Japanese Stack Exchange Dataset
Collection
日本語に関する Stack Exchange の QA データセット
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2 items
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Updated
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1
Datasets:
question
dict | answers
list | id
stringlengths 1
6
| accepted_answer_id
stringlengths 2
6
⌀ | popular_answer_id
stringlengths 1
6
⌀ |
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{
"accepted_answer_id": null,
"answer_count": 2,
"body": "While learning Japanese I'd like to watch some Japanese television, whether it\nis children's programming, drama, or news.\n\nI've found a few places online that allowed me to stream snippets, but nowhere\nto watch full shows. Is there a service similar to Hulu that has Japanese\nprogramming?",
"comment_count": 8,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T18:51:07.397",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "1",
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"last_edit_date": "2011-12-29T06:24:50.560",
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "6",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 15,
"tags": [
"resources"
],
"title": "What are good sources for streaming Japanese language television?",
"view_count": 5858
} | [
{
"body": "<http://tvfromjapan.blog.fc2.com/blog-category-21.html>\n\n<http://wwitv.com/television/106.htm>\n\n<http://multilingualbooks.com/online-tv-japanese.html>\n\n<http://beelinetv.com/>\n\n[http://www.sonymusic.co.jp/?play_vc24&all](http://www.sonymusic.co.jp/?play_vc24&all)\n\n<http://www.ustream.tv/technology>\n\n<http://watch.squidtv.net/asia/japan.html>\n\n<http://tv.atcommons.com/>",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T18:53:26.953",
"id": "2",
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},
{
"body": "<http://www.viki.com/> has some in a variety of languages, but many in\nJapanese. The subtitles are likewise available in several languages, sometimes\nincluding the transcripted original Japanese. I'm not sure how good the\ncontent is though, since I only saw ドラマ which isn't my thing.\n\nThey seem to be a legitimate business with VC funding, so I don't think it's a\npiracy site, which is a plus.\n\n<http://www.youtube.com/user/tokyomx> is a news channel available on YouTube.\nThe really nice thing is that many of their videos have Closed Captioning in\nJapanese (click the CC button on the video). So you can read the Japanese as\nthey speak it.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T18:56:43.457",
"id": "4",
"last_activity_date": "2011-05-31T19:02:22.360",
"last_edit_date": "2011-05-31T19:02:22.360",
"last_editor_user_id": "16",
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"parent_id": "1",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 7
}
] | 1 | null | 2 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "11",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "I came across a Japanese girl in Germany who talked using words like あたし\ninstead of わたし, or ちっちゃい instead of ちいさい. When I asked her, she said that\nthese words or usages of words are more common in Japan.\n\n * Is this true?\n * How does the majority of Japanese people judge this?\n * Shall learners pay attention to such details or avoid this topic entirely?",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T18:54:00.623",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "3",
"last_activity_date": "2014-02-14T00:28:08.837",
"last_edit_date": "2012-05-30T13:42:29.113",
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"owner_user_id": "7",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 21,
"tags": [
"words",
"colloquial-language",
"register",
"spoken-language",
"diminutives"
],
"title": "Commonness of casual phrases like \"あたし\" and \"ちっちゃい\"",
"view_count": 3810
} | [
{
"body": "Yes, they're common, but those words in particular are very casual and あたし is\nonly used by girls. Many women will not use it since it's so effeminate, but\nit's not uncommon.",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T18:58:37.357",
"id": "6",
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"score": 7
},
{
"body": "Only girls would use this kind of language, especially high school girls. If\nadults use it, it wouldn't sound right. You definatley couldn't use it within\na business!\n\nI think they use this kind of language to be kinda cute.\n\nIf you're learning the language, you should of course learn the proper words\nand maybe just look at these kind of feminisms to be aware of it to\nunderstand.",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:01:04.093",
"id": "10",
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{
"body": "Atashi is for females. Chicchai can be seen as more emphatic \"tiny\". They are\nboth quite common. Remember that in most textbooks for any language the most\nideal form of the language (often judged so by prescriptive grammarians) is\ntaught. As you familiarize yourself with real world usage (through travel,\nfriends, and media) you will discover all sorts of words you were never taught\nbecause they seemed \"too casual\". DO pay attention because casual speech is\nappropriate for casual situations; nothing sets you apart as a gaijin more\nthan using polite speech in every single conversation you have.",
