defines it a bit differently).
These words work in sentences as verbs, but are not verbs (i.e. they do not conjugate), and are used to describe some 'general state', not someone actions.

There are quite a few in Polish. e.g. można, trzeba, wiadomo, widać, słychać. They form tenses by using an auxiliary verb 'być' in the appropriate tense. E.g.:

Present Można - it is allowed to...
Past Można było (or było można) = it was allowed to...
Future Można będzie (or będzie można) = it will be allowed to...

They are a little similar in their function to adverbs, and historically they probably were adverbs.

Cinek

Language / A Polish female name (anna) [18]


Maybe it was Joanna? There's nothing like ulanna in Polish (but 'ulana', which may mean completely drunk ;-) ).

Cinek

Po polsku / Staram się polepszać się po polsku :) [85]

Mam zamiar nauczyć się polskiego, ale jeszcze muszę często korzystać z pomocy słownika i Google.

btw. the name 'Google' is getting polonised more and more so you can often find it declined like Googla, Googlami etc. Though it's hard to give the strict rule for creating the Polish cases of this word, but I observe that 2 diferent approaches are common.

1. 'Google' pronounced as 'gugle' which sounds as a pl masc. word, so the cases are created as:
M google
D googli
C googlom
B google
N googlami
Mc googlach
W google

2. 'Google' pronounced as "gugel' (or gugl) which sounds as sng. masc word, so the cases are created as:
M google
D googla
C googlowi
B googla
N googlem
Mc googlu
W googlu

Cinek

Language / Funny/strange/deviant words in the Polish language [35]


Not only this one...

Language / Funny/strange/deviant words in the Polish language [35]


'Rower' (bicycle) is derived from name of a manufacturer of bicycles (Rover).

Cinek

Genealogy / Why Polish aren't white?? [272]


That text is about history of Tatra region (some small part of Polish highlands), not Poland.
If you real want to learn history of Poland you can try on Wikipedia e.g.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Poland

Cinek

Language / in Polish slang, what is the difference between Siema and Siemka? [64]


Nothing but the sounding.


Of course, but please remember that what is allowed in talking between friends not always should be used in other situation.

I didn't want to say that you were any wrong with your examples. I just wanted to point out that the ending -izda may be not the best example for people learning Polish, and gave a much more common ending -cha as more useful.

Cinek