# "свой город" or "своего города"?



## cheshire

Я не очень хорошо знаю свой город.(I don't know much about my city.)

Isn't "свой город" in accusative case? I learned that "не"
 calls for genitive case. Can we replace "свой город" with the genitive "своего города" in this sentence?


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## Q-cumber

Nope, I think we can't. *"Город"* isn't an animated subject, so the word keeps its original form in accusative case. 


Compare: "Я не очень хорошо знаю свой *язык*." vs "Я не очень хорошо знаю своего *соседа*."


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## papillon

I think what *cheshire *is asking here is why accusative and not genitive case in this negative sentence. I don't know the answer other than to say that the original sentence is correct. Obviously the "не calls for genitive case" rule is not absolute and the  choice of grammatical case depends on the context.


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## Q-cumber

*papillon*

I've never heard about such a rule. Could you provide any examples?


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## cheshire

(3) На стол*е* н*е* было тар*е*лки. (There was no plates on the table.)
 　　　　　　　　　
(4) З*а*втра не б*у*дет ур*о*ка. (We have no lessons tomorrow.)

In (3) and (4), there are no animate subjects being used. Neither "тар*е*лки" nor "ур*о*ка" are animate, but why are they in genitive case?


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## cyanista

Q-cumber said:


> Nope, I think we can't. *"Город"* isn't an animated subject, so the word keeps its original form in accusative case.
> 
> 
> Compare: "Я не очень хорошо знаю свой *язык*." vs "Я не очень хорошо знаю своего *соседа*."



And yet the genitive case is possible in very similar sentences.

"Я не очень хорошо знаю свой *язык*." BUT "Я не знаю *язык*а (и обычаев)."

"Я не очень хорошо знаю свой город."          BUT "Я не знаю этого города (и поэтому заблудился)."

Не очень хорошо seems to affect the case of the noun. So, perhaps, Q-cumber's rule applies only if there is an adverbial modifier between не and знаю?..


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## papillon

Q-cumber said:


> *papillon*
> I've never heard about such a rule. Could you provide any examples?


I haven't either, I was referring to *cheshire*'s post:





cheshire said:


> I learned that "не" calls for genitive case.


In fact I was saying that the rule as stated cannot exist, given the examples at hand.


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## cheshire

(5) Я не в*и*жу стол*а*. (I don't see the table.)
 (6) Он не встреч*а*ет сестр*ы*. (He doesn't meet his sister.)



			
				cyanista said:
			
		

> Не очень хорошо seems to affect the case of the noun. So, perhaps, Q-cumber's rule applies only if there is an adverbial modifier between не and знаю?..


Thanks! "Не" must modify only "очень" and no more, that must be the reason why you shouldn't use the genitive case. Do you agree?


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## papillon

cheshire said:


> (5) Я не в*и*жу стол*а*. (I don't see the table.)
> 
> (6) Он не встреч*а*ет сестры*y*. (He doesn't meet his sister.)


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## Maroseika

cheshire said:


> Я не очень хорошо знаю свой город.(I don't know much about my city.)
> 
> Isn't "свой город" in accusative case? I learned that "не"
> calls for genitive case. Can we replace "свой город" with the genitive "своего города" in this sentence?


Negative particle really calls genitive, but only if refers to the verb.
Here it refers to the adverb *очень*.
*Не очень* describes adjective *хорошо* and has nothing to do with the case of the object.


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## cheshire

Thanks Maroseika and other helpful members



			
				Schmetterling said:
			
		

> (5) Я не в*и*жу стол*а*. (I don't see the table.)
> 
> (6) Он не встреч*а*ет сестры*y*. (He doesn't meet his sister.)


WHY??? I can't see the rule governing all that! It doesn't obviously seem to be the animate/inanimate distinction. Then, what is?


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## Maroseika

cheshire said:


> Thanks Maroseika and other helpful members
> 
> 
> WHY??? I can't see the rule governing all that! It doesn't obviously seem to be the animate/inanimate distinction. Then, what is?


In fact formally both cases are possible for animated nouns in negative constructions, genitive being a bit obsolete:
Я давно не видел сестру/сестры.
Вы не встречали тут уборщицы/уборщицу?


