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There are some constructions that use Nai-form of verbs. But some of them use Nai-form with a little bit of changes. In today’s construction, “Nai” of Nai-form changes to be “Nakereba”. This “nai” is an auxiliary-adjective which ends with letter “i”. Therefore, “nai” conjugates in the same way as I-adjectives. But the conjugation from “i” to “kereba” will be taught in last half in beginners’ level. At this time, simply remember that “V-nakereba naranai” desecribes obligation and/or necessity.
Learn the following sentences and try to remember them;
1. Ashita, Sensei ni Awanakereba Narimasen. (I have to meet my teacher tomorrow.)
2. Kuukou de Pasupo’oto o Misenakereba Narimasen. (I have to show my passport in the airport.)
3. Shiken Benkyou o Shinakereba Narimasen. (I need to study for examination. )
This post was written with reference to the exercise A3 on Section 17 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
We have already learned one of conjugation pattern, Nai-form of verbs. Nai-form is useful when distinguishing between Group2 and Group1 verbs. If a vowel before “nai” is “i” or “e”, the verb is of Gourp2. If a vowel before “nai” is “a”, the verb is of Group1. Of course, you need to know that “Kuru/Kimasu” and “Suru/Shimasu” are the Group3 verbs.
Today, let us learn a construction that uses Nai-forms of a verb.
1. [V-nai] de Kudasai.
This construction is basically to prohibit an action that a listener may be going to do. There is a strong expression when you need to stop someone to do something. It’s “Dictionary form + na!”. “[V-nai] de Kudasai.” is more moderate and polite than “[V(dictionary)]+na!”. However, even “[V-nai] de Kudasai.” may sometimes sound like an order. So, please be careful for the situation and whom you are going to say this expression.
Example of “[V-nai] de Kudasai.”
The followings are to forbid an Action;
– Osake o Nomanai*de Kudasai. (Please do not drink alcohol.)
*Nomanai = Nai-form of the verb “Nomu/Nomimasu(drink)”
– Koko ni Hairanai*de Kudasai. (Please do not enter here.)
*Hairanai = Nai-form of the verb “Hairu/Hairimasu (enter/get in)”
Sometimes this construction is used for not only forbidding an action but, by saying so, for expressing your feeling of care about a listener. The followings are to express your caring;
– Sumaho o Wasurenai* de Kudasai. (Please do not leave your smartphone behind.)
*Wasurenai = Nai-form of the verb “Wasureru/Wasuremasu (forget)”
– Amari Shimpaishinai* de Kudasai. (Please do not worry about it so much)
*Shimpaishinai = Nai-form of the verb “Shimpaisuru/Shimpaishimasu (worry)”
This post was written with reference to the exercise A2 on Section 17 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
Now it’s already 9p.m. I don’t have time to write a post about Japanese Learning tonight.
I found them on the shelves of a local grocery store today. 220 means that two hundred and twenty Japanese Yen.
I think that those two were disappeared into my stomach within three minutes.
Quiz answers have to come first:
Yesterday’s quiz was to ask which of to or de fits in the sentences.
Q1 : Satou-san wa Nihonjin { to or de } Daigakusei desu.
Q2 : Asoko ni Satou-san { to or de } Suzuki-san ga Imasu.
A1=de, A2=to
Let’s start for today’s leaning. Nai-form of a verb functions to negate the verb. For example, “Taberu (eat)” is the dictionary form, and the Nai-form of “Taberu” is “Tabenai” which means “not eat”. Therefore, you need to use Nai-forms of verb when you want to negate an action.
In addition, Nai-form can be a useful tool in order to learn conjugation patterns of verbs, because Nai-form tells you what group a verb belongs to. When you want to know which group a verb belongs to Group1 or Group2, first make Nai-form of the verb. And then check the vowel just in front of “nai”.
Group2 = the vowel is “i” or “e”
Group1= the vowel is “a”
Examples(Group2)
– Miru(look, watch, see)
=> Nai-form:Minai => Vowel before “nai” : i => Group2
– Taberu(eat)
=> Nai-form:Tabenai => Vowel before “nai”:e => Group2
Examples (Group1)
– Kau (buy)
=> Nai-form:Kawanai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-W
– Kiku (hear, listen)
=> Nai-form:Kikanai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-K
– Isogu (hurry, hasten)
=> Nai-form:Isoganai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-G
– Hanasu (talk, speak)
=> Nai-form:Hanasanai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-S
– Matsu (wait)
=> Nai-form:Matanai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-T
– Asobu (play to have a fun)
=> Nai-form:Asobanai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-B
– Nomu (drink)
=> Nai-form:Nomanai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-M
– Kaeru (go home)
=> Nai-form:Kaeranai=> Vowel before “nai”:a=> Group1-R
As for Group3 verbs, there are only two. They are “Kuru/Kimasu” and “Suru/Shimasu”. Therefore, you don’t need to use Nai-form to distinguish Groups of verbs. Note that “Suru/Shimasu” has a lot of variations in the forms of [Action Noun]+Suru/Shimasu like “Benkyou-Shimasu”.
