Why is 的 placed after a verb in the end of a sentence?

[CLearningChinese]

 

I read this:

 

今天那两个兄弟也是你派来跟我约会的吧？

"Today you sent your friends to date me, right?" was the translation in the TV show.

 

Struggling to understand what de 的 means here. 

 

Hope anyone can help and thanks in advance!

[jannesan]

That translation is not correct,

it should be something like:

”These two guys (that came to me) today are also sent by you to date me, right?” with the emphasis being on “sent by you”

 

https://resources.allsetlearning.com/chinese/grammar/The_"shi..._de"_construction_for_emphasizing_details

 

This is a good explanation of the 是的 pattern in your sentence.

[Guest realmayo]

If jannesan's explanation is correct, it means that the speaker really wants to emphasise that it was YOU that sent them, rather than SOMEONE ELSE.

In this sentence, I suppose the background would be: we know that those two people were sent by someone, but the mystery is whether they were sent by YOU or not.

However, how would someone ask this question in Chinese if the emphasis wasn't on WHO?

For instance: were these two guys also SENT BY you, or did they TURN UP RANDOMLY AND WEREN'T SENT BY ANYONE?

I suspect the second sentence would be identical.

If so, it wouldn't be a sentence for emphasis.

If so, how would we describe the grammar?

 

Personally I think that it's simply that 的 is being used to show attributes of 兄弟

 

你的猫 = your cat: the 的 makes it clear to the listener that 你 is giving us additional information (attributes) about the 猫.

我只喜欢你的猫 = I only like your cat

你买的茶 = the tea you bought: here the 的 makes it clear to the listener that 你买 is giving us additional information (attributes) about 茶.

我只喜欢你买的茶 = I only like the tea you bought.

 

My (not very good) examples have a noun after the 的. The OP's sentence doesn't. But I don't think that matters - it would be clumsy to repeat 兄弟 at the end.

The important thing is that 的 is signalling that what's come right before it is being used as an attributive - to describe attributes about those two 兄弟.

So the 的 turns "你派来跟我约会" into an attribute.

 

 

Does this sound right? What would be a more concise way of describing it?

 

 

[Vincent666]

他们是约会的人

 

的 can be placed at the the end of the sentence in your case

[Woodford]

I agree with realmayo and Vincent666.  My first instinct was to read the 的 in its sense of "turning an adjective or adjectival phrase into a noun." Just like 黄的 can mean "the yellow one" and 高的 can mean "the tall one," "你派来跟我约会的" can mean "the one(s) you sent to date me." Are those brothers also the ones you sent to date me?

[EnergyReaper]

I think using 是。。的 pattern to explain it is easier to understand. If I only see "Today you sent your friends to date me, right?", I may translate it as 今天你叫你的朋友来跟我约会，是吗？ In this way, we don't use 的 after a verb in the end of the sentence.

[艾墨本]

15 hours ago, EnergyReaper said:

I think using 是。。的 pattern to explain it is easier to understand.

My understanding is the same as @realmayo It isn't a 是。。。的 pattern. If it were, then you could remove both the 是 and 的 and it would mean the same thing but lack emphasis. In this case there is a 是 and there is a 的 but they aren't connected to from emphasis. Rather, the noun that would normally follow the 的 was dropped to avoid unnecessary repetition.

 

To write the sentence in another way:

A是B。

 

It's a simple sentence structure with a complex adjectival clause.

[EnergyReaper]

7 hours ago, 艾墨本 said:

It isn't a 是。。。的 pattern. If it were, then you could remove both the 是 and 的 and it would mean the same thing but lack emphasis.

Not all the 是。。。的 pattern sentences can have both 是 and 的 cut; e.g. in jannesan's link, it gives 你是跟谁去的 ?, and you can't remove both 是 and 的.

Especially, the OP's sentence has 也是 and 吧; Personally, if I don't want to emphasize, I definitely won't say so. 

By the way, I don't know why, but I suddenly think of a line from Stephen Chow's film A Chinese Odyssey Part Two - Cinderella : "人和妖精都是妈生的"  LOL

[艾墨本]

2 hours ago, EnergyReaper said:

Not all the 是。。。的 pattern sentences can have both 是 and 的 cut; e.g. in jannesan's link, it gives 你是跟谁去的 ?, and you can't remove both 是 and 的.

But I believe you can cut it in this example: 你跟谁去？Seems perfectly fine. 

