Learn how to recognize an implied subject in Polish
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Intro |
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| Michael: Is it common to omit the subject in Polish sentences? |
| Igor: And why? |
| Michael: At PolishPod101.com, we hear these questions often. Imagine the following situation: Joanna Jabłońska and Aneta Adamska are trying to make plans for the weekend. |
| Michael: "Do [you] want to go to the cinema tomorrow?" |
| Joanna Jablonska: Chcesz iść jutro do kina? |
| Dialogue |
| Joanna Jablonska: Chcesz iść jutro do kina? |
| Aneta Adamska: Chcę. |
| Michael: Once more with the English translation. |
| Joanna Jablonska: Chcesz iść jutro do kina? |
| Michael: "Do [you] want to go to the cinema tomorrow?" |
| Aneta Adamska: Chcę. |
| Michael: "[I] want." |
Lesson focus |
| Michael: Omitting the subject or |
| Igor: podmiot |
| Michael: is possible in so-called "pro-drop languages." Pro-drop-languages are languages where omitting the pronoun, or the subject, doesn't affect the information conveyed by the sentence. Thus, you can see the subject being omitted, for instance, in Romance and Slavic languages, including Polish. It is not really possible, however, in English. Polish is not only a pro-drop, but also a null-subject language. This is because, in Polish, conjugated verbs contain the information that would be conveyed by subjects in other languages. Consequently, in many cases, the use of the subject would simply be redundant. |
| [Recall 1] |
| Michael: Let's take a closer look at the dialogue. |
| Do you remember how Joanna asks "Do [you] want to go to the cinema tomorrow?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Igor: Chcesz iść jutro do kina? |
| Michael: If we kept the subject "you" in this sentence, it would be: |
| Igor: Ty chcesz jutro iść do kina? |
| Michael: This sentence is correct too, but the meaning is a bit different. Because it's natural to drop a subject in Polish, you wouldn't use a subject here without a reason. If you keep the subject, you actually put emphasis on it. Therefore, the sentence without the subject "you" |
| Igor: Chcesz iść jutro do kina? |
| Michael: means "Do [you] want to go to the cinema tomorrow?" and sounds like a suggestion to go to the cinema, while the sentence with the subject |
| Igor: Ty chcesz jutro iść do kina? |
| Michael: actually means "You want to go to the cinema tomorrow?" and sounds like an expression of surprise. In short, because you went out of your way to actually use the subject, the impression is that there must have been a special reason for you to use it. |
| [Recall 2] |
| Michael: Now, let's take a look at our second sentence. |
| Do you remember how Aneta answers "[I] want?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Igor: Chcę. |
| Michael: Here, too, the subject "I" is omitted. Consequently, this sentence is a simple agreement to the above suggestion. However, if we add the subject "I," |
| Igor: Ja chcę. |
| Michael: Here too the explicit presence of the subject "I" gives an artificial emphasis on the subject, and thus makes the sentence like the English "I want to, but…." |
| [Summary] |
| Michael: So far, you have learned that the subject isn't necessarily needed in Polish, and in some cases adding it to the sentence might change its meaning. |
| Now, let's look at some examples. Our first example is |
| Igor: Chcesz coś zjeść? |
| Michael: meaning "Do you want to eat something?" This sentence omits the subject "you" and thus sounds like a regular suggestion. However, if we add the subject "you," |
| Igor: Ty chcesz coś zjeść? |
| Michael: is closer to the English sentence "You want to eat something?" and expresses surprise. The second sentence actually calls for some extra comment, to make the expression something like: "You want to eat something? We just had our lunch!" Similarly, |
| Igor: Chcę zjeść pizzę |
| Michael: is a plain statement meaning "I want to eat a pizza." However, including the subject, as in |
| Igor: Ja chcę zjeść pizzę, |
| Michael: makes the sentence sound like the speaker went out of the way to use the subject "I" because they disagree with whoever spoke before. For example, if the other person said "I want to eat a salad," but the speaker wanted to eat something different and they explicitly emphasize they want to eat something else, they might do it by simply adding the subject. |
| Expansion/Contrast |
| Michael: While in fact subject omission is very common in Polish, there are some instances where we need to keep it—most notably, when using third-person singular or plural, and especially when mentioning this particular subject for the first time. For example, the sentence "She is reading a book" |
| Igor: Ona czyta książkę |
| Michael: will require the subject if we started to talk about the person in question, and leaving the subject out might make the sentence unclear as to whether we refer to a woman, a man, etc. and in general would make it hard to determine who the sentence refers to. However, if someone asks us the question: "Is she reading?" |
| Igor: Ona czyta? |
| Michael: we can omit the subject in our answer because the question itself clearly pointed out who we are talking about. Thus, our affirmative answer in such a case would be, "Yes, she is reading." or: |
| Igor: Tak, czyta. |
| Cultural Insight |
| Michael: As you have just learned, not omitting the subject does not necessarily make a sentence incorrect, but it might alter its meaning. It's safe to assume, though, that, whenever you use the pronouns "I," "you" and "we" in Polish, you can safely omit them. This does not, however, refer to formal Polish! If you want to ask someone a question, for example. "Are you tired?" |
| Igor: Jest pan zmęczony? |
| Michael: we cannot omit the subject |
| Igor: pan. |
| Michael: If we do, we end up sounding very rude. So, we want to be careful with it, and always keep subjects in place when using formal Polish. |
Outro |
| Michael: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them! |
| Igor: Do usłyszenia! |
| Michael: See you soon! |
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