Learn Hardcore Malay: Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano membuat keluarganya bangga. - Her/His talent in guitar and piano makes her/his family proud.

As a noun:
- Dia ada bakat. – He/She has talent.
- Bakat dia pada muzik sangat jelas. – His/Her talent in music is very clear.
Often followed by a preposition + field/skill:
- bakat dia pada gitar dan piano – his/her talent in guitar and piano
- bakat dia dalam sukan – his/her talent in sports

Related form:

berbakat = talented (adjective / stative verb)
- Dia sangat berbakat. – He/She is very talented.

In your sentence, bakat is the head noun of the subject phrase Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano (“his/her talent in guitar and piano”).

Why is dia placed after bakat? Could we say Dia berbakat pada gitar dan piano instead?

In Malay, both structures are possible but they’re slightly different grammatically:

Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano membuat keluarganya bangga.
- Literally: His/Her talent in guitar and piano makes his/her family proud.
- bakat = noun (“talent”)
- dia = possessive (“his/her”) → bakat dia = his/her talent
- The subject is the talent.
Dia berbakat pada gitar dan piano, (dan itu) membuat keluarganya bangga.
- Literally: He/She is talented in guitar and piano, (and that) makes his/her family proud.
- dia = subject (“he/she”)
- berbakat = stative verb/adjective (“is talented”)
- The subject is the person.

So:

Bakat dia … membuat … focuses on the talent itself as the thing causing pride.
Dia berbakat …, (dan itu) membuat … focuses on him/her as the cause.

Both are correct; they just frame the idea differently.

What exactly does pada mean here, and could we use di or dalam instead?

Pada is a preposition. Here it roughly means in or in the area of:

bakat dia pada gitar dan piano ≈ his/her talent in guitar and piano

Common choices and nuances:

pada
- Used with:
  - people: pada dia (to/for him/her)
  - abstract things: bakat pada muzik, minat pada sejarah
- Often sounds natural in “talent in X” expressions.
dalam
- Literally in/inside; also used for fields or domains:
  - bakat dia dalam muzik klasik – his/her talent in classical music
- Here, bakat dia dalam gitar dan piano is understandable and acceptable, though pada feels slightly more common/natural with instruments for some speakers.
di
- Normally at/in (a place): di rumah, di sekolah.
- bakat dia di gitar dan piano is not idiomatic; speakers would avoid di here.

So, best options here:

pada – very natural.
dalam – also OK, especially for broader fields like dalam muzik, dalam seni.

What is the subject and what is the verb of the sentence?

Sentence: Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano membuat keluarganya bangga.

Breakdown:

Subject (whole noun phrase):
Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano
→ His/Her talent in guitar and piano
Verb (predicate head):
membuat
→ makes / causes
Object / complement phrase:
keluarganya bangga
→ his/her family (be) proud

Structure in a simple pattern:

[Subject] Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano
[Verb] membuat
[Object + complement] keluarganya bangga

So the talent is the thing that makes the family proud.

What does membuat mean here, and is membuatkan also possible?

Membuat is the active verb from buat (“do/make”).
Here it means to make / to cause:

membuat keluarganya bangga – makes his/her family proud

About membuat vs membuatkan:

membuat
- Very common and natural here.
- Bakat dia … membuat keluarganya bangga.
membuatkan
- Also grammatically possible: Bakat dia … membuatkan keluarganya bangga.
- Feels a bit more formal or slightly heavier in style.
- Often used when emphasizing that something causes a state or feeling.

In everyday usage, membuat is perfectly fine and probably more common in this sentence. Using membuatkan wouldn’t be wrong; it just gives a slightly more formal or “written” feel.

What does the -nya in keluarganya mean? How is it different from keluarga dia?

Keluarga = family.
-nya is a third‑person pronoun suffix that often means his/her/their (or sometimes the).

So:

keluarganya ≈ his/her family (most likely meaning here)
keluarga dia = also his/her family

Differences:

Formality / style
- keluarganya: a bit more neutral or slightly more formal, common in writing.
- keluarga dia: more clearly colloquial, often in speech.
Compactness
- -nya attaches directly to the noun: keluarganya, bukunya, rumahnya.
- dia is a separate word: keluarga dia, buku dia, rumah dia.

In this sentence:

keluarganya most naturally means his/her family (the family of the person mentioned by dia).

Why is it just bangga at the end? Do we need something like adalah or berasa bangga?

In Malay, adjectives can function directly as predicates without a separate verb like “to be”.

bangga = proud (adjective / stative verb)

So:

keluarganya bangga = his/her family is proud

You do not say:

✗ keluarganya adalah bangga (unnatural)
✗ keluarganya ialah bangga (also wrong)

Optional variations:

keluarganya berasa bangga – his/her family feels proud
keluarganya sangat bangga – his/her family is very proud

But in your sentence, membuat keluarganya bangga is already fully natural as “makes his/her family proud”.

Could we say bakatnya pada gitar dan piano instead of bakat dia pada gitar dan piano?

Yes, you can.

bakat dia pada gitar dan piano
bakatnya pada gitar dan piano

Both can mean his/her talent in guitar and piano.

Nuances:

bakat dia: clearer, more explicitly “his/her” (colloquial and neutral).
bakatnya: more compact, feels a bit more formal or written; in some contexts it can also be interpreted as “the talent” (with -nya acting like a definite article “the”), but here the natural reading is still “his/her talent”.

So the whole sentence could also be:

Bakatnya pada gitar dan piano membuat keluarganya bangga.
→ Also correct and natural.

What tense is this sentence in? How do we know if it’s past, present, or future?

Malay verbs usually don’t change form for tense. Membuat stays the same for past, present, and future; the time is understood from context or extra words.

Your sentence Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano membuat keluarganya bangga can mean:

His/Her talent in guitar and piano makes his/her family proud. (general/present)
His/Her talent in guitar and piano made his/her family proud. (past, if context is about the past)
His/Her talent in guitar and piano will make his/her family proud. (future, with the right context)

To be explicit, Malay often adds time markers:

dulu / sebelum ini (before/previously) – past
sekarang (now) – present
akan / nanti (will/later) – future

Example:

Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano dulu membuat keluarganya bangga. – used to make his/her family proud (past)
Bakat dia pada gitar dan piano akan membuat keluarganya bangga. – will make his/her family proud (future)

Does dia always mean “he/she”? Can it ever mean “it” like in English?

Dia primarily means he or she (third‑person singular human). It is gender‑neutral.

Most of the time: dia = a person (he/she).

For “it”, Malay often:

omits the pronoun, or
uses the noun again, or
(more rarely) uses dia for animals or very personified things.

In your sentence:

Bakat dia clearly means his/her talent (a human possessor).

You would not naturally interpret dia here as “its talent” (for a non‑human thing) unless the larger context is clearly about an animal or some personified entity.

How would this sentence be said more casually in everyday speech?

A more casual, spoken‑style version might simplify some parts and use dia instead of -nya:

Some possibilities:

Bakat dia main gitar dengan piano buat keluarga dia bangga.
Dia berbakat main gitar dengan piano, buat keluarga dia bangga.
Dia pandai main gitar dengan piano, sebab tu keluarga dia bangga.

Notes:

main gitar/piano – “play guitar/piano”; common in speech.
dengan instead of dan – very common in casual talk.
buat instead of membuat – more informal.
keluarga dia instead of keluarganya – more colloquial.

The original sentence is neutral and perfectly natural; these are just more conversational variants.