"comment_count": 8,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:01:13.953",
"id": "11",
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"score": 24
},
{
"body": "あたし ( _atashi_ ) is the female version of 私 for referring to yourself. わたし (\n_watashi_ ) is the neutral form for that, so you can use it always. あたし is\nonly used by females, while 僕 (ぼく, _boku_ ) one of multiple possibilities for\nmales is (although 僕 by itself is rather informal).\n\nThere are many words that are dependent on who it says, or who it is\naddressed. あたし is just one example there.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:01:18.617",
"id": "12",
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"score": 7
}
] | 3 | 11 | 11 |
{
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"body": "When a person is learning は and が in terms of particles, what are the best way\nto relate them to English equivalents?\n\nThe closest I can come to explaining them to others is \"the\" and \"a\" but I'm\nnot sure if there's a better way to explain them.\n\nThis applies to other particles as well:\n\nの relates to [of] or ['s]\n\nへ relates to [towards] etc.",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:00:05.860",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "7",
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"last_edit_date": "2011-12-27T01:05:25.247",
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"owner_user_id": "17",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 15,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"translation",
"particles"
],
"title": "What are other language equivalents to Japanese particles?",
"view_count": 4470
} | [
{
"body": "The problem is that as you learn more about particles you will come to realize\nthat not all of them have simple equivalents in other languages. Some express\ndifferent ideas based on what they are attached to (e.g. 電車で (\"by train\"), 鉛筆で\n(\"with a pencil\")), and others would require modifying the translation in\nvarious ways (に used to create an adverb from an adj-な).",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:10:53.510",
"id": "17",
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},
{
"body": "I think it would be fairly safe to say there are no exact English equivalents.\nGrammar concepts between two completely different language families rarely\nhave a 1:1 mapping between them.\n\nIt would be best not to try to come up with English \"equivalents\" to particles\nsuch as は and が. It will only confuse you when it inevitably won't work in all\nsituations. Personally I think that the correct usage and nuance differences\nbetween は and が are something that is best learnt by just reading a lot. I\ncouldn't explain when exactly to use which if asked - but I can tell you which\none to use in a certain situation.\n\nAnd this applies to all particles. Even の has a dozen other uses besides\nsimple ['s].",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:11:53.300",
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{
"body": "I'm afraid I don't think there is a 1-1 equivalent in English for は and が.\n\nOne explanation is what you've described there i.e. 'the' and 'a' and that\nanalogy will get you a little mileage, but unfortunately doesn't cover all\nusage.\n\nFor example:\n\n私はビールが好きです。\n\nHere it's used to show what it is you like (in this case beer). I'd recommend\ngetting used to the idea of not having clear mappings between English and\nJapanese, or you're going to struggle later.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:12:37.300",
"id": "21",
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{
"body": "There are no English equivalents to Japanese particles.\n\nSome, like に and へ, correspond fairly closely to prepositions, but many other\nparticles fulfill roles that in English are fulfilled by word order, sentence\nconstruction, or tone of voice. Some may not have an English equivalent at\nall.\n\nFor example:\n\n * The sentence-ending particles like か, ね, and よ indicate tone (questioning, expectation of agreement, and informational respectively). In English tone would be indicated by tone of voice, or by ending punctuation.\n * The particles の and ん indicate that a sentence is an attempt to explain some fact or present some conclusion. For instance, say you decided to leave a friend's party early. They might ask you \" _tsumaranai n desu ka_ \" : is it _due to the fact_ that the party is boring that you're leaving?\n * Particles like は, が, and を mark the topic, subject and object of a sentence, respectively. In English this is usually indicated by word order: \"The dog bit the girl\" vs. \"The girl bit the dog.\"\n * Some particles, like だらけ and なんて, can even indicate the feelings the speaker has about the preceding word.\n\nTrying to find exact English equivalents for Japanese particles is futile.\nInstead, focus on learning about the clever roles particles fulfill in\nJapanese grammar.",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:29:17.663",
"id": "29",
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{
