Lesson 05.Past Tense (Perfect Tense: Perfective & Imperfective)

Lesson Goals

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Form the past tense in Serbian
• Understand the difference between perfective and imperfective verbs in the past tense
• Use auxiliary verb biti (“to be”) + past participle
• Make affirmative, negative, and interrogative sentences in the past tense

1. Structure of the Past Tense

The Serbian perfect tense (used for most past actions) is formed with:

[Present tense of biti] + [Past Participle of main verb]

Example with raditi (to work, imperfective):

• Ja sam radio — I worked / was working (male speaker)
• Ja sam radila — I worked / was working (female speaker)

2. Past Participle Formation

For most verbs:

1. Remove the infinitive ending ti
2. Add o (masc.), la (fem.), lo (neut.) for singular
3. Add li (masc.), le (fem.), la (neut.) for plural

Examples:

• raditi → radio, radila, radilo, radili, radile, radila
• učiti → učio, učila, učilo…

3. Perfective vs. Imperfective in the Past

• Imperfective verbs describe ongoing, repeated, or background actions in the past.
• Juče sam radio ceo dan. — I was working all day yesterday.
• Perfective verbs describe completed actions in the past.
• Juče sam završio posao. — I finished the work yesterday.

Many verbs come in pairs: imperfective ↔ perfective. See Lesson 8 for full aspect rules.

4. Conjugation Example: raditi (to work, imperfective)

5. Negatives

Add ne before the auxiliary verb:

• Ja nisam radio. — I didn’t work.
• Ona nije radila. — She didn’t work.

6. Yes–No Questions

1. da li + auxiliary + subject + participle
• Da li si radio juče? — Did you work yesterday?
2. Inversion
• Jesi li radio juče? — Did you work yesterday?

7. Mini Dialogue (Grammar Focus)

Ana: Šta si radio juče?

(What did you do yesterday?)

Marko: Radio sam u kancelariji. A ti?

(I worked in the office. And you?)

Ana: Nisam radila. Bila sam kod kuće.

(I didn’t work. I was at home.)

8. Vocabulary for This Lesson

9. Practice

A. Complete with the correct form:

1. Ja ____ (raditi, masc.) juče.
2. Ona ____ (učiti) ceo dan.
3. Mi ____ (završiti, masc.) posao.

B. Make negative sentences:

4. I didn’t work yesterday.

5. They (fem.) didn’t finish the job.

C. Ask a yes–no question:

6. Did you study yesterday? (neutral form with “da li”)