Agony or Fun?! Second Language Learning

At the last half of beginner’s level, it is important to learn the complex sentence structure that consists of two clauses as below;

[Subordinate Clause], [Main Clause].

In this sentence structure, a functional word is used at the end of the subordinate clause in order to continue the sentence to the main clause. The typical functional words for this are conjunctive particles like “-to,”, “-ba,”, “-tara,”, “-nara,”, and so on. But not only these conjunctive particles, some nouns are also used for the end of a subordinate clause.

– A5 in the section 18; “-mae+ni,”

– A1 to A3 in the section 23; “-toki,”

– A1 in the section 34; “-to’ori+ni,”

– A2 in the section 34; “-ato+de,”

– A1 in the section 45; “-ba’ai+wa,”

These “mae”, “toki”, “to’ori”, “ato”, and “ba’ai” are all nouns, and function to connect a subordinate clause to the main clause with particles in most cases. Since they are nouns, the words placed in front of them take certain forms as shown below;

– [Verb] + [Noun]

Verbs need to be one of Dictionary form, Nai-form, Ta-form, and V-nakatta.

-[I-adjective] + [Noun]

I-adjectives need to be the following form; [Stem of I-adj] + i + [Noun]

-[Na-adjective] + [Noun]

Na-adjectives need to be the following form; [Stem of Na-adj] + na + [Noun]

-[Noun] + [Noun]

Nouns need to be placed in front of other nouns using “no” in between; [Noun] + no + [Noun]

Now we are going to learn one of such noun-connections between subordinate- and main clauses. It’s “ba’ai wa”. This post introduces sentences using “verbs” and ba’ai wa” only. Those sentences using I-adjectives, Na-adjectives and Nouns are introduced separately in another post. When it comes to the main clause, A1 S45 shows “Renraku-Shite kudasai” only. However, this “Renraku-Shite kudasai” can be replaced with many expressions as shown in the exercise B1. Therefore, this post adopts the notation of “[V-te] kudasai.” for the main clause.

1. Yakusoku no Jikan ni Okureru ba’ai wa Renraku-Shite kudasai.

(If you are going to be late for the appointed time, please let me know.)

“Okureru” is a verb in dictionary form. Note that a verb in dictionary form is most of the time in future tense. Therefore, an incident to be late has not happened yet. To-be-late is expected to happen near future. This is the reason to use dictionary form “Okureru” in this sentence.

————————————–

This post was written with reference to the exercise A1 of Section45 in “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”

The exercise A5 is also for introducing one of uses of the transitive verb “Suru/Shimasu” as well as A4. Because of being a transitive verb, “Suru/Shimasu” is usually used with the particle “-o” as shown in the exercise A4. But “-o” doesn’t seem to appear in the sentence construction of the A5. Instead, the sentences in A5 use the particle “-ni”. Does this mean that the verb “Suru/Shimasu” stopped being transitive and became intransitive? Actually, “Suru/Shimasu” can be an intransitive verb. Such sentences are introduced at the example sentence 5 and the exercise B4 in the section 47. But today’s “-ni Suru” still works as a transitive verb. Let us look through the example sentences.

1. Ban-Gohan wa Tonkatsu ni Shimasu. (I decided having Tonkatsu for my dinner.)

where, “Tonkatsu” is a Japanese food which is fried pork cutlet.

The important thing that you need to learn from this sentence construction is to know “[N] ni Suru/Shimasu” expresses you decided doing or adopting one thing. In addition to this, I would like to point out that “Ban-Gohan wa” is not an agent of the verb “Shimasu” but an object that is chosen. The origin of the sentence 1 is as below;

2. Watashi wa Ban-Gohan o Tonkatsu ni Shimasu. (I choose Tonkatsu for my dinner.)

In the sentence 2, the agent of action “Shimasu” is “Watashi”. And “Ban-Gohan” is an object of the transitive verb “Shimasu” because the particle “-o” follows it. When the subject and the topic is identical, the particle “-wa” is used. But when you want to make an object to be the topic of a sentence, you replace* “-o” to “-wa” and put the word “[Topic] wa” at the head of the sentence. This is what happened to “Ban-Gohan” in the sentence 1.

Again, the main purpose of this exercise A5 is to learn how to say your choice. Let’s take a look at some example sentences.

3. A: Uchiawase wa Itsu ni Shimasuka. (When are we going to have a meeting?)

B: Uchiawase wa Kinyoubi ni Shimasu. (We decided having a meeting on Friday.)

4. A: Heya wa Doko ni Shimasuka. (Which room will we use (for the meeting)?)

B: Heya wa Dai-San-Kaigishitsu ni Shimasu. (We will use the meeting room No.3.)

5. A: Sankasha wa Dare ni Shimasuka. (Who are supposed to be there?)

B: Sankasha wa Kachou to, Watashi, Suzuki-san no San-nin ni Shimasu. (I want three people to participate, Section Manager, me, and Suzuki-san.)

where, Uchiawase in a noun meaning a small meeting with several people, Sankasha is a noun meaning participant(s).

* Replacing to “wa” happens to “-ga” and “-o”. For other than “-ga” and “-o”, “-wa” is added to a particle like “-ni+wa”, “-de+wa”, “-kara+wa”, and so on.

————————————–

This post was written with reference to the exercise A5 of Section44 in “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”

<恐れ入ります。時間がありませんので、後日この投稿を完成させます。>

————————————–

This post was written with reference to the exercise A3 of Section44 in “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”

Last time we learned the combination of two conjugating words that were a verb in Masu-form but without ‘masu’ and the verb “Sugiru/Sugimasu”. This time also, we are learning a combination of two conjugating words. The first part is, again, a verb in Masu-form without ‘masu’, but the second parts are not a verb, but I-adjectives “Yasui” and “Nikui”

(1) [Verb in Masu-form without ‘masu’] + Yasui* + desu.

1. Kono Kyoukasho wa Yomi yasui desu. (This text book is easy to read.)

“Yomi” comes from the Masu-form “Yomimasu”.

2. Kono Gita’a wa Hiki yasui desu. (This guitar is easy to play.)

“Hiki” comes from the Masu-form “Hikimasu”.

＊: When Yasui is written with Kanji, Yasui meaning cheap is “安い”, and Yasui meaning “easy” is “易い”.

(2) [Verb in Masu-form without ‘masu’] + Nikui + desu.

3. Toukyou wa Kurashi nikui desu. (Tokyo is difficult to live in.)

“Kurashi” comes from the Masu-form “Kurashimasu”.

4. Kono Nabe wa Tsukai nikui desu. (This pot is not easy to use.)

“Tsukai” comes from the Masu-form “Tsukaimasu”.

Actually, this exercise A2 is about Yasui and Nikui, and the next exercise A3 is also about Yasui and Nikui.（違いを検討して明日追記します。）

————————————–

This post was written with reference to the exercise A2 of Section44 in “Minna no Nihongo (2nd Edition)” published by “3A Corporation”