"body": "Prepositions, and their equivalents postpositions and case inflections\n(declensions), are some of the most idiosyncratic aspects of languages and do\nnot map well from language to language. Learners tend to have difficulties in\nthese areas because a lot of rote memory or experience is required to become\ngood at them.\n\nThe Japanese language concept of particles doesn't even map neatly to these\naspects of other languages though with English there seems to be greatest\noverlap between English prepositions and Japanese particles compared to other\nEnglish parts of speech.\n\nHaving said that, Korean has a much better alignment of particles to Japanese\nthan does English. Some even have the same or very close pronunciations\nbetween the two languages:\n\n * Japanese \"が\" (ga) : Korean \"가\" (ga) -- indicate the subject of a sentence\n * Japanese \"へ\" (e) : Korean \"에\" (e) -- indicate movement towards something\n\nThese are close in sound as well as meaning but there are more which are\nsimilar in meaning only. Also \"가\" (ga) is only used after vowels whereas \"이\"\n(i) is used after consonants.\n\nAside from Korean and aside from prepositions I have found that some languages\nhave a particle which indicates the direct object like \"を\" (wo), but usually\nonly under various circumstances:\n\n * Hebrew \"את\" (at) - Only when the direct object is semantically definite.\n * Korean \"을\" (eul) / \"를\" (reul) - Like many Korean particles, this works very similar to the Japanese particle.\n * Romanian \"pe\" - Only used when the direct object is 1) a proper noun; the name of a person or animal 2) a common noun referring to a specific person, generally known to both the speaker and listener 3) a common noun acting as a metaphor for a person 4) a common noun in a construction in which the subject and the direct object are the same noun and they precede the predicate.\n * Spanish \"a\" - Only used before words referring to people, pets, or personified objects or places that function as direct objects. This is called \"personal a\".",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T18:10:10.153",
"id": "342",
"last_activity_date": "2011-07-21T08:23:06.867",
"last_edit_date": "2011-07-21T08:23:06.867",
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"score": 13
},
{
"body": "Note: I am not a linguist, nor do I have lots of experience with \"other\"\nlanguages. This is something I read some time ago, I don't actually even have\na credible source...\n\nIn some languages, at least Polish (of which I am a native speaker) and some\nother Indo-European languages (slavic, Latin...), words have multiple\n[cases](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_case) which are used to\ndenote relations between words. In Polish there is a base word which can be\nmodified into cases (with some _very_ rough mapping--again, no 1-1 mapping\npossible):\n\n```\n\n szkoła (\"school\", the root is \"szkoł\")\n szkoły (used in negations and as genitive, like の, negative は, ...)\n szkole (locative, like で, に)\n szkołę (accusative, like を)\n \n```\n\n...and so on (Polish has 7 cases, some languages have [much\nmore](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsez_language)). As you can see, the\ndifference is in the suffix, although some of the suffixes actually modify the\nroot part of the word.\n\nThere is a hypothesis that even in slavic languages those suffixes come from\ndistinct words that were simply appended to the base word -- but later when\nthose languages developed further, those suffixes were merged into the base\nword. And the hypothesis claims that in Japanese this process has simply not\nhappened due to some unknown reason. So while English has dropped the cases\nsystem, quite a lot of languages might had a similar mechanism which was\nsimilar to Japanese particles.",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-09-11T12:49:41.830",
"id": "3102",
"last_activity_date": "2011-09-11T12:49:41.830",
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"score": 4
},
{
"body": "As for the title of the question, when I first started Japanese, word\nparticles reminded me a lot of noun/pronoun declensions in Latin. The basic\nones cover real similar areas - things like topic/subject, direct object,\nfirst noun modifies another (genitive), etc. And a lot of the idea is the\nsame. Where there's not a whole lot of (or in the case of Classical Latin,\nliterally no) mandated word order, you instead just kind of take the basic\nnoun or pronoun and put something at the end of it. Same thing goes for\nomitting the subject. The concepts may be a little different, but they're\nstill similar.\n\nThe description of the question though focuses on English. I wouldn't really\ncompare them to anything in this language. I mean, we've got prepositions and\nconjunctions, and they're kind of similar, but there's a little too much\ndifference there. I would agree with you for の being like [of] or ['s]\n(genitive case, Latin by the way), and maybe for へ as well; but there's not\nreally any similarity between them and specifically English articles, and を in\nparticular has no equivalent word in English.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2014-02-25T04:28:39.570",
