你说我能不管吗?

[thelearninglearner]

I'm having trouble understanding this sentence and the grammar here. Is it rhetorical? Is there a patten I can follow here? 

[889]

Think of 不管 as a single verb which, depending on context, can mean "take no heed of," "ignore" or similar.

 

So here, your sentence probably means something like, "You say I can ignore it?" Again, all depending on context.

 

Remember, too, that Chinese unlike English doesn't demand you always throw "it" or the like in as object. In Chinese in context, it is usually understood.

[thelearninglearner]

thanks @889

much clearer than the other explanations I saw online.

 

in the show, the subtitle in english says, "How could I stay out of this?" with two people having a conversation about some event.

[Tomsima]

能 as in 'can' is actually altered by 你说 to give a sense similar to the English potential 'could' - the subtitles gives a good dynamic translation, as 你说 also questions the recipient, 你说我能吗 - 'how do you think I could?'

[Jim]

Agree with @Tomsima; 管 is worth getting to know in its colloquial uses as it does come up a lot in contexts like this and similar, e.g. someone angrily telling someone else to keep out of something might says, "还用你管吗?" or even more curtly as in this title: https://baike.baidu.com/item/要你管！/13155474?fr=aladdin

[thelearninglearner]

21 hours ago, Jim said:

Agree with @Tomsima; 管 is worth getting to know in its colloquial uses as it does come up a lot in contexts like this and similar, e.g. someone angrily telling someone else to keep out of something might says, "还用你管吗?" or even more curtly as in this title: https://baike.baidu.com/item/要你管！/13155474?fr=aladdin

thanks! I will look into it and see what I can find for the different uses