⚙️ 9 | 1 | Lekcija 2: Dnevni ritam – Gramatika

Dr. Frane Karabatić

Cjelina 9: U zdravom tijelu zdrav duh

⚙️ 9 | 1 | Lekcija 2: Dnevni ritam – Gramatika

Activities and repetition

When we want to express that we do something regularly (i.e., an action that repeats on certain days/times), we need to use the Instrumental case. As you can see in today’s lesson (dialogue four), Luka said:

🏀 Ponedjeljkom, srijedom i petkom je košarka, a ⚽ utorkom i četvrtkom nogomet.

In this sentence, the days are expressed in the Instrumental case, which indicates that the action of playing basketball repeats regularly on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. While soccer is usually on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

❗ When we express the meaning of repeating an action on a certain day, it is also very common to use words such as često (often), ponekad (sometimes), or nikada (never) in the sentence. Remember that when we use nikada we also need to use the negative particle. For example: Ja nikada ne igram nogomet vikendom. Look at the following examples and note the difference in their meanings:

U subotu idem u park.

U subotu (preposition + accusative)
This Saturday I [will] go to the park.

Subotom idem u park.

(instrumental)
On Saturdays I go to the park.

Reflexive verbs

You have already encountered reflexive verbs throughout the previous units. However, now we will look at some that have irregular forms (i.e. those that use different types of endings based on their infinitive form).

In this lesson you encountered regular verbs whose forms change based on the regular -ati or -iti endings. However, you also encountered some verbs whose forms change differently than what we would think based on their infinitive endings. Let’s look at both groups more closely.

–ati verbs

šminkati se, brijati se, tuširati se, prati [zube], češljati se, umivati se

–iti verbs

buditi se, oblačiti se

Group 1: Regular (expected) endings

–ati verbs	with personal pronoun	without personal pronoun
češljati se	ja se češljam	češljam se
umivati se	ja se umivam	umivam se
tuširati se	ja se tuširam	tuširam se
šminkati se	ja se šminkam	šminkam se

–iti verbs	with personal pronoun	without personal pronoun
buditi se	ja se budim	budim se
oblačiti se	ja se oblačim	oblačim se

Group 2: Irregular (unexpected) endings

These verbs use a different set of endings than what their infinitive ending would suggest.

–ati verbs	With a personal pronoun	Without a personal pronoun
brijati se	ja se brijem	brijem se
prati se	ja se perem	perem se

The verb “brijati (se)”

Verb brijati se: when we cut the infinitive ending -ati, what is left is brij–. Thus, since the infinitive stem ends in -j- (one of the Croatian palatal letters), we need to use the endings -em, -eš, -e, etc.

audio	pronoun	verb form
	ja	brij-em se
	ti	brij-eš se
	on/ona/ono	brij-e se
	mi	brij-emo se
	vi	brij-ete se
	oni/one/ona	brij-u se

The verb “prati (se)”

Verb prati se: when we cut the infinitive ending -ati, what is left is pr–. Thus, since the infinitive stem has only one syllable composed of two consonants, we need to add -e- between pr– (for easier pronunciation) and then add the endings -em, -eš, -e, etc.

audio	pronoun	verb form
	ja	p-e-r-em (se)
	ti	p-e-r-eš (se)
	on/ona/ono	p-e-r-e (se)
	mi	p-e-r-emo (se)
	vi	p-e-r-ete (se)
	oni/one/ona	p-e-r-u (se)

Reflexive or not? When to use them?

All of the above verbs can be either reflexive or not. The difference is:

Reflexive verb

It means the action comes back to the subject. The subject of the verb is also its object. When we take a shower (tuširati se), we shower ourselves, when we put on makeup (šminkati se), we make up ourselves, when we wake up (buditi se), we wake ourselves up.

NOT reflexive verb

It means the subject (of the verb) performs the action on something or someone else (i.e., the subject and object of the verb are different).

Let’s look at the following sentence:

Croatian	English
Ja se perem ujutro.	I shower (myself) in the morning.
Ja perem zube ujutro.	I brush my teeth in the morning.
Ja se uvijek budim u 7:00.	I always wake (myself) up at 7am.
Ja budim sestru u 7:00 svaki dan.	I wake my sister up at 7am every day.
Ja se češljam ujutro.	I comb my (own) hair in the morning.
Ja češljam sestru ujutro.	I comb my sister’s hair in the morning.
Ja se šminkam svaki dan.	I put makeup on (myself) every day.
Ja šminkam sestru svaki dan.	I put makeup on my sister every day.

As you can see, all the sentences that DON’T have a reflexive verb use the Accusative case, indicating that the person performing the action is performed on someone/something else.

9.1.2 Zadatak 1: Što radiš?

Look at the following pictures. Complete the sentences in a logical way using the ja form. Then, indicate whether the verb is reflexive or not.

Shaving a person's hair

Brijem glavu, vruće je ljeti. (brijati – not a reflexive verb)

Man shaving

Ja se brijem svako jutro. (brijati se – reflexive verb)

Media Attributions

License

Icon for the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License