The particle 嘛 (ma) is a sentence-final particle identical in pronunciation to the simple "yes/no question" particle 吗 (ma) you learned back in the day, but with a rather different function. It can be used when the speaker feels what he is saying is obvious (from his point of view).
Tag: Chinese Grammar
Chinese grammar: For with 为wei
When you work for a company, or do other sorts of physical (and even mental) activities for another party, you're likely to use the Chinese preposition 为 (wèi), which is often translated into English as "for," a translation which is often unnatural or unnecessary, depending on the particular phrase. The super common Mao-era phrase, 为人民服务 ("serve the people"), doesn't need the word "for" in English, for example.
Chinese grammar: Change of state with 了le
了 (le) has a lot of uses. You probably first learned 了 as a particle that tells you an action is completed, which is also known as 了1. This article is not about that use of 了; it's about indicating a change of state (了2). In other words, there is now a new situation, or there is about to be a new situation. This whole "change of state" idea can take numerous forms, so it's helpful to view them individually, alongside some English translations.
Chinese grammar: Aspect particle 着zhe
The particle 着 (zhe) is one way of indicating the continuous aspect in Mandarin Chinese (another common way is using the adverb 在 in front of verbs). You may have heard that the Chinese particle 着 added onto the end of verbs is similar to the use of -ing in English. This isn't particularly helpful, however, because the use of 着 in Chinese is not nearly so frequent, and can also be quite idiomatic.
Chinese grammar: Sequencing past events with houlai后来
"…, 后来…" (…, hòulái…) is used to sequence past events in the same way that "Afterward…" is in English. Something very important to note is that 后来 can only be used with two events that have already occurred in Chinese grammar.
Chinese grammar: ever since with yilai以来
There are a few ways to express "ever since" in Chinese. In English, we would say something like "ever since I came to Shanghai, my Chinese has improved a lot." In this article, we will first take a look at using 以来 (yǐlái) to mean "ever since". We will also take a quick look at using "ever since" with 来 （lái), which is similar but used in a somewhat different way.
Chinese grammar: Before and after with zhiqian之前 and zhihou之后
Before and after can be expressed using 之前 (zhīqián) and 之后 (zhīhòu). They are in relatively the same vein as 以前/以后, except that these two are adverbs, while 之前/之后 is a preposition. Don't forget that these two are talking about before and after in terms of time.
Chinese grammar: “otherwise” with “yaobu” 要不
要不 (yào bù) can have a number of meanings depending on how it is used. It means giving alternatives, Indicating cause and effect
Chinese grammar: in addition with haiyou还有
"还有" (háiyǒu) is used to express "In addition…" in a conversation. It is introducing new information to the topic the speaker(s) is/are talking about. While it's not the most challenging grammar structure, an important thing to keep in mind is that 还有 starts a completely new sentence or clause.
Chinese grammar: “lai” used to connect two verb phrases
The word 来 (lái) can be used to connect two verb phrases, relating the actions to each other in Chinese grammar. It can be translated as "in order to" or "so that" and it can help in explaining reasoning.
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