# The woman will give/has given rice to the child.



## J.F. de TROYES

I am trying to get a close translation of the following sentences and I'd like to ask some questions :

1- The woman will give rice to the child.
2- The woman  has given rice to the child.

My try :
   1-  女人 快 给 了 孩子 米饭 .
   2-  女人  给 了 孩子 米饭 .

Please first correct what is wrong. The singular/plural is not expressed, so how to mean that only one woman and one child are concerned ?  As for conveying the idea of future , what would the more relevant phrase when the time in the future is not specified as in 1-

Thanks a lot for your help.


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## linlon

J.F. de TROYES said:


> I am trying to get a close translation of the following sentences and I'd like to ask some questions :
> 
> 1- The woman will give rice to the child.
> 2- The woman  has given rice to the child.


This is my try:
1-那位太太(指已婚者)/ 那位小姐(已婚或未婚皆可)會盛一碗飯給小孩.
2-那位太太/ 那位小姐盛了一碗飯給小孩.
(這種說法適用於會話中)

Someone else may have better answers to your question.


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## SuperXW

1. 那女人将会给孩子米饭。 etc.
2. 那女人已经给了孩子米饭。/那女人已经给孩子米饭了。 etc. Yours is colloquial and acceptable too.

Your major problems:
快给=is about to give very soon. / quickly give. 了can't follow快给. So 快给了 is wrong.
Remember 会/将会=will.

Other suggestion:
女人给了孩子米饭 is colloquial and acceptable. It's very concise, so people may think you have something else to say after this sentence.
If you want to emphasize that "the action is done", you should add 已经. 

By the way, although linlon's answer is grammatical and idiomatical, he added some hypothesis into the sentence, which would change the original meaning...
盛一碗饭 literally means "spoon cooked rice into a bowl", but we don't really know if this is the case.


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## J.F. de TROYES

Thank you for your enlightment !


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## BODYholic

J.F. de TROYES said:


> 1- The woman...
> 2- The woman...
> 
> My try :
> 1-  女人...
> 2-  女人...



The subject, "The woman", is singular and definite but "女人" is indefinite. This explains why "那女人" is used in #3.


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## YangMuye

> The singular/plural is not expressed, so how to mean that only one woman and one child are concerned ?


If it's the first time you mention something as a concrete existence, you must put a quantifier before it.
Otherwise, you must drop it so that the listener can know you want to refer the same thing.
那 and 这 are usually omitted when you are telling a story or referring to the subject himself's thing.



> As for conveying the idea of future, what would the more relevant phrase when the time in the future is not specified


If it's not the first time you mention a future or past event, you don't need any special phrase.
Otherwise, different phrases must be used depending on the purpose why you say the sentence.

E.g.
If you don't know whether someone will give the child rice or not, or you know someone will give the child rice but you don't know who it is, then someone can answer you:
“那个妇女*会*给孩子饭。”
“会” must be used when an event seems/is considered to happen.
“将”“要” can also be used here. But “会” is the most neutral. 
“将” is a litter formal, and usually means a planned or non-intentional action if the subject is a human.
“要” usually means an intentional action.

If it's a planed action, “会” can be omitted. e.g. a different person will give the child rice every time, but you don't know who is the next, then someone can answer you:
“那个妇女给孩子饭。” (“那个” is stressed.)

If an event is regarded as a past event, “了” must be attached to the verb.
“那个妇女给*了*孩子饭。”

Both sentence can be used to convey information(e.g. to answer a question, to narrate a story), however, they can 't be used to remind someone(usually used as the first sentence of the topic). 
If that the women gives rice to the child is a bad thing, and you want to stop it, you say:
“那个妇女*(要)*给孩子饭*了*。” ( “要” can be omit if it's obviously a future event.)
“了” must be attached to the end of the sentence.
The same phrase can be used if you find something has already happened, you want to let others know, you say:
“那个妇女*(已经)*给孩子饭*了*。” ( “已经” is usually unnecessary)

When you wonder if this thing will happen or has happened, someone may answer you
“那个妇女*会*给孩子饭。”(会 is stressed)
“那个妇女*(已经)*给孩子饭*了*。”(已经 is stressed if it is used, otherwise, 给 is stressed)

The the sentence is stated as a background and you will continue to speak, 
“那个妇女*会/将/要*给孩子饭，”
“那个妇女给*了*孩子饭，”
“那个妇女*会/将/要*给孩子饭*了*，”
“那个妇女给孩子饭*了*，” 
All these all possible.

But the last two can only be used when it's easy to guess the influence.

In fact, the thing “the woman gives rice to the child” is seldom meaningful. So it will not normally appear in everyday's talk.
Using this sentence when telling a story seems to be the most reasonable assumption me.
In this case, I will say “(那个)妇女给*了*孩子一碗饭。”
We add 一碗 to refer 饭 in a concrete way, rather than a general/abstract way. If you want to continue to describe the rice, you must use it.


