You have probably heard it time and again – With commitment and daily practice, it is certainly possible to speak Chinese fluently, but you still feel at sea. One of the reasons is that you may not know the structure of Chinese language.
Chinese is a language that focuses on the meaning. If you compare it with English, you will find that it is very common to see a long English sentence which is organized by certain grammar rules. While in Chinese you can only find short sentences or long sentences divided to short phrases.
Having said that, it doesn’t mean Chinese has no grammar. In fact, Chinese is a highly pattern-based language that needs grammar exercises. And knowing these structures will enable you to converse more efficiently in Chinese.
The golden rule is: Subject + When + Where + How + Action + Complement
These components of the structure don’t necessarily come together in a single sentence. Most often, we only see part of the whole structure. In the following, we will introduce the top 5 basic and most commonly-used sentence patterns in Chinese.
1. Subject + Verb + Object
This is the easiest type of sentence in Chinese grammar. The word order is normally the same as in English. E.g.
他是英国人。
He is British.
杰克喜欢足球。
Jack likes football.
埃及有金字塔。
There are Pyramids is Egypt.
We can put “不” or “没有” before the verb to express a negative meaning and “吗” at the end of the sentence to form questions. E.g.
他不是英国人。
He is not British.
中国没有金字塔。
There are not Pyramids in China.
杰克喜欢足球吗？
Does Jack like football?
2. Subject + Verb + Direct Object + Indirect Object
In order to express “She teaches me Chinese”, we need to add two objects after the verb. The direct object represents what is being transferred as a result of the action, and the indirect object denotes who is being affected by that action. As in the example, “me” plays the role of a “direct object” and “Chinese” plays the role of an “indirect object”.
Besides “教” (to teach), other verbs that can occur with indirect objects include “给” (to give), “告诉” (to tell), “借” (to lend), etc.
请给我一杯咖啡。
Please give me a cup of coffee.
她告诉我一个秘密。
She told me a secret.
你能借我你的车吗？
Can you lend me your car?
3. Subject + Time When + Verb + Object
To express when an action or an event occurs, we can put the time words immediately after the subject. One difference from English is that Chinese doesn’t need a preposition before the time words. E.g. “She got up at 7 in the morning.” is translated as “她早上七点起床。”
More examples:
他们明天要去美国。
They will go to the United States tomorrow.
我的朋友昨天来西安了。
My friends came to Xi’an yesterday.
4. Subject + Verb + Complement
A complement is a word or phrase following the verb. In Chinese, a complement has a variety of functions, such as showing the duration, place, degree, result, direction or possibility of an action. E.g.
他每天工作八个小时。
He works eight hours everyday.
我的哥哥住在上海。
My brother lives in Shanghai.
你听得清楚吗？
Can you hear well?
啤酒，他喝完了。
He has drunk all the beer.
5. Topic + Comment
In the last example “啤酒，他喝完了”, “喝” is the verb, “啤酒” is the object. You might be wondering: According to “Subject + Verb + Object”, should object not come after “喝”? That’s a good question! In Chinese, objects can be moved to the beginning of a sentence where it becomes the topic. And following that topic is a comment or statement. This is done in order to keep balance of the sentence or to put an emphasis. E.g.
今天的工作，你做完了吗？
Have you finished today’s work?
早饭，你吃了吗？
Did you eat breakfast?
明天的聚会，我不想去了。
I don’t feel liking going to tomorrow’s party.