{"id":3296,"date":"2019-11-10T07:04:38","date_gmt":"2019-11-10T07:04:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chinesemoment.com\/chinese-grammar\/chinese-grammar-rules-5-general-rules-for-chinese-grammar\/"},"modified":"2019-11-10T07:04:38","modified_gmt":"2019-11-10T07:04:38","slug":"chinese-grammar-rules-5-general-rules-for-chinese-grammar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinesemoment.com\/my\/chinese-grammar-rules-5-general-rules-for-chinese-grammar\/","title":{"rendered":"Chinese grammar rules: 5 general rules for Chinese grammar"},"content":{"rendered":"
Whilst it’s im<\/em>portant to learn grammar in detail in small chunks, it can be very useful to get familiar with some general Chinese grammar rules. These aren’t specific grammatical structures, but general facts a<\/em>bout the Chinese language that apply in most cases. They can help you get a feel for Mandarin Chinese and how it works.<\/p>\n

Chinese grammar rule #1: What precedes modifies what follows<\/p>\n

This rule sounds a little bit complicated when you first see it, but it’s actually quite straightforward. It simply means that modifiers come before the thing they modify. The Chinese language, right through from the written classical language to the modern spoken vernacular, has always had this rule.<\/p>\n

Let’s look at some simple examples to demo<\/em>nstrate this rule.<\/p>\n

\u4ed6\u4e0d\u559c\u6b22\u8d35\u7684 \u4e1c\u897f\u3002
T\u0101 bù x\u01d0huan guì de d\u014dngxi.
He doesn’t like expensive things.
\u6211\u54e5\u54e5\u6162\u6162\u5730 \u5f00\u8f66\u3002
W\u01d2 g\u0113g\u0113 mànmande k\u0101ich\u0113.
My brother drives slowly .
\u5979\u80fd\u559d\u5f88\u591a \u5564\u9152\u3002
T\u0101 néng h\u0113 h\u011bndu\u014d píji\u01d4.
She can drink a lot of beer.
As you can see in each of the Chinese sentences, the modifier (colored red) comes before the thing it modifies. \u8d35\u7684 (expensive) comes before \u4e1c\u897f (things), \u6162\u6162\u5730 (slowly) comes before \u5f00\u8f66 (drive) and \u5f88\u591a (a lot of) comes before \u5564\u9152 (beer). Notice how the position of the modifier varies in the English sentences.<\/p>\n

Knowing a<\/em>bout this ‘modifiers first’ rule in Chinese grammar can be very helpful in the early stages of your Chinese studies. It lets you follow the structure of sentences more quickly because you can identify modifiers (adjectives and adverbs) and the things they’re modifying (nouns and verbs) more easily.<\/p>\n

It also lets you form sentences with more co<\/em>nfidence because you know that adjectives should be placed before the nouns they modify, and adverbs should be placed before the verbs they modify.<\/p>\n

Rule #2: Words do not change<\/p>\n

Unlike in European languages, words in Chinese do not change. They have a fixed form that is the same no matter what they’re used for or wher the appear in a sentence. In Chinese, you don’t co<\/em>njugate verbs and you don’t make adjectives agree. According to Chinese grammar rules, a word is a word.<\/p>\n

Have a look at these examples that illustrate this point:<\/p>\n

\u5979\u53bb\u5de5\u4f5c\u3002
T\u0101 qù g\u014dngzuò.
She goes to work.
\u6211\u53bb\u5de5\u4f5c\u3002
W\u01d2 qù g\u014dngzuò.
I go to work.
\u4ed6\u4eec\u53bb\u5de5\u4f5c\u3002
T\u0101men qù g\u014dngzuò.
They go to work.
\u6211\u4eec\u53bb\u5de5\u4f5c\u3002
W\u01d2men qù g\u014dngzuò.
We go to work.
These simple sentences show that verbs do not change in Chinese, wheras they do in English. The verb \u53bb (qù) is the same in every sentence and doesn’t change. These sentences would be even more varied in a language like French, but in Chinese the verb is the same every time.<\/p>\n

It’s not just verbs that never change according to Chinese grammar rules. Adjectives are also fixed in their form and are the same no matter what noun they modify. Let’s see some examples:<\/p>\n

\u8fd9\u662f\u4e00\u8f86\u9ed1\u8272\u7684 \u8f66\u3002
Zhè shì y\u012b liàng h\u0113isède j\u016b.
This is a black car.
\u6211\u770b\u5230\u4e86\u4e00\u4e9b\u9ed1\u8272\u7684 \u732b\u3002
W\u01d2 kàn dàole y\u012bxi\u0113 h\u0113isède m\u0101o.
I saw some black cats.
\u8fd9\u662f\u4e00\u4ef6\u9ed1\u8272\u7684 \u886c\u886b\u3002
Zhè shì y\u012b jiàn h\u0113isède chènsh\u0101n.
This is a black shirt.
The adjective in these sentences, \u9ed1\u8272\u7684 (h\u0113isède) , is the same for each of the items. There is no gender or grammatical number in Chinese grammar rules.<\/p>\n

