Thread: A few questions about the genitive case... ?

First off, is " пожалуйста, убрать твоя себя от моего дома сейчас" correct?
The only words that are supposed to be in the Genitive case are "My" and "House"?

Soo.. это кошка Алины. Alina is the one who owns the cat? (Why is кошка not in the genitive?) Does it actually need to be это Алины кошки (или кошкии)?
I just thought кошки = "cats"...
And I know that I am not supposed to put ы the the end of кошка because of к. (Spelling rule да?)

BUT У меня есть бирюзовой машины is "By me, there is a turquoise car"? (What is owned here is in the Genitive, unlike кошка in the first instance. Why?) Does it have anything to do with using У?

I've been using кого?, чего?, У кого?, Чей?, откуда? and когда? to help me. But I just need some double checking since Im sure I've got a few things wrong in me head. And I may be more wrong then I think I am.



Hopefully I didnt overcomplicate anything!

First question:
Yes. Think of it this way: "remove yourself from where?" "from my house".
Also, «убрать» needs to be in the imperative form: «убери» (if you were on «вы» terms with your interlocutor, you would add «те» to the end of imperative forms: «уберите»).
I believe the correct sentence would be: «пожалуйста, убери себя от моего дома сейчас»

Second question:
«это кошка Алины» is correct. "Whose cat?" "Alina's cat". «кошка» does not need to be in the genitive.
If it was «это кошки Алина», you would be saying "this is the cat's Alina". If genitive is being used to show possession, it is the agent that possesses that requires the genitive, not the object being possessed. In English, we simply use the possessive "s" for this (Alina's cat).

Third question:
The sentence is wrong. «я» is the agent that possesses the car, the genitive of «я» is «меня». You should not put the object of possession into the genitive as well. Your sentence should be «У меня есть бирюзовая машина».

Originally Posted by Demonic_Duck

...У меня есть бирюзовая машина.

Моя машина бирюзового цвета.

Well first off "себя" means "oneself/myself/yourself" on it's own, so there is no need for "твоя". And убрать needs to be in the imperative, so it should be "убирай-те". Since себя is an animate object, and it is the direct object, it also needs to be in the genitive case. Which it is. (The nominative cases would be сам, сама, само. Dative - себе. Conjugates mostly like тебя.)

это кошка Алины. This literally means "This is cat of Alina. Alina is in the genitive case because it's describing possession. If you were saying, "This is a cat" you would just say "Это кошка".

У меня есть бирюзовой машины. "бирюзовой машины" shouldn't be in the genitive case. In this case, you would only need to use the genitive case to describe negation, or the absence of something ex: У меня нет бирюзовой машины.

I'm not a native speaker, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Originally Posted by OceanEyes

First off, is " пожалуйста, убрать твоя себя от моего дома сейчас" correct?
The only words that are supposed to be in the Genitive case are "My" and "House"?

Yes, only these... but the sentence is wrong. "Убирайся от моего дома" is more or less correct, however "пожалуйста" doesn't fit the rude style mandated by "убирайся". "Убирайся из моего дома" too.

If you want to be polite or neutral and if you want to say something like "Please go away from my house" it's "Отойдите/Уйдите от моего дома, пожалуйста" (if they are nearby your house, outside) or "Уйдите из моего дома, пожалуйста" is they are inside (note the difference between prepositions "от" and "из").

If you are a little more irritated AND if you do want to use the verb derived from "убирать" the perfectly natural choice will be:
"(Сейчас же/Немедленно) Убирайтесь из моего дома!" = "Get away from my house (right now/immediately)!"

Убирайтесь - plural or formal, убирайся - singular. Infinitive - убираться
"Убираться" is a reflexive verb (Reflexive Verbs), and it's the closest equivalent to English "убирать себя" (two words mended into one).

Originally Posted by Demonic_Duck

Third question:
The sentence is wrong. «я» is the agent that possesses the car, the genitive of «я» is «меня». You should not put the object of possession into the genitive as well. Your sentence should be «У меня есть бирюзовая машина».

Originally Posted by RussianCause

У меня есть бирюзовой машины. "бирюзовой машины" shouldn't be in the genitive case. In this case, you would only need to use the genitive case to describe negation, or the absence of something ex: У меня нет бирюзовой машины.

I'm not a native speaker, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Great! And this is what I initially thought. Now im definitely sure about it all. :]

У меня есть карандаш и бумага.
У её нет карандаша и бумаги.

хорошо?

Only correction to make is that it should be «у неё» because with prepositions (such as «у»), «её» and «его» are prefixed with «н».

