Particles

Particles are uninflected words with independent syntactic position in a sentence. Moreover, some particles can function as discourse organizers since they often refer to objects or contents beyond the sentence they belong to syntactically. Particles can modify the meaning of the entire sentence or the meaning of the separate words, for instance: Czy ktos jest w domu? (Is anyone at home) - the particle czy modifies the entire sentence, chodzze! (Come!), the particle ze modifies only the verb. This feature accounts for the difficulty in differentiating particles from adverbs, which in Polish are also uninflected, have characteristic ending -o or -e, and have similar syntactic functions as particles.

Particles can be divided into 3 main groups:

1. Particles expressing moods. For example:

interrogative: czy, Czy jesteśgotów? (Are you ready?);

negative: Ja nie wiem, co mam robić. (I don't know what I am supposed to do.);

imperative: Niech tak bedzie! (Let it be that way!);

ze, no, Badzze cicho! (Be quiet!);

reflexive Particles such as "się" described in the section on Reflexive Verbs.

tylko, Tylko tego brakowalo! (Now that is happening!)