Persian Lesson 72 - Some questions

Salam! Khosh amadid!

Today, we have got some questions to answer. Let’s try these questions together first.

Question: In lesson 20 when i was doing useful drills i encountered a problem ie .

He jumped on his bicycle –the translation is not thru previous rule .Here verb is just after pronoun. can u plz explain it to me the reason….??

Answer: You are right. The rule is a bit, and not too much, broken! Remember, in translation, we should always keep an eye on the context. It is the context that tells us which style, for example, we should use.We cannot and should not translate a comedy into a formal speech format. That’s true with Oral and Written form of the text. This is very important, especially in Persian, to differentiate these two kinds of speech in our translations. In lesson 20, the scenario is rather Oral-based. In persian, verbs usually appear in sentences as you see in this lesson when the text is conversational. Even the conversational stories that appear in English without any major changes in their style, should be translated into Oral – based speech not into a book-style method in Persian. In this lesson, I just tried to use a different text to make your mind familiar with such structures. I just hoped you would follow the structure to get acquainted to it without facing problems! Anyway, that text is oral based.

Question: I understand the idea in lesson 14 of using plural ‘you’ instead of singular to show more respect. I sort of get using 3rd person plural instead of 3rd singular for ‘he’ or ‘she.’ I just need to make sure that I’m supposed to use the 3rd plural verb ending when the subject of the sentence is ‘my brother,’ or ‘my friend.’ Is that correct?

Answer: I cannot issue a general rule for this. It mostly depends on the sentence. However, you are allowed to use both plural and singular verbs in your sentences when you have a sentence with a ‘third person” subject.

Example:

Mr. X can = /a:gha: ye X mitæva:nænd/ in formal or written form. OR /a:gha: ye X mitæva:næd/ , which can be used in the same way as the above one. OR /a:gha; ye X mitu:næn/, which is polite and plural but conversational. OR /a:gha: ye X mitu:neh/, which is less polite and rather friendly style, conversational and singular verb.

I hope you are not confused! (You asked for it!!).

Question: I am unsure of which verbs you use with the subject+time+object+verb order. You mentioned in one lesson that /beh…dast zaedaen/ uses it, but then it seems in some of the useful drills that other verbs use this construction as well. I would be grateful if you could confirm that the following verbs (accompanied by the useful drills in which I found them) use this construction:

/neveshtaen/ (Useful Drills 18 #4-6)

/beh…raeftaen/ (Useful Drills 19, #1 & #2)

/beh…dast zaedaen/ (Useful Drills 19 #10)

Answer: Well, another trouble seeker and maker!! Frankly, I myself, don’t know the exact number of such verbs! (Don’t tell anybody!). This is not necessary. Do you still remember my English grammar teacher? I don’t want to be like that!! We just use words in contexts; and whenever we face a different word, I will tell you. I think this seems better than memorizing lots of words without knowing how to use them. Currently the above mentioned verbs are confirmed!

Question: This is a question about writing. First of all, when you use /ha:/ to make a word plural, is /ha:/ a separate word or part of the word you are making plural? For instance, is /baech:cheh ha:/ one or two words? Also, In the useful drills section of Lesson 20, you have written /tu:pha:/ with the /pe/ and the /he/ connected, but you have written /ba:dkonaek ha:/ with the /ka:f/ and the /he/ not connected. Why is that?

Answer: Good question! /ha:/ is a plural maker (not a trouble maker!! just a joke!) like “s” in English. Book – Books. You may consider it a suffix. In writing, you may either attach or separate it from the main word. The reason I have not separated /tu:p/ and /ha:/ in /tu:pha:/ is that this combination is not confusing when you want to read it. However, in /ba:dkonæk ha:/, I have purposely separated them because the combination of /k/ and /h/ produces /kh/ sound as in Spanish Jose. To avoid this, I have separated them. You know, there are many students who, due to some reasons, are not able to listen to the sound files. So, I have to keep them in my mind as well.

Thank you very much for all your attention and questions. I hope you have found your answers now.

All right, now let’s do the quiz first and then go to Useful Drills page.

Quiz:

1- Listen to the audio files first (preferably once). Repeat it for a couple of times. Write it down on a paper. Find their English equivalents. (Seen)

One

Two

Three

2- Find the English equivalent for the following words and make four sentences with each of them (one in simple past tense, one in present perfect tense using ‘for’, one in simple future tense, and one in past perfect tense).

3- Say these numbers in Persian:

4- Follow the examples, combine the letters, and make words using the given letters. You’ll have to change the big letters into the small ones whenever needed.

Friend <= /du:st/ < ==