Rule #3: Chinese is topic-prominent<\/p>\n

This is a rule that English-speakers often find hard to get used to. Chinese is topic prominent. This means that it puts the thing the sentence is a<\/em>bout first. English is subject prominent, which means that it puts the doer of an action (the subject) in a sentence first.<\/p>\n

If you haven’t studied grammar before, you might not be familiar with these terms. The subject in a sentence is the thing that performs the action of the verb. The subject of the following sentences is colored red:<\/p>\n

He likes cheese.
You are awesome.
New York is exciting.
We eat rice.
English and other European languages usually prefer to put the subject first, as you can see in the sentences above. But Chinese and other East Asian languages often prefer to put the topic of the sentence first.<\/p>\n

The topic of a sentence isn’t as clear as the subject. The topic is not a grammatical role, but the thing that the sentence is a<\/em>bout. It’s the main point of the sentence. It’s also called the theme of the sentence for this reason.<\/p>\n

I’ve finished my work .
In this sentence the subject is “I”, but that’s not really what the sentence is a<\/em>bout. The sentence is not a<\/em>bout the speaker, it’s a<\/em>bout the work. So the topic of this sentence is “the work”.<\/p>\n

Because Chinese is topic-prominent, it’s often possible and very natural to put the topic first in a sentence rather than the subject. It is also possible in English, but it sounds much less natural, as you can see in the following examples:<\/p>\n

\u7ea2\u9152\u6211\u4e0d\u592a\u559c\u6b22\u3002
Hóngji\u01d4 w\u01d2 bù tài x\u01d0huan.
Red wine, I don’t really like.
\u6cd5\u56fd\u6211\u6ca1\u53bb\u8fc7\u3002
Fàguó w\u01d2 méi qùguò.
France, I haven’t been to.
\u4e00\u652f\u7b14\u6709\u5417\uff1f
Y\u012b zh\u012b b\u01d0 y\u01d2u ma?
A pen – got one?
The sentences above are perfectly permissible according to Chinese grammar rules, but quite odd in English. Note that you could also form the Chinese sentences with the subject first and they would be just as grammatical.<\/p>\n

Also notice that the last sentence doesn’t include the subject (you) at all. This is possible because Chinese grammar is primarily interested in the topic (a pen) and not the subject.<\/p>\n

Rule #4: Aspect, not tense<\/p>\n

Another big difference between European languages and Chinese is aspect and tense. European languages usually indicate both of these things in a sentence, wheras Chinese tends to o<\/em>nly indicates aspect.<\/p>\n

Again, you might not be aware of what these terms mean. Tense is a<\/em>bout when an action took place relative to now, when we’re speaking. Aspect is a<\/em>bout the completeness of an action relative to when it took place. Have a look at these two sentences in English to see the difference:<\/p>\n

I will set off to Beijing.
I will have set off to Beijing.
Both of these sentences are in the future tense. But the aspect is different, because the completeness of the action (setting off to Beijing) is different in the time f<\/em>rame of each sentence. The speaker hasn’t yet set off to Beijing in either sentence. In the time f<\/em>rame they’re speaking a<\/em>bout in the second sentence, though, they will have. So the aspect is different (the action is complete in that time f<\/em>rame).<\/p>\n

How Chinese marks for aspect is difficult and quite complex. It revolves around a few particles, most im<\/em>portantly \u4e86 (le), but we won’t go into details of that here. The lesson here is to bear in mind that Chinese doesn’t mark for tense, but it does mark for aspect. This will take some getting used to, but you will get there eventually!<\/p>\n

Rule #5: Chinese is logical<\/p>\n

Finally, we come to the most general rule a<\/em>bout Chinese grammar. One of the joys of studying Chinese is that on the whole it’s a very logical, co<\/em>nsistent language. This is very true in Chinese vocabulary, as you can usually see very clearly the logic behind most words. It’s also true in Chinese grammar rules, which tend to be co<\/em>nsistent and reusable o<\/em>nce you’ve learned them.<\/p>\n

One example of this is that Chinese tends to o<\/em>nly indicate things o<\/em>nce in a sentence. For example, if the time has already been made clear, it doesn’t need to be indicated again. Similarly, the number of a noun o<\/em>nly needs to indicated o<\/em>nce in most cases. More of these examples crop up as you get further into the language. Try to bear this point in mind and you will often find that you can guess how to say new things with some accuracy.<\/p>\n

That rounds up this short list of Chinese grammar rules, which aims to give a very generalized feel for how the language works. If you’d like to get into further, have a browse around this site!
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