Change of state with "le"

Revision as of 09:18, 20 February 2014 by Yucui (talk | contribs)
Chinese-grammar-wiki-le.jpg
Also known as: 了2, change-of-state 了, sentence 了 and modal 了.

了 (le) has a lot of uses. You probably first learned 了 (le) as a particle that tells you an action is completed, which is also known as "了1". This article is not about that use of 了 (le); it's about indicating a change of state (了2). In other words, there is now a new situation, or there is about to be a new situation. This whole "change of state" idea can take numerous forms, and this page includes some good general examples.

Structure

When used in this way, 了(le) is placed at the end of the sentence to mark that the whole statement describes a new situation.

[New Situation] + 了

Examples

Some examples:

  • 我 会 说 中文 (I couldn't before)I can speak Chinese now.
  • 我 有 女朋友 (I didn't have one before)I have a girlfriend now.
  • 我 想 妈妈 (I didn't before now)I miss my mom now.
  • 我 25 岁 I'm 25 years old now.
  • 我 明白
  • 我 有 钱
  • 他 笑
  • 没 有 水
  • 下 雨
  • 你 胖

See also

Sources and further reading

Books

Websites