Questions & Answers about Is het erg pijnlijk, zo'n piercing?
Why is the sentence structured as Is het... zo'n piercing instead of just asking Is zo'n piercing erg pijnlijk?
This is right dislocation, which is very common in conversational Dutch. The speaker uses a placeholder pronoun (het) to get the core question out quickly (Is het erg pijnlijk?), and then tacks the specific subject (zo'n piercing) onto the end as a clarification or afterthought.
Because piercing is a de-word (de piercing), shouldn't the placeholder pronoun be hij or die instead of het?
Not necessarily! In right dislocation, when expressing a general attribute or asking about a concept in general, Dutch frequently uses the generic neuter pronoun het (or dat), regardless of the noun's actual gender. If you were pointing at one specific physical piercing, you might hear Is die erg pijnlijk, die piercing? instead.
What exactly is zo'n short for in this sentence?
Zo'n is the contraction of zo een, which translates to 'such a' or 'a thing like that.' It is used here to refer to the general concept of getting this type of body modification.
Does adding the clarified subject at the end affect the word order of the main question?