Learn about some common prefixes in Romanian
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Intro |
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| Antoni: What are some prefixes in Romanian? |
| Anna: And why are they useful to know? |
| Antoni: At RomanianPod101.com, we hear these questions often. Imagine the following situation: Ben Lee is with his friend, Mara Moldoveanu, who is drinking Coke. Ben says, |
| "That's unhealthy." |
| Ben Lee: Este nesănătos. |
| Dialogue |
| Ben Lee: Este nesănătos. |
| Mara Moldoveanu: Știu, dar îmi place. |
| Antoni: Once more with the English translation. |
| Ben Lee: Este nesănătos. |
| Antoni: "That's unhealthy." |
| Mara Moldoveanu: Știu, dar îmi place. |
| Antoni: "I know, but I like it." |
Lesson focus |
| Antoni: In this lesson, you will be learning about prefixes in Romanian and why they are useful to know. To begin with, let's talk about what a prefix is. While studying Romanian, you might have noticed that several words begin with the same letter groupings. These groupings are called prefixes. A familiar prefix in English is "re-" which is usually added to words in order to convey a sense of something being repeated. Consider words like "redo," "revisit," "restructure," and the like. |
| Prefixes usually can't be broken down into smaller components and, while they carry meaning, they are not actually words. Instead, they are added to other words in order to modify those words. The Romanian word for "prefix" is easy to remember because it sounds so much like the English: |
| Anna: prefix. |
| Antoni: A common Romanian prefix was used in the dialogue for this lesson so let's quickly listen to the relevant part of the dialogue again before we proceed to explore examples of various common Romanian prefixes. |
| [Recall 1] |
| Antoni: Do you remember how Ben says, "That's unhealthy?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Anna as Ben Lee: Este nesănătos. |
| Antoni: Here Ben uses the word |
| Anna: nesănătos |
| Antoni: which, as we have learned, means "unhealthy." The English word is prefixed with "un" which is a prefix that is used to form a word that is the antonym of the root word to which the prefix is attached. The same is true of the Romanian prefix |
| Anna: ne- |
| Antoni: Knowing this, it is easy to deduce that the root word |
| Anna: sănătos |
| Antoni: means "healthy." Knowing Romanian prefixes is useful because, if you already know the word for "healthy," for instance, but you don't know what the word |
| Anna: nesănătos |
| Antoni: means, then you can easily figure it out through a simple process of deduction. This is because you know that the prefix forms antonyms of the root word to which it is attached. Knowing that this prefix forms antonyms can, therefore, help you understand what certain words mean, even if you have never encountered them before. Let's try another example with this prefix. If we know that the word |
| Anna: hotărât |
| Antoni: means "decided," for instance, we can then figure out that the word |
| Anna: nehotărât |
| Antoni: means the opposite—"undecided." Again, this is because we know that attaching the prefix forms a new word that is an antonym of the root word. This prefix is, in fact, the most common Romanian prefix. Another, less common prefix that forms antonyms of the root word is |
| Anna: in. |
| Antoni: It can be attached to a word like |
| Anna: decis |
| Antoni: which means "determined" or "resolute" in order to form the antonym meaning "irresolute:" |
| Anna: indecis. |
| Antoni: There is also another prefix that creates antonyms when attached to a root word. It has two forms: |
| Anna: des |
| Antoni: and |
| Anna: dez |
| Antoni: If it is attached to a word like |
| Anna: a face |
| Antoni: which means "to do," then the newly formed word means the opposite—"to undo:" |
| Anna: a desface. |
| Antoni: And now that you know how these Romanian prefixes work, we can discuss a few more examples of prefixes, but, before we do that, let's quickly review what we've learned so far. |
| [Summary] |
| Antoni: In this lesson so far, you have learned that a prefix is a small unit of language that is not a word but still carries meaning. Usually, a prefix cannot be broken down into a smaller unit of meaning. It is attached to the beginning of a root word in order to modify that root word. Knowing how prefixes modify the words they are attached to can help you to understand the meaning of certain words, even if you have never encountered them before. For that reason, let's now have a look at some other common Romanian prefixes. The first one we will discuss is |
| Anna: în-. |
| Antoni: This prefix is used to form derivational verbs such as |
| Anna: a înfricoșa |
| Antoni: which means "to scare" or "to fill with fear." This verb is derived from a Romanian adjective meaning "cowardly" or "fearful:" |
| Anna: fricos. |
| Antoni: Let's try another example. If we start with the Romanian noun meaning "blockhead" or "idiot," which is: |
| Anna: dobitoc |
| Antoni: we can derive a verb from it by adding the prefix: |
| Anna: a îndobitoci. |
| Antoni: This verb means "to make stupid or dull." It can also mean "to make like a brute," or "to brutify." There is an important variation of this prefix that we should take note of, and it sounds like this: |
| Anna: îm-. |
| Antoni: It imparts to the root word that it modifies the same meaning as |
| Anna: în- |
| Antoni: but is used before root words that start with a "B" or a "P," such as |
| Anna: a împușca |
| Antoni: which means "to shoot," but with a gun, not a camera. This word is derived from the noun |
| Anna: pușcă |
| Antoni: which means "gun." Another common Romanian prefix is |
| Anna: răs-. |
| Antoni: When this prefix is attached to a root word, the newly formed word usually denotes a repetition or return to the action that the verb refers to. This next word, for instance, means "to read the same thing many times:" |
| Anna: a răsciti. |
| Antoni: A similar prefix which is also used in English in the same way is |
| Anna: re- |
| Antoni: An example of how it can be used is in the Romanian word for "resubscribe" is: |
| Anna: a reabona. |
| Antoni: You have now learned a few of the more common prefixes that are used in Romanian. |
| Expansion/Contrast (Optional) |
| Antoni: Let's end with some examples of indefinite adverbs and indefinite pronouns in Romanian. Indefinite adverbs are words like "anywhere"– |
| Anna: oriunde, |
| Antoni: "anyhow"– |
| Anna: oricum, |
| Antoni: and "anytime"– |
| Anna: oricând. |
| Antoni: All of the Romanian indefinite adverbs we've just mentioned began with |
| Anna: ori |
| Antoni: and this is also true of the indefinite pronouns such as "anything" |
| Anna: orice |
| Antoni: and "anyone" |
| Anna: oricine. |
| Antoni: Indefinite adverbs and pronouns in Romanian can be placed before or after the verb in a sentence, but they usually follow the verb. If the indefinite adverb comes before the verb, then it is usually for the sake of emphasis. |
Outro |
| Antoni: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them! |
| Anna: La revedere. |
| Antoni: See you soon! |
| Credits: Anna (Romanian, Romania), Antoni (English, synthetic voice) |
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