Nai-form is necessary to negate action. But this doesn’t you always use Nai-form to make negative sentences. In the case of a verb predicate sentence in present tense, sometimes Japanese would say;
– Watashi wa Osake o Nomanai desu.
You see that the Nai-form “Nomanai” is used in order to negate the verb “Nomu (drink)”. Actually, this sentence sounds a little casual. The following sounds polite and is much better than “Nomanai desu.
– Watashi wa Osake o Nomimasen. (I don’t drink alcohol.)
Furthermore, for the past tense, you need to know the followings;
<WRONG> Kinou, Watashi wa Osake o Nomanai deshita.
<RIGHT> Kinou, Watashi wa Osake o Nomimasen deshita.
(Yesterday, I didn’t drink alcohol.)
Anyway, Nai-form is one of the important conjugation patterns. Try so that you can make Nai-form of any Japanese verbs.
This post was written with reference to the exercise A1 on Section 17 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
Yesterday, we learned how to use two adjectives in a sentence. I wrote at the beginning of yesterday’s post that “‘to’ is to juxtapose two nouns”.
Today’s construction may seem to be contradict to what I wrote yesterday because two nouns are not connected by “to”, but “de”.
1. Satou-san wa Nijuu Roku sai de, Dokushin desu.
Where,
– Nijuu Roku sai = Twenty-six years old
– Dokushin = Single (currently don’t marry)
“Nijuu Roku sai” consists of the number twenty-six and the quantifier for year-old, which can be regarded as a noun to tell you age.
“Dokushin” is a noun. It is not a Na-adjective because we hardly say “Dokushin na Hito” (Hito is “person”. Remember yesterday’s definition of Na-adjective), but we say “Dokushin no Hito”.
If both “Nijuu Roku sai” and “Dokushin” are nouns, would it be okay to say as below?
<WRONG> Satou-san wa Nijuu Roku sai to Dokushin desu.
The answer is NO, you cannot say “Nijuu Roku sai to Dokushin desu”. It should be “Nijuu Roku sai de, Dokushin desu”.
Why is “Nijuu Roku sai to Dokushin desu” wrong, despite of juxtaposing two nouns?
Look at an example that is using “to” to juxtapose two nouns.
2. Satou-san no Asa-gohan wa Pan to Gyuunyuu desu. (Sato-san’s breakfast is bread and milk.)
In this example, there are two things, bread and milk, to be a breakfast. In other words, the breakfast consists of two things. It is not like the breakfast is bread, and at the same time, the breakfast is also milk.
Then look at sentence”1″ again;
1. Satou-san wa Nijuu Roku sai de, Dokushin desu.
Sato-san is twenty-six years old. and at the same time, Sato-san is also single. The subject doesn’t consist of two things, but the subject has two aspects.
Therefore, you can think the sentence “1” came from the following two sentences;
3. Satou-san wa Nijuu Roku sai desu. Soshite, Satou-san wa Dokushin desu.
=> Satou-san wa Nijuu Roku sai <de>, Dokushin desu.
I guess Japanese teacher would have several different renditions about this “de” in the sentence “1”. Once I saw a Japanese teacher tried to explain this as a case particle “de” on his blog. Someone may say it is the conjunctive particle “de”. I may be wrong but my guess is that this “de” is the continuative form* of auxiliary verb “da”.
Quiz: When you use two nouns parallelly in one sentence, which fits in the following sentences; to or de?
Q1 : Satou-san wa Nihonjin { to or de } Daigakusei desu.
Q2 : Asoko ni Satou-san { to or de } Suzuki-san ga Imasu.
Answers will be shown tomorrow.
*連用形 which is the form when another conjugation word follows behind.
This post was written with reference to the exercise A4 on Section 16 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
It is important to know that you cannot use “to” when you use two adjectives parallelly in a sentence. “to” is to juxtapose two nouns, it is not for adjectives.
Do you remember that there are two types of adjectives in Japanese? One is I-adjective and the other is Na-adjective. The definition why we call them “I-” and “Na-” are as below;
– I-adjectives : when an adjective modifies a noun, the last letter of the adjective becomes “i”
Examples; Omoshiroi Manga (funny manga), Atsui Ocha (hot tea), Kanashii Kimochi (sad feeling)
– Na-adjectives : when an adjective modifies a noun, the last letter of the adjective becomes “na”
Examples; Shizukana Toshokan (Quiet library), Shinsetsuna Hito (Kind person), Kireina Kouen (Beautiful Park)
(I always tell you that “Kireina” is not I-adjective but Na-adjective. Please remember it.)
