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Identify and Describe People and Things

It is extremely useful to be able to ask what something is or who someone is.  Small children never tire of pointing at things and asking about them.  That's how they learn. That's how we should learn too.

What's that?

This might be the simplest and most important question you can know how to ask.  Consider the following pattern showing how to ask what something is.

Co to je?

What's that?

To je auto.

That's a car.

Jaké je to auto?

(What kind of car is it?)

To auto je nové.

The car is new.

To je nové auto.

It's a new car.

Notice that the Czech answers don't have an equivalent to the English "a" or "an" in these examples.

Also note that the answers use the dictionary form (nominative) of the identified item.

Who's that?

Asking the identity of a person is very similar to asking the identity of a thing.  The only real difference here is the use of kdo who rather than co what in the question.  When identifying people it is common to further identify them with a career, nationality, or other descriptive label.

Kdo je to?

Who's that?

To je Jana.

That's Jane.

Jana je lekařka.

Jane is a doctor.

Notes

Determining the gender of a noun.

You can't just turn a noun over like a puppy dog to determine its gender! Actually there are some things you can look at to help determine a noun's gender.

Words identifying people, their names and their occupations always have the gender of the person they describe:

 Masculine můž man, kamarad male friend, učitel male teacher, student male student, Pavel Paul, Martin Martin
 Feminine žena woman, kamaradka female friend, učitelka female teacher, studentka female student, Pavla Paula, Martina Martina

Even when their endings might suggest otherwise:

 Masculine kolega male coworker
 Feminine Paní lady

The gender of all other nouns is determined from their endings. The following common noun endings are a sure indicator of gender:

-aFeminine kniha book, škola school, kavárna cafe, voda water, lampa lamp, rodina family, taška bag, káva coffee, banka bank, otáska question, mapa map
-oNeuter auto, rádio, okno, slovo, město, jidlo, kino, pivo
-íNeuter nadraží (train) station, naměstí (town) square, štěstí happiness, zdraví health, cvičení exercise

The great majority of nouns ending in -e are feminine but some are neuter.

-eFeminine židle chair, práce work, nemocnice hospital, televize television, informace information, ulice street
 Neuter moře sea

Most nouns ending in a consonant (especially one of the so-called hard consonants) are masculine but many are feminine and some are neuter.

-consMasculine hrad castle, stůl table, pokoj room, hotel hotel, park park, svetr sweater, obchod shop, úkol task, slovník dictionary, film movie, čaj tea, orloj astronomical clock
 Feminine postel bed, tramvaj tram, skříň cupboard, láhev bottle
 Neuter muzeum museum, centrum town center
Using ten, ta, and to.

Ten, ta, and to are used in Czech similarly to how that and the are used in English to refer to a specific person or thing.  When used in this way the word used must match the gender of the person or thing it is used with.

  • Ten stůl je malý.
  • Ta kniha je zajímavá.
  • To auto je nové.

To can also stand alone as a pronoun in place of some noun.  When used in this way there is no change for gender.

  • To je malý stůl.
  • To je zajímavá kniha.
  • To je nové auto.
Gender Agreement with Adjectives
TBD

 

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