How to Use 把 Ba Learn Chinese Now

Hey guys and welcome to Learn Chinese Now. Really sorry that we haven't had a video up for the last two weeks, but we've got a pretty cool video for you today. We're going to be looking at the character 把. And so this is a grammatical particle. The actual meaning of the character is meaning maybe to grab or take. It's also used as a measure word. For example, it's the measure word for umbrellas. 一把椅子 All right. Or 一把椅子, the measure word for chairs too. But today we're going to be looking at the grammatical use of it. And so I'm going to give you an example of how this is used. So in Chinese, sentences normally go subject, verb or verb phrase and then object. All right. And a very simple example of that is 我给你 All right. I give to you. I give something to you. So and these sentences, you know, can have more words built up around them. Like 我给你这本书 I give you this book. Okay. That actually has two objects. And 这本书 Okay. Now, how we would use the word 把 in this sentence, you would switch around the order. So we would say 我把这本书给你 Okay. So it's another way of saying the same thing. And I actually like to think of it as I take this book and give it to you. Okay. 我把这本书给你 Okay. And so because 把 can mean to grab or hold, that's how you get that sort of take meaning. Obviously, it's really just a grammatical particle here. But this is how I like to think of it. It'll help you remember it. So 把 always comes immediately before the object that's being manipulated in the sentence. So for example, say to close the door, you could just say 关上门 Okay. So the object that is being manipulated that is being closed is the door. All right. It's being moved. So you would say 把门关上 Okay. That 把 comes before the object that is being manipulated. And you could translate that as literally as take the door and close it. All right. Just means close the door. Here's another one. 把杯子放在桌子上 Take the cup and put it on the table. Now 把 can also be used in negative sentences. So to change that sentence into negative, you would say 不把杯子放在桌子上 Do not take the cup and put it on the table. And if you're going in past tense, you'd say 没有把杯子放在桌子上 So the negative word comes before the word. Okay. When you're negating it. So don't take the cup and put it on the table. I didn't take the cup and put it on the table. Okay. These sentences are a little bit clunky. You know, people wouldn't necessarily use the sentence 不把杯子放在桌子上 You would probably say 那个杯子你不要放在桌子上 Okay. I think the second one is more normal. 我没有把杯子放在桌子上 I did not put the cup on the table. That's more like something you would hear. But you know, just demonstrating the grammar. Sometimes we have to use a more sort of simple sentence that people wouldn't exactly speak exactly like that just to show you and illustrate the grammar rules in a very clear way. Now you shouldn't overuse 把 Okay. It's a little bit like when we talked about 杯 a few videos back. Okay. So if you say 把门关上 Okay. Take the door and close it. All right. You could just say 关门 Okay. 关上门 Or 关门 Which would mean close the door. Okay. There's no point adding in these extra grammatical particles just because you know them. All right. Because people are going to be like, why are you speaking in this kind of weird way? But there are some sentences where you do need it. And I'll give you an example of this. 把这句话翻译成中文 Okay. Take this sentence and translate it into Chinese. You would not be able to say 翻译这句话成中文 Okay. You can't say that. That's using English grammar in Chinese. So the way to say this, really, you need 把 for this sentence. 把这句话翻译成中文 Take this sentence and translate it into Chinese. So guys, that's just a sort of little introduction to the 把 character. The key point is 把 always comes before the noun that is being manipulated, before the object that's being manipulated in the sentence. If you're negating 把, you always put the negative word before the 把 in a sentence. Don't overuse it. Sometimes it's a lot simpler to say stuff without using 把. But there are certain situations where you do need it. And it's a super useful grammatical particle to know. Guys, thanks for watching Learn Chinese Now. As always, I'm Ben Hedges. Please subscribe. If you're new, give this video a thumbs up and keep studying hard. We'll see you next time.