"id": "14605",
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{
"body": "Playing necromancer a bit...\n\nWhen it comes to equating them to analogous elements in other languages, the\nmajor Japanese particles can be thought of as case markers. For example:\n\n * は = nominative case (indicates the subject)\n * が = dative case (indirect object)\n * を = accusative case (direct object)\n * の = genitive case (possession)\n * で = locative case (where things are happening) or instrumental case (tool the action was performed with)\n * に、へ = locative case again\n * から = ablative case (movement from something)\n\nThese are general approximations, but hopefully they get the point across.\n\nAdmittedly, part of the reason I took up Japanese was so that I didn't have to\nwork with Romance grammar, but the fact is that the same distinctions appear\nin most every language; it's just a matter of figuring out how they are\nindicated.",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2014-03-17T22:32:45.027",
"id": "14917",
"last_activity_date": "2014-03-17T22:32:45.027",
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{
"body": "I teach Japanese, and have the basic particles pretty well sussed out for\nteaching purposes. I recently began to take up learning Latin. I had already\nencountered Korean and the almost but not quite mirror imaging of\npostpositional particles. But Latin for an English speaker provides the best\ncomparison, but it is most definitely NOT a 1:1 comparison. For example は has\nno counterpart, and should simply be explained away as the \"topic marker\", or\n\"topic case\". I think が is closer to being the nominative case. A great\nsentence is 象は鼻が長いです。The topic is the elephant, and the subject is the nose.\n\nTo the learner, で seems to cover a multitude of usages, until you tie\neverything together and label it the ablative of instrument. For the\naccusative, を is a no-brainer, and I am leaning more to the idea of に being\nthe dative. And the simple genitive is of course の. This in no way is a\ncomplete comparison - and there are many more particles, double particles, and\nso on.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2016-02-11T12:16:50.793",
"id": "31080",
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"score": 4
}
] | 7 | null | 342 |
{
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"body": "I often run into kanji that I don't recognize and need some way to translate\nthem into kana, so that I'm able to look up the meaning.\n\nWhat's the most useful utility (in any form, web-based, application, iPhone\nprogram, etc) for performing this task? Something where I can draw in the\nkanji and have it identify it from that is probably best.",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:00:19.947",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "8",
"last_activity_date": "2015-04-17T15:43:32.267",
"last_edit_date": "2014-04-16T04:24:39.747",
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"owner_user_id": "32",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 5,
"tags": [
"kanji",
"resources",
"writing-identification"
],
"title": "What's the best utility for identifying kanji?",
"view_count": 5171
} | [
{
"body": "There are dozens of methods and approaches. Some you might have heard of are\n\"Bushu radical decomposition\", \"SKIP\", stroke-reading (as you directly copy\nthe kanji).\n\n<http://jisho.org/kanji/radicals/> is a pretty handy method if you're decent\nat decomposing kanji into radicals.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:01:51.643",
"id": "13",
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{
"body": "If you have a Nintendo DS then\n[漢字そのまま楽引辞典](http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ds/arjj/) (Kanji Sonomama Rakubiki\nJiten) is a great tool. It accepts kanji and kana entry via the touchscreen,\nand includes a JP->EN dictionary, a EN->JP dictionary, and a JP->JP\ndictionary.",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:06:16.493",
"id": "14",
"last_activity_date": "2011-05-31T19:06:16.493",
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"score": 4
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{
"body": "One tool for identify kanji is SKIP Codes, which were developed by Jack\nHalpern for his kanji dictionary. It works even if you don't quite know kanji\nradicals, much less the primary radical in a kanji.\n\n[basic-japanese.com](http://www.basic-japanese.com/Hilfsdateien/skipCode.html)\nhas some information about how to determine the skip code for a kanji.From\nthere you need a dictionary that understands skip codes.\n\n[Kanjidic](http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/kanjidic.html) includes SKIP\ncodes and is free. You can search it for example\n[here](http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/cgi-bin/wwwjdic.cgi?1B).\n\nJapanese.app for iPhones is one such tool with a good UI that makes skip codes\neasy to use:\n\n\n\nThere's also the iPhone Chinese handwriting keyboard for trying to reproduce\nthe kanji directly, but I've had limited success with that since Japanese is\nneither Traditional nor Simplified Chinese.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:09:41.420",
