UNIT NINE
Questions
In this unit we will look at the most common ways of asking questions in
Italian. We have already seen (Units 4 and 5) that the order of the words in
the sentence does not change in the interrogative form; now we need to look
at some Italian ‘question words’.
1 Chi?
Chi means ‘who/whom’, or sometimes ‘which of’, and is only used to refer to
people. Chi is invariable – that is, the same form is used for masculine and
feminine, singular and plural:
When an adjective refers to chi, it must be in the masculine singular form
unless it refers to an all-female group:
Chi è quell’uomo?
Chi è quella ragazza?
Chi sono i tuoi amici?
Chi sono quelle ragazze?
Chi vuole venire al cinema
con me?
Chi viene a cena?
Con chi esci?
A chi scrivete?
Chi ha una penna?
Chi non va in gita domani?
Chi non inviti?
Chi di loro parla italiano?Who is that man?
Who is that girl?
Who are your friends?
Who are those girls?
Who wants to come to the cinema with me?Who’s coming for dinner?
Who(m) are you going out with?
Who(m) are you writing to?
Who’s got a pen? [i.e. has anyone got a pen?]
Who’s not going on the trip tomorrow?
Who(m) aren’t you inviting?
Which of them speaks Italian?Chi è pronto?
Chi è soddisfatto?
Chi non è stanco?
Chi di voi (ragazze) è pronta?
Chi di voi (Signori) è italiano?Who is ready?
Who is satisfied?
Who isn’t tired?
Which of you (girls) is ready?
Which of you (gentlemen) is Italian?