In today's video lesson we’ll learn how to use the two forms of reduplication of Verbs in Chinese. We'll also know how to use measure words for Action Verbs appropriately.
The structure of Reduplication of Verbs in Chinese indicates that
In conversations, the Reduplication of Verbs are commonly used to
The logic here is that, by indicating that the action will only cost a short amount of time and effort, the request of anticipation would be a relatively easy thing to do. Therefore, it should be easier to accept.
The Verbs are reduplicated in this way:
(1) For one-syllable verbs, V, there are two forms
Verbs | Reduplication of Verbs | |
V
|
VVThe Second V in Netral Tone |
V一V一 in Neutral Tone |
xiǎng 想 |
xiǎngxiang 想想 |
xiǎng yi xiǎng 想一想 |
kàn 看 |
kàn kan 看看 |
kàn yi kàn 看一看 |
wèn 问 |
wèn wen 问问 |
wèn yi wèn 问一问 |
(2) For two-syllable verbs, Vv, the form is
Verbs | Reduplication of Verbs | |
Vv |
VvVv |
|
yùndòng 运动 |
yùndòng yùndòng 运动运动 |
|
xiūxi 休息 |
xiūxi xiūxi 休息休息 |
|
jièshào 介绍 |
jièshào jièshào 介绍介绍 |
Reduplication of Verbs are commonly used in Chinese conversations. For example,
In Chinese, Measure Words for Action Verbs(See also Types of Verbs in Chinese) are usually there to measure how many times an action has been done. There are only a limited amount of them and in today's lesson we'll use three:
Just like Measure Words for Nouns and Nouns Phrases [(I), (II) and (III)], Measure Words for action Verbs can be used following (1) a number, (2) pronouns 这zhè, 那nà, 每měi, or (3) question pronouns 哪nǎ, 几jǐ, 多少duōshao
For example,
NOTE: ① when the number before a Measure Word is 一, it can be omitted.
下 is to measure how many times a general action has been done as well, but using 下 indicates that the action only costs a short amount of time and/or a little bit of effort. Most of the times, it’s used with number 一 in the structure V一下.
For example,
Also, because it indicates “short amount of time”, 一下 can also be used in the same way that Reduplication of Verb are used, to soften the tone of a request or the expression of one’s own anticipation.
For example the following two sentences have the same meaning
你能告诉我一下吗?
I just noticed 一下 is here after object, not verb.
Not sure if this is a mistake or not
Thank you for bringing this up. Many times, for a grammatical rule, there can be exceptions and this is an example. 我 is a Personal Pronoun, so the order is “你能告诉我一下吗”.
And also many times, it is very difficult to include every exception when introducing a new grammatical structure. Most of the time, following the rule is a safe way to avoid making mistake. But the more we know about the language, the more we will be able to notice these exceptions and be able to use them in our own communication.
Thank you
你能告诉一下我吗 is also correct?
“你能告诉一下我吗” is not grammatically correct.
Video 2:00 Note that if the 1st character in the VV form is in the 3rd tone, it changes to the 2nd tone in speech
This is really confusing since 2nd character already changed to neutral tone, so there are 2 rules for tones applying at the same time here?
Sorry for the confusion. Yes the Tone changes are like this:
想 – original Pinyin: xiǎng
想想 – written Pinyin: xiǎngxiang / actual pronunciation: xiángxiang