Breakdown of Коллеги продолжают согласовывать договор.
договор
contract / treaty
продолжать
to continue
коллега
colleague
согласовывать
to approve (imperfective)
Questions & Answers about Коллеги продолжают согласовывать договор.
Why is согласовывать imperfective here? Shouldn't approving a contract be a single completed action?
Even though approving a contract has a clear goal, the verb продолжают (continue) forces the next verb to be imperfective. In Russian, verbs that express starting, continuing, or finishing an action always take an imperfective infinitive because they focus on the ongoing process itself.
Could we add a deadline like к пятнице (by Friday) from this current lesson to this sentence?
No, you wouldn't use к + Dative with this exact sentence. The preposition к for deadlines focuses on a completed result, so it naturally pairs with perfective verbs (e.g., Они согласуют договор к пятнице - They will have approved the contract by Friday). Because this sentence describes an ongoing process, if you wanted to add a time limit, you would instead use до + Genitive (until Friday: до пятницы).
Why didn't the ending of the word договор change?
Договор (contract) is the direct object receiving the action, so it is in the Accusative case. However, because it is a masculine, inanimate noun, its Accusative form looks exactly the same as its Nominative (dictionary) form.
Согласовывать is quite a mouthful. Is there an easier way to remember this vocabulary word?
It helps to break it down! It comes from the noun согласие (agreement), which itself is built from the prefix со- (with/together) and голос (voice) — literally meaning to speak with one voice. The -ыва- part in the middle is just a standard suffix used to build imperfective verbs.
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