Breakdown of No hi ha ningú a l'oficina, però la secretària tornarà aviat.
no
not
haver-hi
there be
a
in
però
but
Questions & Answers about No hi ha ningú a l'oficina, però la secretària tornarà aviat.
What does hi ha mean here?
Hi ha is the very common Catalan expression for there is / there are.
So:
- Hi ha ningú would literally be there is nobody / there is anybody
- No hi ha ningú means there is nobody or there isn’t anybody
It helps to learn hi ha as a fixed chunk, because Catalan uses it constantly to talk about existence.
Why is there a hi in No hi ha ningú?
In this expression, hi is part of the standard existential structure hi ha.
Historically, hi is a locative pronoun, but for a learner, the most useful thing is to treat hi ha as one unit meaning there is / there are.
So even if English just uses there, Catalan uses hi ha.
Why does Catalan use both no and ningú? Isn’t that a double negative?