Learn about a future tense in Chinese
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Intro |
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| Hi everybody! Yinru here. Welcome to Ask a Teacher, where I’ll answer some of your most common Chinese questions. |
| The Question |
| The question for this lesson is: Does Chinese have a future tense? |
| Explanation |
| Just like there’s no past tense in Chinese, there’s no future tense in Chinese either. You can indicate something is going to happen in the future by using the auxiliary words 会 (huì ), 要 (yào), and/or add future time phrases, like 明天 (míngtiān “tomorrow”), 下个月(xià ge yuè, “next month”), and so on. |
| 会 (huì) can be translated as “will” or “will expect to.” In comparison, 要 (yào) indicates one’s intention, like “to be going to” or “to want to.” Let’s look at some examples: |
| 明晚我会去看电影。(Míngwǎn wǒ huì qù kàn diànyǐng. “Tomorrow night, I will go see a movie.”) |
| 你要跟我一起去吗？(Nǐ yào gēn wǒ yìqǐ qù ma? “Do you want to go with me?”) |
| 下个星期我会去上海。(Xià ge xīngqī wǒ huì qù Shànghǎi. “I will go to Shanghai next week.”) |
| To make negative forms, just put a 不 bù in front of 会 (huì) and 要(yào) to make it 不会 (búhuì)，不要 (búyào). For example: |
| 她不会喜欢这个地方的。(Tā búhuì xǐhuān zhège dìfang de. “She won’t like this place.”) |
| 我不要跟你一起去上海。(Wǒ búyào gēn nǐ yìqǐ qù Shànghǎi. “I am not going to go to Shanghai with you.”) |
| Some more time phrases expressing the future include 下星期三 (xià xīngqī sān “next Wednesday”), 后天 (hòutiān “the day after tomorrow”), 明年 (míngnián “next year”), 以后 (yǐhòu “in the future”), etc. |
| 我下星期三会给你打电话。(Wǒ xià xīng qī sān huì gěi nǐ dǎ diànhuà. “Next Wednesday I will give you a call.”) |
| 你明年要毕业了吗？(Nǐ míngnián yào bìyè le ma? “Are you going to graduate next year?”) |
| 以后我不会再来了。(Yǐhòu wǒ búhuì zài lái le. “I will not come again in the future.”) |
Outro |
| How was it? Pretty interesting, right? |
| Do you have any more questions? Leave them in the comments below, and I’ll try to answer them! |
| 我们下期再见! Wǒmen xià qī zàijiàn! Bye! |
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