Saturday 5 January 2013

Ты и вы, ja i ty, teba a vás

Пустое вы сердечным ты
Она, обмолвясь, заменила,
И все счастливые мечты
В душе влюблённой возбудила. 
Пред ней задумчиво стою,
Свести очей с неё нет силы;
И говорю ей: как вы милы!
И мыслю: как тебя люблю.
- A.S. Pushkin -
Today I had an interesting discussion with a Slovak colleague of mine (who also speaks Swedish really well) about how to address people. 

In Finland and in Sweden, we tend to be very informal. I would never address anyone formally in Finnish or Swedish, unless it were an elderly, grumpy lady. 

In Slovakia – as in most of Europe – people are a lot more formal. No stranger would say “ty” to me (resulting in me feeling like that old grumpy lady). 
This topic led my thoughts to Slovak declension of personal pronouns. I copied the table from Wikipedia (yes, shame on me). 

As you can see (you Slavic speakers), there are similarities with both Russian and Polish. Also note that Slovak, very much like Polish, has a locative case.  

Personal pronouns
Nominative
ja
ty
on, ona, ono
my
vy
oni, ony

Genitive
ma (mňa)
ťa (teba)
ho (jeho, neho,-ňho, -ň), ju, ho (jeho, neho, -ňho, -ň)
nás
vás
ich (nich), ich (ne)

Dative
mne (mi)
tebe (ti)
mu (jemu, nemu,-ňmu), jej (nej), mu (jemu, nemu,-ňmu)
nám
vám
im (nim), im (nim)

Accusative
ma (mňa)
ťa (teba)
ho (jeho, neho, -ňho, -ň, -eň), ju, ho (-ň, -eň)
nás,
vás
ich (nich), ich (ne)

Locative
mne
tebe
ňom, nej, ňom
nás
vás
nich, nich

Instrumental
mnou
tebou
ním, ňou, ním
nami
vami
nimi, nimi

There is also the reflexive pronoun sa, which is declined as follows: N: -, G: seba, D: sebe /si, A: seba/sa, L: sebe, I: sebou

You know where this will be leading us, right? To the exciting world of… tadadda… cases. You have been warned Smile





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