“To Be” (Part 3)

Here are the translations for the last two sentences on the previous page:

그것이   무엇입니까? 그것이   책입니다.
What is this thing (nearby)? This thing is a book.

이것이   무엇입니까? 이것이   집입니다.
What is this thing (here)? This thing is a house.

I’ve given the answer as a complete sentence because it gives you more practice with the full construction. In conversation, you wouldn’t normally repeat the subject in your response. Instead, you’d drop the "this thing/that thing" in the answer and have a dialogue as follows:

그것이   무엇입니까? 책입니다.
What is this thing (nearby)? It’s a book.
이것이   무엇입니까? 집입니다.
What is this thing (here)? It’s a house.

When you’re first learning a language, you don’t want to start dropping words out too early; otherwise you end up speaking like a caveman:

Q: What’s that thing?
A: A book.

Q: Where are you going now?
A: The movies.

Q: What have you been doing lately?
A: Ug.

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