# imperative



## AmigoKurt

Da 4 jia1 hao3!

Wo3 xiang3 find out how to make commands in Mandarin. 

I have searched the internet and looked in books, but I still cannot find it.

How do you make commands with verbs?

For example:

Come here now!

Take out the trash!

Please include pinyin because I am still a novice at Mandarin.

Xie4xie,

Kurt


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## avlee

Come here now! xian4 zai4 jiu4 guo4 lai4.

Take out the trash! ba3 la1 ji1 na2 chu1 qu4.


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## On Retrouve a Paris

Are you asking a special formular like English, start with verb. There seems to be no such a regulation for Chinese, besides the 2 exemples that avlee has already helped you to translate, two more exemples.
Turn left! = 向左边转(xiang4zuo2bian1zhuan3) or 左转
Turn off the light before sleeping! = 睡觉前关灯（shui4jiao4qian2guan1deng1)
You dont see any rule for the structure.


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## xiaolijie

On Retrouve a Paris said:


> You dont see any rule for the structure.


The rule seems to be very clear and simple to me: 
In essence, just say what you want to say but omit the [你 (You)] in the sentence. (Even if 你 is included, I don't see there's any serious problem in this)


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## On Retrouve a Paris

dont always bother me! = 你不要老是来烦我！and 不要老是来烦我！
is it really that there is no serious problem with 你? i think the seriousness depends a lot on the tone how we say it. 
Actually originally I wanted to strengthen that to start with 'verb' at the beginning of the sentence is not a rule for command in chinese.


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## desertrat

xiaolijie said:


> The rule seems to be very clear and simple to me:
> In essence, just say what you want to say but omit the [你 (You)] in the sentence. (Even if 你 is included, I don't see there's any serious problem in this)



Though nothing beats the tone of voice, could we not also say that using 吧 at the end of a sentence gives it more of an imperative sense?


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## On Retrouve a Paris

with 吧 you get a sound more 'euphemism', more polite to me.
开窗！（open the window!)
开窗吧。(how about openning the window?)


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## frequency

[Moderator's Note: Merged with a previous thread]
Hello,
Just out of curiosity, how do you make an imperative sentence? For example, what do you say "Drink water."? I know _I drink water_ is _我喝水_, but how does this one change in its imperative?


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## thetazuo

1. 喝水去!
2. 给我去喝水!
3. 给我喝水（去）!
4. 你怎么不喝水啊？
5. 喝水呀!
6.（快）去喝水！


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## frequency

Oof, you have some variations. I think 2, 3 and 6 are variants of 1. 4 and 5 seem different. And the point is that you need to use 去?


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## hx1997

If you say it directly, like in #9, it sounds very rude, as if you were mad at someone or you were ordering a dog (or some other animal) to drink water. If that's not what you intended, you should say 喝杯水吧 (Please drink a glass of water). 

If it's an instructional imperative (used in medication instructions, for example), simply 喝水 will do.


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## frequency

hx1997 said:


> 喝杯水吧





hx1997 said:


> 喝水


The verb 喝 comes at the beginning of a sentence, making an imperative. 谢谢.


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## Skatinginbc

frequency said:


> how do you make an imperative sentence?


Method 1: Make a second-person-subject statement (e.g., (你)喝水； Note: the subject "you" is often omitted) without any aspect or modality marker (e.g., 正，了,  將，會，能，須，etc.), similar to the bare infinitive in English.  For example, 喝水，請喝水 "Please have some water"，去喝水 "Go drink some water".

Method 2: Make a ba-construction (把字句)(Note: the subject "you" is often omitted) with the perfective aspect (了) if the verb is not accompanied by a complement.  For example, 把水喝了 (as in 「乖，聽媽的話，把水喝了，這樣病才會快好」)，把他殺了!  把他放了!  把垃圾倒了!

Method 3: Make a ba-construction without any aspect or modality marker if the verb is accompanied by a complement.  For example, 把水喝光!  把垃圾拿出去!

Method 4: Add 給我 "at my bidding" before the verb.  For example, 給我打 "Beat as I bid you." 給我衝 "Charge as I bid you."

There are still more, but I'm tired of typing. That's it for now.


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## frequency

Does the difference between Method 1 and Method 2 lie in politeness?


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## Ghabi

把 can only be used when the object is definite. One cannot use it, for example, for "Drink some water!"


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