你是做什么工作的？
“What do you do for a living?”
THE DIALOGUE REEL
“He never asked for change. He's really generous.”
你是 做什么工作的 ？
“What do you do for a living?”
做工程的 经常魏阳、省城 两地跑 你呢？
“Construction. I go back and forth between Weiyang and the provincial capital very often. And you?”
Direct spoken expression in this communicative setting.
Asking about one's occupation early in an acquaintance is completely standard and polite in Chinese social etiquette to establish mutual context.
LEARNING CHUNKS & PARTICLES
what kind of work someone does
The standard, polite conversational question used when inquiring about another person's job or career.
Forms a 'shi...de' construction to focus on the nature or category of the action/profession.
VOCABULARY & EXPRESSIONS
Parallel Spoken Cinema Scenes (语义近邻切片)
“What do you do for a living?”
“What work? Delivering packages?”
“Can you tell me about your career plans and goals?”
“What big business have you been dealing with?”
“What kind of business does your company do?”
“What are you doing now? Working?”