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"body": "The first thing you need is a little knowledge about the radicals. If you can\nbreak a kanji down into it's radicals, you can look it up in books and\nelectronic dictionaries. It makes it easier to understand the kanji too, since\nyou can identify its parts. If you can name a few of them, you can often type\nthe names into an electronic dictionary to filter choices. Here's a couple of\nplaces to learn:\n\nNames of many radicals:\n<http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly/aa070101a.htm>\n\nRadicals by stroke count: <http://nuthatch.com/kanji/demo/radicals.html>\n\nA dictionary lookup with radicals: <http://jisho.org/kanji/radicals/>\n\nThe next thing you need is to know about stroke order. Learn the general\nrules, like write left-to-right, and how a horizontal, then vertical stroke\ncount as one (like in 口, which has 3 strokes, not 4). You can learn most of\nthese rules by learning the first 30 or so basic kanji.\n\nWith these two things, you're ready to look up kanji in a book, but it is\ntedious doing it that way. Instead of this, find a touch-screen device and get\nsome software for it. Nintendo makes a good dictionary for DS, and iPhones or\niPads work well.\n\nWith iPhones, iPads (and even the touchpad on a newer MacBook) you can write\nin Chinese characters, but they still don't have support for Japanese kanji.\nPlenty of the Chinese characters are the same as Japanese kanji, but there are\nenough differences to make you confused. Find an app with a custom input\nmethod instead. I use\n[Daijirin](http://www.monokakido.jp/iphone/daijirin.html) to write in kanji,\nand it has a custom input method. After I find it, I either search in that\napp, or copy and paste into another app.",
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] | 8 | null | 13 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "263",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "I am a native Japanese speaker with a casual interest in languages. I\nsometimes have trouble explaining the Japanese grammar in English because I do\nnot know the established English translation of some technical terms in the\nJapanese grammar such as _joshi_ (助詞). (In this particular case, it seems that\n_joshi_ is usually translated as “particle.”)\n\nI can look up a Japanese-English dictionary for this purpose, but is there any\nmore easily accessible list of technical terms, preferably freely available\nonline?\n\n_Added_ : I know several general Japanese-English dictionaries and translation\nservices freely available online, which can be used to satisfy my need but not\nin the most convenient way. I am looking for a simple table of technical terms\nin the Japanese grammar written both in Japanese and in English, which may\nlook like:\n\n> * 文: sentence\n> * 段落: paragraph\n> * 名詞: noun\n> * 動詞: verb\n> * 助詞: particle\n> * …\n>",
"comment_count": 3,
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 23,
"tags": [
"translation",
"resources",
"terminology"
],
"title": "Is there an easily accessible list of terms in the Japanese grammar written both in Japanese and English?",
"view_count": 4507
} | [
{
"body": "Sounds like you are looking for a technical dictionary (i.e. [Japanese -\nEnglish Dictionary of Technical\nTerms](http://www.kanji.org/cjk/samples/japterm.htm)) which is more or less\nthe Japanese term followed by the English term and the reading. These tend to\nbe very specialized and domain specific (e.g. Computers/IT, medical, etc) so a\nstandard dictionary may or may not have all of the terms you are looking for.\n\nIn regards to finding such a resource, you might be better off looking for one\nwhat was written for native Japanese speakers trying to learn English as most\nof the resources I've been able to find (i.e [Japanese Grammatical\nTerms](http://thejapanesepage.com/terms.htm)) appear quite limited.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:39:35.920",
"id": "63",
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"body": "I found a [list of English grammar terms in Japanese](http://www.alse-\nnet.com/column/grammar-terms.htm), and a very exhaustive list of [English\ngrammatical terms](http://www.usingenglish.com/glossary.html) which you could\nuse with a dictionary to compile your own list. The Japanese-English list\nisn't authoritative, but has a good enough translation for many terms.",
"comment_count": 6,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:46:23.847",
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"body": "I found three fairly comprehensive lists online; each covers slightly\ndifferent areas.\n\n * <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Japanese/Vocabulary/Linguistics>\n * <http://thejapanesepage.com/w/index.php?title=Grammatical_terms>\n * <http://www.omegawiki.org/Part_of_speech/jpn>",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T07:28:12.267",
"id": "263",
