HSK 4 Grammar 09: Prepositions
HSK · HSK · HSK 4 トピック 9 4:13 英語ナレーション・英語＋中文字幕 burning-in
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Two preposition jobs at HSK four. Suizhe ties one moving thing to another moving in step with it: as x changes, y changes. And the brackets zai, something, shang and zai, something, xia frame a field and a condition, in terms of and under such circumstances. Neither has anything to do with physical position, and all three carry a formal, written flavour that sets them apart from everyday chat.
The structure is suizhe, plus a noun and its change, then the main clause. Suizhe jingji de fazhan, shenghuo yuelaiyue hao, as the economy develops, life keeps getting better. Haizimen suizhe yinyue tiao qi le wu, the children started dancing along to the music. The character sui means follow, so the suizhe clause sets a moving backdrop and the main clause tracks it: picture two things moving together, the economy rising and life rising with it. The word is formal in flavour, a news-report word more than a chat word, and casual speech would often reach for yue lai yue or a plain cause clause instead.
Report a change that tracks another. The backdrop: suizhe tianqi bian leng, as the weather turns cold. What tracks it: ganmao de ren yuelaiyue duo le, more and more people are catching colds. Two moving things, one pacing the other, carried by one sentence. Check the relationship before you use the word: suizhe is for movements in step, not for a single static cause, so the sentence should feel like a graph with two lines rising together.
Zai, topic, shang frames the field or aspect something holds in. Zai zhege wenti shang, women de kanfa yiyang, on this matter, our views are the same. The same bracket gives zai lishi shang, in history, and zai yufa shang, grammatically. The caution that gives the pattern its exam value: nothing is physically on top of anything. Zai zhege wenti shang means on this issue, not on top of a problem. The bracket is abstract, and it picks the field the statement lives in.
Zai, condition, xia frames a condition. Zai zhe zhong qingkuang xia, ni hui zenme zuo, under these circumstances, what would you do. And the practice sentence from the handout: zai Xiao Wang de bangzhu xia, women anshi wancheng le xiangmu, with Xiao Wang's help, we finished the project on time. Again the caution: nothing is physically beneath anything. Zai bangzhu xia is with help, not underneath the help. The bracket is abstract, and it picks the condition under which the main clause happens.
Put the cautions in one place. Don't read shang and xia as real positions: zai yufa shang is not on top of grammar, and zai bangzhu xia is not underneath help. The upper bracket picks the field, and the lower bracket picks the condition, and both are abstract. And suizhe keeps its own boundary: it is formal and written in flavour, and it names two movements in step, so save it for reports and essays rather than breakfast conversation.
Pause and check both. First, sui means follow, which is why suizhe clauses keep pace with their backdrops. Second, the condition bracket is zai, something, xia, the lower one, as in zai pengyou de guli xia, with a friend's encouragement, wo jianchi le xiaqu, I kept going. The remaining review question: zai yufa shang means grammatically, in terms of grammar, with nothing sitting on top of anything. Take one bracket into your next paragraph, and let it frame either the field or the condition, never a location.