Since there are two types of adjectives, we need to check how two adjectives we can connect for each.
Case1: The first adjective is I-adjective
– Satou-san wa Wakai desu. Soshite, Genki desu. (Sato-san is young. And she is energetic.)
The first adjective “Wakai” is an I-adjective. The second one is Na-adjective “Genkina”. But we don’t need care whether the second is I- or Na-adjectives.
If you connect two sentences above, how do you do it?
– WRONG: Satou-san wa Wakai to Genki desu.
– RIGHT: Satou-san wa Wakakute Genki desu. (Sato-san is young and energetic.)
Don’t think that “to” of Japanese works identically to “and” of English. You can say “Ring to Mikan” for “Apple and Mandarin”, but not “Wakai to Genki” for “young and energetic”. Also, you need to know, when I-adjective is followed by another conjugating word, “i” changes to be “ku”. Do you remember that an I-adjective is followed by negative “nai” which is a conjugating word, “i” becomes “kunai”? That is the same conjugation pattern.
Let us look at one particular I-adjective “ii”
– Satou-san wa Atama ga Ii desu. Soshite, Omoshiroi desu.
When you connect these two sentences;
– WRONG: Satou-san wa Atama ga Ii to Omoshiroi desu.
This is incorrect. You cannot use “to” to juxtapose two adjectives. Then, is the following okay?
– A little Wrong: Satou-san wa Atama ga Ikute Omoshiroi desu.
This is still not perfect.
– RIGHT: Satou-san wa Atama ga Yokute Omoshiori desu. (Sato-san is clever and interesting.)
Case2: The first adjective is Na-adjective
– Satou-san wa Shinsetu desu. Soshite, Yasashii desu. (Sato-san is kind. And she is compassionate.)
The first adjective “Shisetsu” is a Na-adjective “Shinsetuna”. If you connect two sentences above, how do you do it?
– WRONG: Satou-san wa Shinsetsukute Yasashii desu.
No. “-kute” is for I-adjective. Shinsetsu is not an I-adjective, but Na-adjective.
– RIGHT: Satou-san wa Shinsetsude Yasashii desu. (Sato-san is kind and compassionate.)
Remember the correct expressions;
1. Satou-san wa Wakakute Genki desu. (Sato-san is young and energetic.)
2. Satou-san wa Atama ga Yokute Omoshiori desu. (Sato-san is clever and interesting.)
3. Satou-san wa Shinsetsude Yasashii desu. (Sato-san is kind and compassionate.)
Note that “-kute” for I-adjective, and “-de” for Na-adjective.
Actually, there is one caveat. Today, we have learned how to use two adjectives parallelly in a sentence. But to apply today’s construction, you need to be careful about meanings of adjectives. Today’s method is only applicable when the two adjectives are both positive, or both negative.
4. Kono Shokudou no Gohan wa Yashukute Oishii desu. (Foods in this restaurant is reasonable and tasty.)
=> Yasui(reasonable) and Oishii(tasty) are both positive in their meanings.
5. Kono Heya wa Kurakute Samui desu. (This room is dark and cold.)
=> Kurai(dark) and Samui (cold) are both negative in their meanings.
You need to connect differently when two adjectives are opposite in terms of positive or negative meanings. The way to do it will be explained in another opportunity.
Lastly, although I have written “how to use two adjectives parallelly”, but actually it is not completely “parallel”. Sometimes the first adjective is a reason of the second. See 1. “Wakakute Genki”. It sounds like being young is a reason to be energetic. In 2. “Atamaga Yokute Omoshiroi”, being clever is a reason of being an interesting person.
This post was written with reference to the exercise A4 on Section 16 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
A caution is always needed. “Wa-ga construction” is not always applicable. This site strongly recommends you telling the difference of “Wa-ga construction” from Sentences of transitive verb predicate.
– Wa-ga construction;
[Topic] wa [Subject] ga [State predicates] .
Example: Satou-san wa Kami ga Nagai desu. (As for Sato-san, her hair is long.)
– Transitive verb sentence;
[Subject] wa/ga [Object] o [Transitive verb].
Example: Satou-san wa Kami o Kirimashita. (Sato-san cut her hair.)
Many Japanese learners tend to use Wa-ga construction in many cases, and don’t learn how to use the particle “o” which is necessary to describe an object of action by a transitive verb.
But it is a fact that there is “Wa-ga construction” in Japanese. Wa-ga constrcution has several types, and some of them have already been introduced. Today’s Wa-ga construction is a typical one that has double subject. Let us look at the above example again;
Example: Satou-san wa Kami ga Nagai desu.