Other than that, всё правильно

Originally Posted by OceanEyes

BUT У меня есть бирюзовой машины is "By me, there is a turquoise car"? (What is owned here is in the Genitive, unlike кошка in the first instance. Why?) Does it have anything to do with using У?

I have never heard anyone saying "бирюзовая машина" in Russia. Folks mostly say "машина цвета морской волны" (literally color of sea wave). If this is turquoise color.

Бирюзовое платье (turquoise dress), бирюзовый ковёр (turquoise carpet)...

A most common way of saying is: У меня машина цвета морской волны. = I have a turquoise car.

"бирюзовая машина" - it is not the genitive case because "бирюзовая" is an adjective for "машина" (and it's translated without "of"), for genitive it should be a noun, eg "дверь машины".

Originally Posted by Demonic_Duck

interlocutor

I thought only Russians use this word

I think I can work with all of that. :]

I had another question though.
When it comes to using the Genitive to express amounts of something, does it work with abstract subjects?
For example: "11 years of hard work", "2 years of sorrow" or "5 nights of dreamless sleep" "the eyes of the ocean"? (I wonder where that last one came from) :]

Originally Posted by Romik

Originally Posted by Demonic_Duck

interlocutor

I thought only Russians use this word

Why, do you have this word in Russian as well? «интерлокютор», perhaps?

It's a useful word and it's sorely underused in the English language. We should start a campaign to bring it into common usage!

Originally Posted by Demonic_Duck

Why, do you have this word in Russian as well? «интерлокютор», perhaps?

It's a useful word and it's sorely underused in the English language. We should start a campaign to bring it into common usage!

We have "собеседник", a quite usual word and a Russian-English dictionary translates it to you as "interlocutor" but English speakers seem more like to say - conversation partner, listener, person to talk to - as I take it.

The word 'interlocutor' is sorely underused in English. Красиво сказано, уважаемый Duck! В моём словаре даётся примечание, что слово 'interlocutor' - книжно-литературное (kind of bookish). Is it so? Though, getting off topic a little bit...

alexsms, в OALD это слово отмечено как formal, если "интересный собеседник" перевести как "an interesting interlocutor" и прогуглить - большинство ссылок будут русскими, типа Ирина, Ольга желают познакомиться Лучше эту фразу перевести a nice person to talk to.

Originally Posted by Romik

We have "собеседник", a quite usual word and a Russian-English dictionary translates it to you as "interlocutor" but English speakers seem more like to say - conversation partner, listener, person to talk to - as I take it.

Originally Posted by alexsms

Though, getting off topic a little bit...

Yes, I agree :]
Though Romik makes a good point about how interlocutor is understood in English.
An English speaker who uses interlocutor may just be utilizing their extensive vocabulary.
I've never come across that word in any english classes or books, so I would definitely say it's rarely used. But that doesnt mean people dont know about it at least. :]

Originally Posted by alexsms

The word 'interlocutor' is sorely underused in English. Красиво сказано, уважаемый Duck! В моём словаре даётся примечание, что слово 'interlocutor' - книжно-литературное (kind of bookish). Is it so? Though, getting off topic a little bit...

Yes, it is generally seen as a rather literary word. In fact I didn't even know this word existed until 2 or 3 years ago, and that was only because I was learning about the Platonic dialogues in my philosophy class. It just seems like a useful word that is hardly ever used, and there's no reason it shouldn't be used outside of literary contexts... other than the fact that your interlocutor might not know the word "interlocutor"

Originally Posted by Romik

conversation partner, listener, person to talk to

Yes, these expressions would be encountered more widely, but "conversational partner" and "person to talk to" aren't exactly concise, and "listener" doesn't have quite the same meaning. In fact, I think the most commonly used phrase is "the person [that] I/you/he/she/we/they am/are/is/was/were talking to", which is horribly un-concise.

(Derailing topics is getting to be a bad habit of mine...)

Originally Posted by Demonic_Duck

(Derailing topics is getting to be a bad habit of mine...)

Believe it or not, it's actually ok. :]

And as long as everything gets answered, who cares?

Originally Posted by OceanEyes

I had another question though.
When it comes to using the Genitive to express amounts and ownership, does it work with abstract subjects?
For example: "11 years of hard work", "2 years of sorrow" or "5 nights of dreamless sleep" "the eyes of the ocean"? (I wonder where that last one came from)

hard work, sorrow, dreamless sleep and ocean would all be in the Genitive correct?

I have the hardest time with these cases. Anybody suggest me a book or website to check out?
(Sorry for off-topic)