Questions
Nothing moves in a Vietnamese question. Word order stays as it is; a yes/no question is made with a frame around the verb, and a question word sits exactly where the answer will go.
Yes / no: có … không?
The basic frame puts có before the verb and không at the end:
Anh có đi không? — "Are you going?" Chị có thích phở không? — "Do you like phở?" Ở đây có wifi không? — "Is there wifi here?"
In speech the có is usually dropped: Anh đi không? Keeping it is a shade more careful. The answer repeats the verb or uses có / không:
— Có. / Đi. — "Yes." · — Không. — "No."
For a completed action the frame is đã … chưa? and the negative answer is chưa "not yet":
Anh đã ăn chưa? — Chưa. / Rồi. — "Have you eaten? — Not yet. / Yes (already)."
Ăn cơm chưa? "Eaten yet?" is the everyday greeting of the country, and it wants rồi, not an answer about food.
Tags: phải không, à, hả, nhỉ
| tag | force |
|---|---|
| … phải không? | "right?", "isn't it?" — checking a fact; the answer is phải / không phải |
| … đúng không? | the same, "correct?" |
| … à? | mild surprise, seeking confirmation: Anh là người Pháp à? "Oh, you're French?" |
| … hả? | casual, blunt — friends only |
| … nhỉ? | inviting agreement about a shared observation: Hôm nay nóng nhỉ? "Hot today, isn't it?" (north; south hén, ha) |
| … nhé? | seeking consent: Tôi đi nhé? "I'll go, ok?" |
Question words stay in place
| word | meaning | example |
|---|---|---|
| gì | what | Anh ăn gì? — "What are you eating?" (ăn gì = eat what) |
| ai | who | Ai đến? — "Who came?" / Anh gặp ai? — "Who did you meet?" |
| đâu | where | Nhà vệ sinh ở đâu? — "Where is the toilet?" / Anh đi đâu? |
| nào | which (after the noun) | Cái nào? — "Which one?" / Xe nào của anh? |
| bao nhiêu | how much / many | Cái này bao nhiêu (tiền)? — "How much is this?" |
| mấy | how many (small numbers), what time | Mấy giờ rồi? — "What time is it?" / Anh có mấy con? |
| tại sao / sao | why | Tại sao anh không đi? / Sao thế? — "What's up?" |
| thế nào / sao | how, what … like | Anh thấy thế nào? — "What do you think?" (north; south sao) |
| khi nào / bao giờ | when | see below |
Gì comes after the verb because the object comes after the verb. Ai as a subject comes first because the subject comes first. There is no rule for questions; there is only the rule for sentences.
When: the position tells the tense
Khi nào and bao giờ at the start ask about the future; at the end, about the past:
Khi nào anh đi Huế? — "When will you go to Huế?" Anh đi Huế khi nào? — "When did you go to Huế?"
Politeness: wrap, don't rewrite
A polite question is the same question inside a frame: cho tôi hỏi "let me ask" in front, a kin term, and ạ at the end.
Nhà ga ở đâu? → Cho em hỏi, nhà ga ở đâu ạ? — "Excuse me, where is the station?"
Or turn it into wondering aloud with không biết "(I) don't know": Không biết anh có rảnh không? — "I wonder whether you might be free?"
If you speak Korean
Question words staying in place is what Korean does too — 뭐 먹어? is ăn gì?, word for word in the other order. What is new is that Vietnamese cannot ask a yes/no question by intonation or by an ending: it needs the có … không? frame or a tag. Phải không? is 맞지?, nhỉ? is -네요? / -지요?, à? is the surprised 어?.
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