I put an English translation “As for Sato-san, her hair is long.”, so that the word order could have similarity with the original Japanese Wa-ga construction. But the following is better for the meaning;
– Sato-san has long hair.
Putting this English translation in your head, you may think that “Satou-san” must be the subject of Japanese sentence “Satou-san wa Kami ga Nagai desu.”. I don’t think that arguing whether subject is Satou-san-wa or Kami-ga is productive. Probably an acceptable answer in the realm of Japanese education, to the question what the subject is in Wa-ga construction of this type is;
– Satou-san wa = Topic
– Kami-ga = Subject
Again, this kind of argument is not productive. It would be better to put them as “double subject”. How double? It can be said that the word with “wa” is broader subject, while the word with “ga” is smaller and specific subject. In other words, “Something+ga” is a small part of “Something+wa”. For exapmple, Sato-san’s hair is a thing that exists on Sato-san’s head, you can call it a part of Sato-san. Confirm that “Something+ga” is a part of “Something+wa ” in the following examples;
1. Satou-san wa Se ga Takai desu. (As for Sato-san, her height is tall.)
2. Satou-san wa Kao ga Marui desu. (Sato-san is a person whose face is round.)
3. Satou-san wa Yubi ga Hosoi desu. (Sato-san’s fingers are thin.)
The English translation is inconsistent among 1 through 3, but I just tried to translate “Wa-ga construction” of “double subject” in English.
This post was written with reference to the exercise A3 on Section 16 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
I am a little tired to write a post for “Japanese Learning” tonight.
Recently I wrote that a well-written textbook introduces the construction expressing “Sequence of actions” with the following construction that uses three verbs;
1. [V1-te], [V2-te], [V3].
This is because sometimes the following construction makes it unclear as to whether the sentence is “Sequence of actions” or “Incidental actions”
2. [Verb clause1]+te, [Verb clause2]. = [V1-te], [V2].
Then, how do you express if you want to say that you do action number one and then you do action number two, with two clauses like 2.? You use the Te-form of a verb for action number one, but not only with “te”, you would add “kara” after “te”. Look at the examples;
3. Te o Aratte kara, Gohan o Tabemasu. (I wash my hands, and then I eat meal.)
— 3. is in present tense that expresses what you usually do as habit.
4. Jugyou ga Owatte kara, Kaimono ni Ikimashita. (After the class ended, I went shopping.)
— 4. is in past tense.
Note that there is difference between 3 and 4 other than the tense.
– The subject of two verbs (Aratte and Tabemasu) is identical for the sentence 3. It’s “Watashi (I)”.
– In the sentence 4, the subject of the verb “Owatte” is Jugyou, while the subject of the verb “Ikimashita” is “Watashi (I)”.
For the construction of today;
5. [Verb clause1]+te kara, [Verb clause2]. = [V1-te]+kara, [V2].
It is okay to use different subjects for the first verb clause and for the second verb clause.
This post was written with reference to the exercise A2 on Section 16 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
Let us look at complex sentences consisting with two verb clauses in which “te” of Te-form of the first verb functions as conjunctive particle.
[Verb clause1]+te, [Verb clause2]. = [V1-te], [V2].
There are three types of sentences of this construcion.
1. Sequence of actions; Action of verb1 has happened, and then action of verb2 takes place.
2. Incidental actions; While action of verb2 is being carried out, action of verb1 is keeping on.
3. Cause/Reason; Action of verb1 is the cause/reason of action2 of verb2.
There is one thing that is important for this construction “[V1-te], [V2]”. The subject for verb1 and the subject for verb2 must be identical. Only for 3, The subject for verb1 and the subject for verb2 can be different.
And in order to make clear difference between 1.”Sequence of actions” and 2.”Incidental actions”, a well-written textbook introduces 1. using three verbs as the following;
1′. [V1-te], [V2-te], [V3].
So, we will learn this construction 1′ to describe a sequence of actions.
4. Ashite Koube e Itte, Minato o Mite, Chuuka-Ryouri o Tabemasu.
(Tomorrow, I will go to Kobe, see the port, and eat Chinese cuisine there.)
This sentence is in future tense.
5. Kinou no Yoru, Bangohan o Tabete, Douga-Kyouyuu Saito o Mite, Nemasita.
(Last night, I ate supper, watched a video sharing site, and then went to bed.)
This sentence is in past tense.
6. Nichiyoubi, watashi wa Soujishite, Sentakushite, Kaimononi Ikimasu.
(On Sunday, I clean the room, wash my clothes, and go shopping.)
Note that each sentence has three verbs, and the subject for the three verbs is identical (it’s “I”).
This post was written with reference to the exercise A1 on Section 16 of “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”
Agony or Fun?! Second Language Learning 