# לסדר עבודה



## I see you

Hi,

My textbook says that לסדר means "to tidy up". However, I just read "ani lo yakhol lesader avoda". What did he mean? "I can't tidy up work."?


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## slus

It's a slang term meaning I can't fix [you] up with a job.
לסדר generally means to make things right.


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## elroy

slus said:


> I can't fix [you] up with a job.


 Isn't it in reference to the speaker?

אני לא יכול לסדר עבודה - I can't find a job.
אני לא יכול לסדר *לך* עבודה - I can't hook you up with a job.

No?


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## oopqoo

You are correct elroy, it is true that when there's no לך/לי/לכם the default is a reference to the speaker. However, as much as it is plausible to hear the sentence "אני לא יכול לסדר עבודה" I personally would say "אני לא יכול לסדר לעצמי עבודה".


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## slus

I depends on the context. 
לסדר עבודה doesn't mean to simply find a job.


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## elroy

I know.  But I couldn’t find a nice way to put it in English.  I like “hook somebody up with a job” for the second one, but unfortunately “hook up” doesn’t work if the person that needs a job is yourself.

Arabic has a verb that is used with the same meaning, and if there is no indirect object the reference is definitely to the speaker, regardless of the context.  So my judgments here may have been influenced by Arabic.

لازم أدبّر شغل - I have to find a way to get a job. (better translation?) [لازم أدبّر *لحالي* شغل - literally אני חייב לסדר *לעצמי* עבודה - is actually unidiomatic.]
لازم أدبّرلك شغل - “for you” is necessary


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## I see you

Didn't you mean شغلاً? It's the object, isn't it?


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## oopqoo

I was actually going to write that it's very similar to ادبّر or ازبّط. I want to stay on topic so I'm just going to ask about parallels we may have. There is another option in Hebrew actually which is "אני חייב לסדר לי עבודה", so I wonder if you could say in a parallel fashion لازم ادبّرلي شغل or لازم ازبّطلي شغل.


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## Drink

I see you said:


> Didn't you mean شغلاً? It's the object, isn't it?



In Standard Arabic, yes, but not in most dialects; elroy is giving examples from his (Palestinian) dialect.


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## I see you

Oh, I see. I was told that Arabs spoke in dialects under most circumstances but always wrote in Standard Arabic.


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## elroy

You can say لازم أدبّرلي شغل, but this is not an indirect object; it’s called an _ethical dative _and can be added to pretty much any verb: لازم أكُللي إشي، لازم أدرسلي موضوع حلو، لازم أنَملي شوي، لازم أرُحلي شي مرة عحيفا.  I don’t know if לי can be used this way in Hebrew?

The only acceptable indirect object form is لحالي.

لازم أزبّط شغل is not idiomatic.  لازم أزبّطلك شغل is better, but I would say لازم أزبّطك بشغل.

Also, أدبّر and أزبّط don’t mean quite the same thing, but I think going into the differences would be off-topic here. 


I see you said:


> I was told that Arabs spoke in dialects under most circumstances but always wrote in Standard Arabic.


  No, not always.


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## oopqoo

I might be trippin' but I think it does work in Hebrew. It does sound even more colloquial and I may be inclined to add איזה to add to the colloquialness:
אני צריך לאכול לי איזה משהו
אני צריך ללמוד לי איזה נושא נחמד
אני צריך לישון לי קצת
אני צריך ללכת לי מתישהו לחיפה

I shall open the ادبّر VS ازبّط discussion in the Arabic subforum then.


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