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"body": "Section 5 of the [ipadic user\nmanual](http://sourceforge.jp/projects/ipadic/docs/ipadic-2.7.0-manual-\nen.pdf/en/1/ipadic-2.7.0-manual-en.pdf.pdf) (warning: 271KB PDF) has a list of\nJapanese parts of speech which seems quite exhaustive. Each entry includes the\nname for the part of speech in both Japanese and English, an explanation in\nEnglish and several Japanese examples.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2012-07-27T10:35:40.157",
"id": "6293",
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}
] | 9 | 263 | 263 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": null,
"answer_count": 1,
"body": "Japanese uses both native and Chinese numbering numbering systems, the Sino-\nJapanese pronunciations being いち, に, さん, etc. and the native being ひと, ふた, み,\netc. For the most part they are used for different things. However, numbers\npast 10 generally always use the sino pronunciations in modern Japanese, with\nsome exceptions like 二十日 (はつか) or when fossilized in words such as 八百長\n(やおちょう). To different degrees, Sino- and native numbering systems are also\nused in Vietnamese and Korean (and maybe others?). When did the Japanese start\nusing Chinese numbers? When did native numbers past 10 fall into disuse?",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:11:57.167",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 12,
"tags": [
"numbers",
"chinese",
"language-change",
"history"
],
"title": "Japanese/Chinese numbers usage timeline",
"view_count": 1008
} | [
{
"body": "八百長 (やおちょう) is one word, if you extract first two \"八百\", it will become \"はっぴゃく\"\n(meaning - 800) there is no relation between those two.\n\nRegarding the word \"八百長\" timeline,\n[Wikipedia](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%85%AB%E7%99%BE%E9%95%B7), and\nGogen guide, it started to be used in the Meiji Era (1868–1912).",
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:57:37.223",
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] | 19 | null | 162 |
{
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"body": "When is it correct to use は but not が, and when is it correct to use が but not\nは? Are there any times when you can use either without changing the meaning of\nthe sentence? How does switching change the meaning of a sentence?",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:13:38.343",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 193,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"particles",
"particle-は",
"particle-が",
"は-and-が"
],
"title": "What's the difference between wa (は) and ga (が)?",
"view_count": 42901
} | [
{
"body": "は and が are a bit complex because they have several meanings, and some of the\nshades of meaning of wa and ga are a bit hard to distinguish casually.\n\nThe best coverage of this that I have read is [\"The Structure of the Japanese\nLanguage\"](https://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/com/0262110490) by Susumu\nKuno (written in English). I'm going to attempt to synthesize some of that\nhere, but Kuno's explanation is much more complete. I wrote most of this as an\nanswer to a similar question on an internet forum about a year ago, so if you\nfind it there, that's me too.\n\nThere are two meanings to は, and three for が. は is used for contrast and\nthematic reference. が is used as a direct object marker for certain\nverbs/verbals, an exhaustive subject marker, and as a 'neutral-descriptive'.\n\nは is often called the 'topic marker', in contrast to the 'subject marker' of\nが, but the key difference is context. Imagine, if you will, a big box of\nthings that have been mentioned in a conversation. We'll call this box the\n\"universe of discourse\". Certain constructions can only be used with things\nthat are in this \"universe\". This sounds ridiculously abstract, until you\nrealize that we do this in English as well.\n\n**English Anaphoric Phrases** :\n\n> The boy was bouncing a ball off the store wall.\n\nis not a valid sentence in isolation.\n\nNow, several of you are freaking out right now, since that seems like a\nperfectly reasonable English phrase. It is... but not without context. If I\nstart the conversation with that phrase, I've left out enough important\ndetails that you'd be reasonable to suspect I was playing a game of quotations\n(or insane...).\n\n> I saw a boy in Wallgreen's last night. The boy was bouncing a ball off the\n> store wall.\n\nprovides the needed context. The first sentence introduces a boy into the\ncontext of the conversation, the \"universe of discourse\", and \"The\" selects\nhim out of it as the particular object I wish to make a statement on.\n\n> A boy was bouncing a ball off the store wall in Wallgreen's.\n\nis perfectly reasonable. From this we can see that we use \"A\" to introduce\nelements to our \"universe of discourse\", and \"the\" to select them out. There\nare several things that are considered to be always in this universe, such as\npersonal referents. Note my first example is perfectly fine if your listener\nis aware you have a son. This can get a bit messy in English, so let's head to\nJapanese before the analogy fails.\n\n**Thematic wa**\n\nIn Japanese, the thematic は is used with generic noun phrases (\"the brits\") or\nthings that are already in the universe of discourse. It's sometimes tricky to\nnail down exactly what is there, but the general idea is that you don't\nintroduce things to the conversation using thematic は。 