[EnergyReaper]

22 minutes ago, 艾墨本 said:

But I believe you can cut it in this example: 你跟谁去？Seems perfectly fine. 

When I hear 你跟谁去？I will understand it as "who will you go with?", not as "who did you go with?" for 你是跟谁去的 ?

By the way, Chinese doesn't have the concept of clause. If you think adjective clause help you understand the OP's sentence, it's okay. Personally, whenever I see 的 in the end of a sentence, I tend to find if there is 是 after the subject or maybe 是 is omitted, so I tend to use 是...的 pattern to explain.

[艾墨本]

1 hour ago, EnergyReaper said:

When I hear 你跟谁去？I will understand it as "who will you go with?", not as "who did you go with?" for 你是跟谁去的 ?

That's a very good point and brings the conversation in another direction, then. If the 是。。。的 isn't  adding emphasis here, how is it that the structure affects the perceived tense?

[EnergyReaper]

1 hour ago, 艾墨本 said:

how is it that the structure affects the perceived tense?

是...的 pattern is frequently used when asking or telling details about the past. 

If context gives you the hint of time in the past, it's safer to remove both 是 and 的, e.g. 你昨天跟谁去电影院？

Edit:

But native Chinese speakers tend to keep 的 at least, e.g.

A：你昨天跟谁去电影院的(or using 了)？

B：我和小明去的 。

Below sounds a bit weird:

A：你昨天跟谁去电影院？

B：我和小明去 。

[Guest realmayo]

@EnergyReaper, I wonder if we, as language learners, are coming at the 是...的 from the opposite direction that you are, as a native speaker.

 

I mean, you're telling us various ways in which 是...的 sounds natural, or sounds unnatural, which is extremely helpful. You're saying 'this is when I'd want to use 是...的.' But for us, when we look up information about 是...的, we get told: this is what 是...的 does, it emphasises something. And that rule seems much more restrictive than the natural use of langauge that you are illustrating.

 

So in your example from Chinese Odyssey, the "rule" says that 唐三藏 is emphasising 妈生. That is, he is making clear that we aren't both born from fathers or from brothers or from sisters, but are in fact born from mothers.

 

But that's clearly not what's happening in the sentence - in fact, if anything's being emphasised, it's the 都.

 

He doesn't want to start the sentence with 妈, as in "mothers give birth to both 人和妖精",  because mothers aren't the topic of the sentence. 人和妖精 are the topic.

 

So can we say that 是...的 is used：
- as the "comment" part of a "topic + comment" sentence
- it encloses a verb and a noun, where the verb modifies the noun
- and that this verb + noun combine to describe a state that already applies to the topic of the sentence.

 

There are 人 (and 妖精) and they have been 生'd by 妈s.
There are 兄弟 and they have been 派'd by 你.
There is a 苹果, and its 色 is 红.

As for the future, would it be natural to say "原来他不是明天来的，他是后天来的"?

[EnergyReaper]

5 hours ago, realmayo said:

As for the future, would it be natural to say "原来他不是明天来的，他是后天来的"?

No, it's weird. The interesting thing is when I put it into an online dictionary, I got the translation — So he didn't come tomorrow, he came the day after tomorrow. I guess the dictionary had the same feeling as me. ?

Then I cut the two 的 to make it natural and try it in dictionary again. This time I got — So he's not coming tomorrow, he's coming the day after tomorrow.

But if you say "原来他不是上周五来的，他是上周三来的 ", it's natural,  and I got translation from the dictionary — It turns out that he didn't come last Friday, he came last Wednesday.

[Guest realmayo]

Ha!

I'm not surprised that it's weird with the 的. But it's very interesting that it's natural to you with the 是.

It almost makes me think that the 是...的 we've been talking about isn't one grammar point, but two (first the 是+verbal attribute, second the 的 to make clear the attribute already exists).

 

 

[EnergyReaper]

是...的 indeed has various usages, as said in The "shi... de" patterns: an overview

[Guest realmayo]

Ah yes, but with those uses (on that website) I think the 是 is optional but the 的 is necessary? Whereas we're talking about keeping the 是 and losing the 的.

 

What I meant was: we were discussing 是...的, but it turned into 是... (without the 的). So perhaps we were really just discussing 是....

 

 

[EnergyReaper]

7 hours ago, realmayo said:

So perhaps we were really just discussing 是....

If considering my revision "原来他不是明天来，他是后天来", that's right. This sentence is similar to 原来他的计划不是明天来，而是后天来