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## SuperXW

linlon said:


> This is my try:
> 1-那位太太(指已婚者)/ 那位小姐(已婚或未婚皆可)會盛一碗飯給小孩.
> 2-那位太太/ 那位小姐盛了一碗飯給小孩.
> (這種說法適用於會話中)


If you really speak in this manner, people will feel you are "too well" educated and not natural in speaking... 
那位太太 is equal to "that lady", and for 小姐, we are still discussing the changing meaning of 小姐 in another thread.
To honor the woman, you can also consider the word 女士, which is more general, regardless her marriage status.
But in a casual and informal situation, people offen say 那女的, which is much less respectful but more common.


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## 南島君

YangMuye said:


> ...(恕刪)
> 
> The the sentence is stated as a background and you will continue to speak,
> “那个妇女*会/将/要*给孩子饭，”
> “那个妇女给*了*孩子饭，”
> “那个妇女*会/将/要*给孩子饭*了*，”
> “那个妇女给孩子饭*了*，”
> All these all possible.
> 
> But the last two can only be used when it's easy to guess the influence.
> 
> ...(恕刪)




敢問 YangMuye，以上不明白，請您分説。謝謝！


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## YangMuye

南島君 said:


> 敢問 YangMuye，以上不明白，請您分説。謝謝！


It is just the same as the preceding explanation. The two sentences are backgrounds, but can also be regarded as separate sentences.

It just reminds me that, an obvious influence is neither a sufficient nor a necessary condition to put 了 at the end of a sentence.
Maybe it would be easier to think it as an reply to the question “……了没有？”. We care more about the type/process of the event/action.



> 1a. ?我丢了钱包，所以你先帮我垫一下吧。
> 1b. ???/*我丢钱包了，所以你先帮我垫一下吧。
> 1c. best 我(把/的)钱包(弄)丢了，所以你先帮我垫一下吧。


(1a) is acceptable to me, but putting 了 at the end of the sentence is the more natural.
(1b) sounds extremely strange to me.



> 2a. 咦，我钱包丢了！
> 2b. ???咦，我丢钱包了！
> 2c. ?咦，我竟然丢钱包了！
> 2d. ?咦，我丢了钱包！
> 3a. 啊，我杀人了。
> 3b. ??啊，我杀了人。
> 3c. 啊，我杀了一个人。
> 3c. *啊，我杀一个人了。


(3c) is not acceptable to me, unless he is reporting the process.(e.g. He planed to kill 100 people, how may has he killed so far?)
I prefer to refer 杀人 in a general way without using a quantifier.

The word order(1a vs. 1b), use of quantifier(3a vs. 3c), and sense of achievement(2c) also matter.
Do you have any ideas?

我想了很久，还是没想通。不知道南島君有没有相关的研究结果。

PS, 省略的部分用“……”“(下/中/上)略”这样就好，“删”字看起来杀气腾腾的……


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## 南島君

感謝以上答復。我原來是一時不理解先前的解釋，現在了解了。感謝。
（我想 劉承慧，中古譯經「已」對近代「了」的影響——語言接觸如何牽動語法演變？，《中央研究院歷史語言研究所集刊》，81卷，3期，467-512，2010。  也許可以回答您部分的疑問。至於3c  我覺得完全符合語法，只是它表達的意義正如您說的 he is stating how many people  he killed so  far，只是不符合您預期它表達的語義，不證明它不合語法。換個比較生活化的談話内容，也許您會覺得比較容易接受。cf.  A問: 他還了錢麽？  B答： 他還100元了（，還欠兩百）。）

Sorry for derailing the discussion  So here's my bit of contribution:


SuperXW said:


> ...（恕刪）
> Your major problems:
> 快给=is about to give very soon. / quickly give. 了can't follow快给. So 快给了 is wrong.
> ...（恕刪）


This is true. Since 快V means "_about to V_", the composition of 快V with 了 behind Verb （動後了, aka 了1,  perfective 了） is disallowed. I would like to follow this idea explained  by SuperXW further suggesting another way to express future temporal in  modern Mandarin, which however can only bear the meaning of "_is about to V_" that might be unfavorable to your initial request, with presence of 了 behind sentence （句尾了，aka 了2）：
　　　　那女人快给孩子米饭*(了)。The woman is about to give rice to the child.
　　cf.
　　　　他快死*(了)。 He is about to die. 
　　　　他快睡*(了)。 He is about to sleep.
　　　　他快來*(了)。 He is about to come.


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## Kevin70s

Why is it that nobody has asked for the context of the sentence?


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## J.F. de TROYES

Kevin70s said:


> Why is it that nobody has asked for the context of the sentence?



I understand your objection and I agree with YangMuye saying " In fact, the thing “the woman gives rice to the child” is seldom meaningful. So it will not normally appear in everyday's talk. Using this sentence when telling a story seems to be the most reasonable assumption to me " ( #6 )
 In fact I wanted to see the different ways of phrasing in Mandarin what is called in English and other I.E languages future tense , definite articles or such specific gammatical notions .


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