Learn the basic rules of Vietnamese sentence structure
Now Playing: Lesson Audio
Get a breakdown of the dialogue and translations instantly with the Premium line-by-line Audio. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
Intro |
|---|
| Antoni: How are sentences structured in Vietnamese? |
| Nguyet: And are the rules rigid? |
| Antoni: At VietnamesePod101.com, we hear these questions often. In the following situation, Ben Lee, a foreign-exchange student, thinks he sees a famous Vietnamese singer as he's walking with a friend in central Hanoi. He gestures to his friend, Sandra Storm, and says, |
| "I know him; that's the singer Son Tung." |
| Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| Dialogue |
| Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| Sandra Storm: Sơn Tùng thì tôi cũng biết. |
| Antoni: Once more with the English translation. |
| Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| Antoni: "I know him; that's the singer Son Tung." |
| Sandra Storm: Sơn Tùng thì tôi cũng biết. |
| Antoni: "I know [him] too." |
Lesson focus |
| Antoni: In the conversation, Ben and Sandra say different versions of the sentence, "I know him!" In English, Sandra only adds another word—the word for "too," |
| Nguyet: cũng |
| Antoni: You will also notice that the words are in a different order. Whereas Ben says, "I know him," |
| Nguyet: Tôi biết anh ấy, |
| Antoni: Sandra says, "I know him too." |
| Nguyet: tôi cũng biết |
| Antoni: In this case, however, Sandra drops the pronoun and literally says "I too know." But that’s because she already mentioned the name of the object at the beginning of the sentence, which is |
| Nguyet: Sơn Tùng |
| Antoni: Vietnamese is classified as an S-V-O language like English, which means the subject usually comes first in the sentence, followed by the verb, and then the object. |
| [Recall 1] |
| Antoni: Let’s dig deeper into the Vietnamese sentence structure by taking a closer look at the dialogue. |
| Do you remember how Ben Lee says "I know him; that's the singer Son Tung?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Nguyet as Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| Antoni: Let’s focus on the phrase "I know him," or |
| Nguyet: Tôi biết anh ấy. |
| Antoni: Here, we can see the fundamental sentence structure of the Vietnamese language, where the subject |
| Nguyet: Tôi |
| Antoni: or "I" comes first and is followed by the verb, |
| Nguyet: biết |
| Antoni: or "know," and the object |
| Nguyet: anh ấy |
| Antoni: or "him." "I know him." |
| Nguyet: Tôi biết anh ấy. |
| [Recall 2] |
| Antoni: Now, let’s take a look at our second sentence. |
| Do you remember how Sandra says "I know [him] too?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Nguyet as Nguyet Ngo: Sơn Tùng thì tôi cũng biết. |
| Antoni: This is literally, "Sơn Tùng then I also know." But let’s just focus on the phrase "I know him too," or |
| Nguyet: tôi cũng biết. |
| Antoni: Here, we have the adverb "too," or |
| Nguyet: cũng |
| Antoni: In Vietnamese, adverbs are usually placed after the verbs they modify. This is the same as in English. And, as in English, some adverbs can be placed before the verbs they modify, such as in this sentence. If we take the whole sentence, the word order we have is Object-Subject-Adverb-Verb. This may seem to go against the usual sentence structure of Vietnamese, but it’s simply one of those instances in colloquial speech where some words are dropped when they are implied. It’s like saying, "If it’s Sơn Tùng, well, I know him too." |
| [Summary] |
| Antoni: So far, we have learned that the subject-verb-object structure is what’s dominant in Vietnamese. |
| Expansion |
| Antoni: However, Vietnamese doesn’t always follow the same rules as English in terms of sentence structure. For instance, adjectives don’t go with the verb "to be." If you want to say, "She is smart," you say that as |
| Nguyet: Cô ấy thông minh. |
| Antoni: which is literally, "She smart." But, even in more complex sentences, Vietnamese tends to stick to the S-V-O pattern. When forming questions, for example, it’s either that a question word is added at the beginning of the sentence or at the end. In between are the subject, verb, and object. Here’s an example: |
| Nguyet: Tại sao bạn yêu âm nhạc? |
| Antoni: "Why do you love music?" Here, we have the question word |
| Nguyet: Tại sao |
| Antoni: or "Why" at the beginning of the sentence. It’s then followed by the subject |
| Nguyet: bạn |
| Antoni: "you," the verb, |
| Nguyet: yêu |
| Antoni: "to love," and the object |
| Nguyet: âm nhạc |
| Antoni: "music." |
| Practice Section |
| Antoni: Let's review. Respond to the prompts by speaking aloud. Then, repeat after Nguyet focusing on pronunciation. |
| Do you remember how Ben Lee says "I know him; that's the singer Son Tung?" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Nguyet as Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| Antoni: Listen again and repeat. |
| Nguyet as Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Nguyet as Ben Lee: Tôi biết anh ấy, đó là ca sĩ Sơn Tùng. |
| Antoni: And do you remember how Sandra says "I know [him] too?" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Nguyet as Nguyet Ngo: Sơn Tùng thì tôi cũng biết. |
| Antoni: Listen again and repeat. |
| Nguyet as Nguyet Ngo: Sơn Tùng thì tôi cũng biết. |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Nguyet as Nguyet Ngo: Sơn Tùng thì tôi cũng biết. |
| Expansion |
| Antoni: We mentioned that Vietnamese tends to stick to the S-V-O sentence structure regardless of the complexity of the sentence. We have observed this in a previous example using an interrogative sentence. The same principle can be observed when forming conditional sentences, such as |
| Nguyet: Nếu trời mưa, tôi sẽ ngủ. |
| Antoni: "If it rains, I will sleep." |
| Antoni: Here, we have the if-then clause followed by the subject, verb, and object. The same sentence can be reversed where the if-then clause is positioned after the subject, verb, and object. Even then, the S-V-O sentence structure remains intact. |
Outro |
| Antoni: Do you have any more questions? We’re here to answer them! |
| Nguyet: Tạm biệt! |
| Antoni: See you soon! |
| Credits: Nguyet Nguyen (Vietnamese, Vinh Phuc), Antoni (English, synthetic voice) |
Comments
Hide