This is why you cannot\nuse question words with は, the non-specified referent cannot be in the\nuniverse of discourse. (だれは来ましたか?) <\\--- BAD! INVALID! DO NOT USE!\n\n**Contrastive wa**\n\nContrastive は, on the other hand, is much more free, and this partly explains\nwhy 「雨は降っていますが、たいしたことはありません」 is valid, while 「雨は降っています。」 is not.** Note that\nthis is more complicated than the textbook contrastive は, as the contrast\nextends through the meaning of the final predicate, not just the things before\nthe は marker.\n\nAnd unfortunately it can be ambiguous which は you're looking at. Kuno's\nexample is 「わたくしが知っている人はパーティーに来ませんでした」. If read as thematic は (if you were\ntalking about all the people you know... such as all your new Japanese\nfriends), it means \"Speaking of the people I know, they did not come to the\nparty\". If you read it as contrastive, it means \"People came to the party, but\nnone that I know.\"\n\nThere can be only one thematic は in a sentence. If you see a second one, the\nsecond is certainly contrastive, and the first might be.\n\n**On to が...** The first meaning of が is trivial, the direct object of certain\nverbs, particularly those having to do with personal capability or preference,\nreplacing the normal direct object particle を, e.g.「だれが映画が好きですか？」. This is\nadequately covered elsewhere, and aside from the curious subset of verbs on\nwhich this is used, is mostly uninteresting.\n\n**Exhaustive listing ga vs neutral description ga**\n\nThe other two meanings, exhaustive-listing and neutral description, are a bit\ntricky to understand. Any が can be an exhaustive-listing が, but neutral\ndescription only works with action verbs, existential verbs, and\nadjectives/nominal adjectives that represent state change. \"Sentences of\nneutral description present an objectively observable action, existence, or\ntemporary state as a new event.\" Neutral description is a valid way of\nintroducing something to the universe of discourse, but it is far from the\nonly one.\n\n**For predicates with stative verbs or adjectives/nominal-adjectives of\npermanent states, が can only be interpreted as exhaustive-listing.**\nExhaustive-listing works similar to contrastive は, implying contrast to the\nrest of the universe of discourse.\n\n> A:「だれが日本語を知っていますか？」 B:「ジョンが日本語できます」\n\nできる is a non-action verb, so this is exhaustive-listing. Assume that we are\ntalking about the three new students: Jon, Bill and Tom. If B knows that Jon\nand Tom can both speak Japanese, B just lied. If B knows Jon can speak\nJapanese, but doesn't know about the others, the contrastive は is appropriate\nto use instead of が.\n\nNote that this is only a quick overview of the whole topic, and each of these\nuses has special-cases that bends the rules... but this is a decent summary of\nthe common cases.\n\n** It's very hard to think of a valid way to introduce rain (in a non-general\nway) to the conversation without it falling. I'm sure someone can dream up a\nway for it to work, but for the general meaning of \"it's raining\", は is not\ncorrect.",
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"body": "If you already speak a little Japanese, compare these:\n\n> _Aiko-chan ga suki desu_ \n> I like (love) Aiko.\n\n> _Aiko-chan wa suki desu_ \n> Aiko likes it.\n\nI read a lot about this, theory about subjects and objects, but for some\nreason, this simple example (heard once I'd had a few months in Japan) most\nhelped me to \"get it\".",
"comment_count": 8,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-08T00:13:32.073",
"id": "760",
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"body": "In my opinion, it is a bit of a mistake to think of は as being in opposition\nto が. There are times where は marks things that have nothing to do with the\nsubject of the sentence. There are times where you have to choose between は\nand を for example.\n\n今はどうしようかな？ = What should I do now? Sometimes the は will be left off, but が\ncould never be used here because it's not the subject (the subject is implied\nto be the speaker -- or it could be the listener or whoever the context\nsuggests). The function of は in a sentence like this is contrastive... \"I'll\ndo such and such tomorrow, but what should I do _now_?\"\n\nAs for when は replaces を, consider a sentence such as 魚はよく食べるけど、寿司はあまり食べない。\nHere you're contrasting the two things: \"As for fish, I eat it often, but as\nfor sushi, I rarely eat it.\"\n\nThink of は as separate from the subject of the sentence. Think of 私はもう行きます not\nas \"I'm going now\", but rather something more like \"As for me, I'm going now.\"\nNotice how \"me\" occurs twice in the latter sentence (the second time under the\nguise of \"I\", but both are 私). The 私は says \"We're gonna talk about me and what\nI'm gonna do.\" You could add 私が after it for the \"I\" in \"I'm going\" -- but why\nwould you? We already know that you're the one who's going to be going, since\n\"As for me, he's going\" would make no sense. I did this in my translation of\nthe fish/sushi example, too; notice the way I worded it when a more natural\ntranslation would have been \"I eat fish often, but I rarely eat sushi.\"\n\nAnother thing that helps is to imagine sentences as answering questions, even\nif the questions weren't actually asked. For example, to grasp the difference\nbetween 太郎さんは学生です and 太郎さんが学生です, consider that the former answers the question\n\"Who is Tarō-san?\" (太郎さんは誰ですか？) and the latter answers the question, \"Who is\nthe student?\" (誰が学生ですか？).\n\nThe book Making Sense of Japanese goes into more depth about this sort of\nstuff.",
