Breakdown of Pracujący obywatele apelują o poprawę bezpieczeństwa.
pracować
to work
bezpieczeństwo
the safety
obywatel
the citizen
apelować o
to appeal for
poprawa
improvement
Questions & Answers about Pracujący obywatele apelują o poprawę bezpieczeństwa.
Why does o take the Accusative case here instead of the Locative?
The verb apelować (to appeal) expresses a request for a specific objective. When the preposition o is used with verbs of asking, appealing, or fighting for something, it requires the Accusative case. Here, poprawę is the Accusative form of the feminine noun poprawa (improvement). If o meant 'about' in the context of a discussion, it would take the Locative instead.
What kind of word is pracujący and how is it formed?
It is an active participle, which is essentially a verb acting as an adjective (translating to 'working'). You create it by taking the 'they' form of the present tense verb, pracują (they work), and adding the ending -cy. Because it describes obywatele, it takes the masculine personal plural form, which happens to look exactly identical to the masculine singular form.
The dictionary form of the word for citizen is obywatel. Why is the plural obywatele instead of taking a standard -i or -y ending?
Masculine personal nouns that end in a soft consonant, like the -l in obywatel, typically take the -e ending in the Nominative plural. You might remember this same pattern from other professions or people, such as nauczyciel becoming nauczyciele (teachers) or przyjaciel becoming przyjaciele (friends).
Why is bezpieczeństwa in the Genitive case here?
It directly follows and describes another noun, answering the question 'an improvement of what?'. When linking two nouns this way in Polish (translating to 'improvement of safety'), the second noun must be in the Genitive case. Bezpieczeństwo (safety) is a neuter noun, so its Genitive ending is -a.
Learn Pracujący obywatele apelują o poprawę bezpieczeństwa and more in Polish
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free