得 grammar

[metlx]

I generally understand the usage of 得, but i am confused about a few examples:

1）"麦克跑步得非常快”

This one is supposedly wrong. I can't find the mistake. Should it be (i) ”麦克跑步跑得非常快“？or (ii) perhaps “麦克跑得非常快” without the 步？

2) ”我每天吃饭得很少“

Same as 1). I can't find the mistake.

It's weird because apparently a sentence like "她这个句子翻译得不对“ is correct. Notice how 翻译 is not separated, which kind of looks identical to 1) and 2).

Help please

[陳德聰]

For 1 & 2, you are pretty much spot on in (i) and (ii) as corrections.

The reason for this is that most verbs (I hesitate to say all, but I am pretty sure it's all) can't take both an Object and a Complement (得 structures after the verb), thus the reduplication of the verb or omission of the object.

With that said, the reason 翻译 is fine but 跑步 is not, is that 跑步 is a verb-object construction, whereas 翻译 is a verb-verb compound verb (where both the characters are verbs). So then following from above, if 步 is actually the "object" of 跑, but 译 is actually an inherent part of the verb "翻译", you can put 得 after 翻译 but not after 跑步.

Hopefully that makes sense?

[joshua.r]

So if sentence #2 follows the same solution it would read...

(i) 每天我吃饭吃得很少。 or (ii) 每天我吃得很少。

Is "很少" describing how much I eat or how often I eat? These are not necessarily the same. I might eat only once a day but when I do, I eat a lot.

Thanks OP for posting this. 得 is a big question for me too. So is 的。

[陳德聰]

The primary reading I get from 每天吃得很少 is that you don't each very much every day. This is theoretically as ambiguous as "I don't eat much" in English, where you could be saying you don't eat often, but it would be imprecise.

I would say 我很少吃饭 to mean I don't eat very often.

[tooironic]

Consider also the related (and common) phrase 少吃多餐 ("to add small but frequent meals").

[adrianlondon]

Isn't it to do with repeating the verb?

我每天吃饭得很少 -> ”我每天吃饭吃得很少

Edit: I notice I'm being repetitive in more than just the verb.

[陳德聰]

As posted above, yes. Yes it is.

[Yinyue]

Could one also say 每天吃的很少 - and if not, why? What's the difference between 的 and 得 (as talking about 得 here, I didn't want to open an extra topic)?

[skylee]

Could one also say 每天吃的很少 - and if not, why? What's the difference between 的 and 得 (as talking about 得 here, I didn't want to open an extra topic)?

Yes. Please see this thread and my #12 -> 活多的做不完

[Yinyue]

@skylee:

 

Thanks for the hint, however I did not really figure out in the discussion in the thread your link points to, what the difference actually is (and I do not have enough knowledge of Chinese yet to understand what the dictionaries in #12 say about it). I'd rather not like to resort to the idea that they are all the same, on one hand because my Chinese language partner once told me that there is a difference, but I didn't really grasp it ...and on the other, because there must be, else there wouldn't be 2 different characters.

[skylee]

When I was young, I was taught that the 的 in 每天吃的很少 would be wrong. It should be 得，period. In the thread that I linked to above, I found that now the overlapping of 的得地 is sort of endorsed by the authorities, as shown in the entries of the dictionary of the Taiwan Ministry of Education, and the Xiandai Hanyu Cidian. You can ignore the overlapping, and use 的得地 as you are taught. Just don't say that the others are wrong, as I did, as they may not be wrong.

As to the different functions of 的得地，I am sure other more learned members will be able to tell you that they are artificial and that they are synonyms, etc. Just note that they are not synonyms in Cantonese.

[metlx]

@Yinyue

 

I'm assuming you know when to use 的，so I will explain only 得.

 

得 is used when you want to describe in what manner you did something. For example:

他说。 》He talks.

他说得快。》He talks fast.

(subject + action verb + 得 + adjectival verb).

 

In longer sentences that include 'object', the action verb has to be repeated.

他说话说得快。

(subject (他) + action verb (说) + object (话) + action verb (说) + 得 + adjectival verb (快)).

 

In everyday conversations the first action verb can be omitted.

他话说得快。

 

It's negated by 不

他(说)话说得不快。

 

Adjectives (很，真，太，。。。）are places in the same position as 不 - before the adjectival verb.

他(说)话说得太快。

When together with 不:

他(说)话说得不太快。 》He doesn't talk too fast.

 

Questions are formed with 怎么样  / verb不verb / 吗 at the end.

他(说)汉语说得怎么样？ 》 How does he talk/speak chinese? (usually related to level of fluency)

他(说)汉语说得好不好？ 》 Does he speak chinese well? 

他(说)汉语说得太快吗？ 》Does he speak chinese too fast?

[Yinyue]

That's very helpful, thanks a lot. And yes, I know 的 already, right assumption.

[skylee]

Also take a look at this thread -> Grammar #3 的得地

[Yinyue]

Ah, that's exactly the kind of thread I was looking for. Thanks. I should try to use the search function first...