Breakdown of Dia menanyakan jadwal rapat kepada guru di perpustakaan.
dia
he/she
di
at
guru
the teacher
jadwal rapat
the meeting schedule
Questions & Answers about Dia menanyakan jadwal rapat kepada guru di perpustakaan.
Does "Dia" mean he or she? How is it different from "Ia" or "Beliau"?
- Dia = he/she (gender-neutral). Very common in speech and writing.
- Ia = also he/she, but more formal/literary and usually used as a subject, not after prepositions.
- Beliau = respectful he/she (for teachers, elders, officials).
- Capitalized Dia in the middle of a sentence is typically reserved for God; here it’s capitalized only because it starts the sentence.
Why use menanyakan instead of bertanya?
- bertanya is intransitive: pattern is bertanya kepada [person] (tentang [topic]).
- menanyakan is transitive: pattern is menanyakan [thing/topic] kepada [person].
- Both are correct and mean the same here:
- Dia bertanya kepada guru tentang jadwal rapat.
- Dia menanyakan jadwal rapat kepada guru.
How is menanyakan formed? Why not "mentanyakan"?
- Root: tanya. Prefix meN-
- root + suffix -kan.
- With roots beginning with t, the t drops and the prefix becomes men-: meN- + tanya → menanya-. Add -kan → menanyakan.
- mentanyakan is incorrect.