позајмити ствар
“позајмити ствар” (pozajmiti stvar) — to lend an item in Serbian. Phrase, level B1. The verb works both ways: pozajmio sam mu knjigu, I lent him; pozajmio sam od njega, I borrowed from him. The preposition sorts it out. In a live sentence: “Могу ли да позајмим ствар само за викенд?” — Can I borrow the item for the weekend only? You can hear how it sounds right here. Written with the characters п, о, з, а, ј, м, и, т, и, с, т, в.
In short
| Written in Serbian | позајмити ствар |
| Read in Latin letters | pozajmiti stvar |
| Translation | to lend an item |
| Part of speech | phrase |
| Level | B1 |
- позајмити стварpozajmiti stvarto lend an item
Why it looks that way
The verb works both ways: pozajmio sam mu knjigu, I lent him; pozajmio sam od njega, I borrowed from him. The preposition sorts it out.
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- Могу ли да позајмим ствар само за викенд?Mogu li da pozajmim stvar samo za vikend?Can I borrow the item for the weekend only?
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “to lend an item” in Serbian?
«позајмити ствар», read “pozajmiti stvar”. In a live sentence: “Могу ли да позајмим ствар само за викенд?” — Can I borrow the item for the weekend only? You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Phrase, level B1; written with the characters п, о, з, а, ј, м, и, т, и, с, т, в.
How is “позајмити ствар” written in Latin letters?
pozajmiti stvar. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
The verb works both ways: pozajmio sam mu knjigu, I lent him; pozajmio sam od njega, I borrowed from him. The preposition sorts it out. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how it sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.