Breakdown of Вместо того чтобы показать эмпатию, он показал предубеждение.
он
he / it (for a masculine noun) / it (for a neuter noun)
показать
to show (perfective)
тот
that
чтобы
in order to
вместо
instead of
эмпатия
empathy
предубеждение
prejudice
вместо того чтобы
instead of (doing something)
Questions & Answers about Вместо того чтобы показать эмпатию, он показал предубеждение.
How would we expand this sentence to say he showed prejudice 'towards us', using the grammar from this lesson?
You would add по отношению к (in relation to / towards) followed by the Dative pronoun нам. The phrase предубеждение по отношению к нам perfectly demonstrates this lesson's compound preposition, which is commonly used after nouns expressing attitude or stance like эмпатия or предубеждение.
Why is the English gerund 'showing' translated with чтобы and an infinitive?
To express 'instead of doing something', Russian uses the compound conjunction вместо того чтобы followed by an infinitive. You cannot use the preposition вместо directly with a verb. If you wanted to express this using just nouns, you would drop the verb entirely and say вместо эмпатии (instead of empathy) using the Genitive case.
Both times 'show' is used, it's the perfective verb показать. Why not the imperfective показывать?
The perfective is used because it refers to a single, specific event with a factual result. He was expected to demonstrate empathy in that particular moment, but delivered a singular display of prejudice instead. If the sentence described a repeated habit over time, you would use the imperfective показывать.
The word for prejudice, предубеждение, looks like it's made of several parts. How does it break down?
It is built from the prefix пред- (meaning before or pre) and the noun убеждение (meaning conviction or belief). It mirrors the English concept of prejudice as a firmly held belief formed ahead of time.
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