Breakdown of Wszyscy mają własne obowiązki i muszą pracować sami.
i
and
mieć
to have
pracować
to work
wszyscy
everyone / all (the)
musieć
to have to
sam
alone / himself (emphatic) / pure / nothing but
własny
own
obowiązek
duty
Questions & Answers about Wszyscy mają własne obowiązki i muszą pracować sami.
Why do we use sami here instead of sam or same?
Sami means "by themselves" or "alone" and it has to match the subject of the sentence. The subject is wszyscy (everyone), which is a masculine personal plural word (referring to a mixed group of people or just men). If the group was entirely female, we would use wszystkie for "everyone" and same for "by themselves".
Why is the word for "everyone" wszyscy and not wszystko?
Wszyscy specifically means "everyone" or "all people" (in a mixed or male group). Wszystko means "everything". Since things cannot have duties and work, we must use the word for people here!
Why does własne end in -e? Doesn't it need to match the plural people?
No, własne (own) describes the noun right after it: obowiązki (duties). Even though the duties belong to the people, the word for "duty" is an inanimate object. For inanimate plural nouns, adjectives take the non-masculine personal ending, which is usually -e.
What is the singular form of obowiązki?
The singular is obowiązek (duty). Notice that the e in the last syllable drops out when you add the plural ending. This dropping e (called a mobile e) is a very common pattern in Polish to make words easier to say!
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