Word
Я часто общаюсь с этим умным человеком.
Meaning
I often communicate with this smart person.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Я часто общаюсь с этим умным человеком.
я
I
человек
person
этот
this [f: эта, n: это]
часто
often
Questions & Answers about Я часто общаюсь с этим умным человеком.
Why do этот and умный change to этим умным in this sentence?
The verb общаться (to communicate) pairs with the preposition с (with), which requires the Instrumental case. Since человек is a masculine noun, the demonstrative pronoun этот changes to its Instrumental form этим, and the adjective умный takes the masculine Instrumental ending -ым.
Since the lesson covers the Instrumental case without a preposition, could we drop the с here?
No, you must keep с here because you are communicating together with a person. You only drop the preposition when using the bare Instrumental case to name a tool you are using to perform an action, like writing with a pen (писать ручкой).
Is человеком the regular Instrumental form of человек? I thought this word was irregular.
Yes, it is completely regular in the singular! It simply adds the standard masculine Instrumental ending -ом. It is only considered irregular because of its plural form, where it changes to a completely different word (люди - people).
Why does the verb общаюсь end in -сь instead of -ся?