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## Q-cumber

*cheshire*

Frankly speaking, it's somewhat difficult for native speakers to recall any appropriate rules.  We just *feel * how to conjugate words.
* Он не встречает сестрy.* is the correct wording, I confirm.

 Getting back to the initial question, *Maroseika* provided the clue: here particle *не* belongs to adverb *очень* (very - not very), so it doesn't affect the other words. Should *не* belong to a verb, it might make the difference indeed.

PS I fuzzily recollect that some particular verbs (вижу, etc.) might change cases. Am I wrong?


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## palomnik

Q-cumber, Papillon: many Russian texts for foreigners state that the object of a negative verb is supposed to be in the genitive case. When the learner gets on the ground in Russia he finds that this is seldom true; I believe that it was common once, but now obsolescent. To grab the first quote I could find:

_Высокой страсти не имея_
Для звуков жизни не щадить...

My impression, Cheshire, is that in the sentence you give _не_ is actually modifying _очень хорошо_ and not _знаю_, and therefore you would use the accusative case, regardless of whether the rule applies or not.


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## Q-cumber

cheshire said:


> (3) На стол*е* н*е* было тар*е*лки. (There was no plates on the table.)



This phrase isn't that common. If we want to say *There were no plates on the table*, we use the wording На столе не было тарелок (of plural тарелки).  

"На столе не было тарелки (of singular тарелка)". would hint that there previously was one on a table and then it disappeared.


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## Q-cumber

While on workout I was thinking about the topic and I noticed something interesting.

Listen up:  Let's voluntarily assign a broader meaning to the word "сестрa". It doesn't mean "a sister" anymore...from now it means "a girl (any)". Then we can say Он ещё не встречал сестр*ы* (девушки) красивее, чем эта.  Agree? So, what makes the difference? Any ideas?


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## papillon

You know, I have a feeling that this is closely related to other cases, where a verb can take a noun in either accusative, or genitive, depending on the context. A while ago we had a discussion of the verb ждать, trying to figure out the rule for when to use accusative and when genitive. For this verb, here is the explanation given at gramota.ru which I found convincing:

Глаголы _ждать, ожидать_ управляют родительным (кого, чего) и винительным (кого, что) падежом. Родительный падеж - при сочетании с отвлеченными существительными или конкректными, но употребленными с оттенком неопределенности: _Я жду автобуса_ (любого, какой подойдет, на такой и сяду). _Мы ждем поезда _(любого). _Я жду любви, как позднего трамвая_. _Он ожидал удобного случая_. Винительный падеж - при сочетании с одушевленными существительными или неодушевленными с оттенком определенности: _Я жду сестру. Я жду автобус № 20_ (именно этот, конкретный). _Мы ждем поезд № 132.

_


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## Q-cumber

papillon said:


> Винительный падеж - при сочетании с одушевленными существительными или неодушевленными с оттенком определенности: _Я жду сестру. Я жду автобус № 20_ (именно этот, конкретный). _Мы ждем поезд № 132.
> _


_


Yeah, this makes sense._


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## palomnik

My understanding (as a foreigner, but one who had to learn the language from the ground up), was that ждать was unusual in that it could take the genitive case in affirmative statements.  

In other words, I don't know if we're dealing with the same rule that Cheshire is asking about.


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## Q-cumber

palomnik said:


> My understanding (as a foreigner, but one who had to learn the language from the ground up), was that ждать was unusual in that it could take the genitive case in affirmative statements.
> 
> In other words, I don't know if we're dealing with the same rule that Cheshire is asking about.



Nope, it is definitely not the same rule, yet it seems that multiple rules are involved here.


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## cheshire

Thank you everyone! l learned a lot!

What I learned here:

1: negational genitives are basically optional. But can we say "У миня нет слов*о*." instead of "У миня нет слов*а*."?

2: negational genitives are basically archaic.

3: Whether negational genitives can be used in a given sentence depends from sentence to sentence.


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## Q-cumber

"У меня нет слов."   (I have no words - plural) is the only variant we actually use.  Should we suggest a similar sentence with a singular "слово", the correct variant would be. "У меня нет слова." 
Here's a real phrase: пиво (a beer) --> У меня нет пив*а*.


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## cheshire

OK, I see that there are two types of "genitivization": compulsory and optional.


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