上海人做衣服做得很好

[deathtrap]

Could someone please explain why they write 做衣服做 instead of just omitting the first 做 ? Maybe I'm misunderstanding the meaning of the sentence.

Thanks.

[雅各]

Each transitive verb should only be followed by one object/complement. Therefore, if you want to say both 衣服 and （得）很好 after 做, then you need to repeat the 做 in order to be able to include both objects/complements.

If anyone can help refine my explanation I'd greatly appreciate it.

[Daan]

You can, in fact, omit the first 做 here. 上海人做衣服做得很好 and 上海人衣服做得很好 mean the same, although the latter is a bit more colloquial to my ears. But you can't omit the second 做 here. In other words, 上海人做衣服得很好 is incorrect. What's that 得 going to be connected to without a verb immediately preceding it?

[creamyhorror]

上海人做衣服做得很好 and 上海人衣服做得很好 mean the same, although the latter is a bit more colloquial to my ears.

While both renderings can mean "Shanghainese tailor clothes well", I think the 2nd could also mean "Shanghainese, their clothes are well-made." So it might be a bit more ambiguous in certain contexts (although the meanings will usually be the same).

[雅各]

Sorry, looks like I was heading the wrong direction with my answer. It's good to hear the options/meanings when omitting the first 做.

[jbradfor]

I'm not sure if this helps (or is even correct), but the way I parse the sentence is that

上海人做衣服 -- subject

做 -- verb

得很好 -- adverb

So it's clear why the second 做 can't be omitted -- it's the verb of the sentence.

For the subject, I think the following three are all correct, and mean more-or-less the same, except maybe with slightly different emphasis

上海人做衣服 -- the clothing made by Shanghainese

上海人(的)衣服 -- the clothing of Shanghainese (made by or purchased by is not clear, as creamyhorror also states)

上海人做的衣服 -- as to the the clothing that is made by Shanghainese (more emphasis on the clothing than the first case)

[deathtrap]

Thank you very much to all of you, it makes a lot more sense now.

[Iriya]

上海人做衣服 -- the clothing made by Shanghainese

This is wrong. The above just means "The Shanghainese people make clothes". You can't omit 的 here.

Anyway, the structure is (Verb +)Object + Verb + 得 + Adjective. You can usually omit the first instance of the verb if you feel like it, but never the second. If there's no object, then there's only one instance of the verb. Compare:

他跑得很快。

他跑步跑得很快。

他步跑得很快。

There are other structures with repeating verbs, BTW. E.g. 他学汉语学了三年了. Note the second 了, as well.

[navaburo]

The key here is to realize that the topic-comment sentence structure is being used. That, combined with the fact that you cannot remove the main verb (the second 做), should explain the allowed variations.

I had a similar question a while back, and Daan's response clarified my question nicely:

http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/35112-help-parsing-sentence-with-%e7%94%bb%e7%9a%84/page__fromsearch__1

Cheers