polski · A2 · vocabulary · 4 minutes
Feelings and reactions
Describe a feeling, its cause, and changes while keeping gender agreement.
Understand the choice
Emotion adjectives change for speaker gender and often require a specific complement. Learn dumny z, zły na, rozczarowany czymś, and zaskoczony czymś as chunks.
Core rule: Predicate adjectives agree with the experiencer; causes take lexical cases/prepositions such as dumny z + genitive.
Notice it in context
Jestem zdenerwowana egzaminem, ale moja koleżanka pozostaje spokojna.
I am nervous about the exam, but my friend remains calm.
Zdenerwowana agrees with feminine speaker and takes instrumental egzaminem; spokojna agrees with koleżanka.
Jest szczęśliwy, ale czasem smutny i zły.
He is happy but sometimes sad and angry.
Szczęśliwy, smutny, and zły appear in masculine forms.
Dumny uczeń był zaskoczony wynikiem.
The proud pupil was surprised by the result.
Dumny and zaskoczony are listed adjective forms.
What to remember
- Zły can mean angry or bad; complement/context distinguishes it.
- Podekscytowany is excited; wzruszony is moved emotionally.
Common trap: Do not use masculine adjective forms for every speaker.