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"body": "I think we should also mention that は is often favored by native speakers in\nnegative statements (but is context-dependent too). This may be a variant of\nthe contrastive-marker function, but you don't always need to explicitly state\nwhat it is contrasting. \n田中：バナナ **が** 好きですか。 \n山下：いいえ。バナナ **は** 好きじゃないです。\n\nSo in negative statements, the contrast is often implied by は rather than\nbeing directly stated.",
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"creation_date": "2017-10-11T14:35:29.547",
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"body": "I like to use this as a guide. は denotes and emphasises what comes before it,\nwhereas が emphasises what comes after it. e.g. If I wanted to say \"I am Luke\"\nand wanted to make myself the focus of the sentence, I would say 私はルークです, but\nif I wanted to make my name the focus instead of myself, I would say 私がルークです. \nAnother example: \nThese sentences have the same English translation - \"The cat is blue\": \nねこは青いです - the cat is emphasised ねこが青いです - the colour of the cat is emphasised",
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] | 22 | 51 | 51 |
{
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"body": "When looking at the hiragana ぬ ( _nu_ ), ね ( _ne_ ), and る ( _ru_ ) one\nnotices a small circle in the symbols. In fact that circle is the only\ndifference when comparing them with the hiragana め ( _me_ ), れ ( _re_ ) and ろ\n( _ro_ ).\n\nIn the history of hiragana, is there any special reason that lead to this. And\nwhile I could see the relation of ね/れ and る/ろ (given that they sound similar),\nwhy are ぬ and め so different in their pronunciation?\n\n\n\n(Image was taken, and slightly adjusted, from the manga “Mahoraba” by Kojima\nAkira)",
"comment_count": 0,
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 28,
"tags": [
"history",
"hiragana"
],
"title": "Origin of the circle in ぬ, ね, and る",
"view_count": 1655
} | [
{
"body": "They all originate from the cursive versions of kanji with the same/similar\npronunciation as the hiragana. Here's a picture [from\nWikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana#History) to illustrate:\n\n\n\nTo answer your question - there is no deep connection between the kana with\ncircles. The kanji they came from just happened to have a circle when written\nin cursive.\n\nAnd just to be complete, Wikipedia also has a picture on [the origin of\nkatakana](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katakana#History). They're a bit more\nobvious because they're taken from the \"plain\" forms of the kanji.",
"comment_count": 1,
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] | 23 | 28 | 28 |
{
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"body": "What are the essential Japanese counter words?\n\nFor example -dai for machines, -mai for papers and stuff like that.\n\n * What else to expect/know? \n\nThank you",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:19:07.113",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "24",
"last_activity_date": "2014-04-24T02:19:12.103",
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"owner_user_id": "7",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 5,
"tags": [
"numbers",
"suffixes",
"counters"
],
"title": "List of Japanese counter words",
"view_count": 2124
} | [
{
"body": "The [article at Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_counter_word)\ncovers the common ones as well as a decent number of extended ones, and lists\nthe exceptions for days, people, etc. as well as rendaku and number word\nchanges (e.g. 300->san*bya*ku, 4:00-> *yo*ji).",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:23:50.853",
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"body": "There are entire dictionaries for this (数え方の辞典).\n[Here's](http://www.hyou.net/ka/kazoekata.htm) a link to a whole bunch. 個 (ko)\nis the most commonly used one. Japanese people use it often even with words\nthat should have a special counter if it's a less-often used one. It can\nsometimes be annoying even for them to think of the proper 数詞! Here are most\ncommon ones I can think of:\n\n * 人 (nin) for people\n * 名（様）[mei sama] for people, used when referring to number of customers at restaurants, etc.\n * 本 (hon) for long skinny stuff (pencils, pillars)\n * 冊 (satu) for bound stuff (books, magazines)\n * 枚 (mai) for flat stuff (paper, cds、shirts)\n * 台 (dai) for machines like cars and computers\n * 匹 (hiki) for most animals (four legged, insects, fish, etc.) \n * For some other animals:\n * 頭 (tou) for cattle\n * 羽 (wa) for birds and sometimes rabbits\n * 回、度(kai, do) for number of times an action occurs\n * 隻 (sen) for big ships\n\nEtc. The list goes on. I happened to live near a harbor so the last one was\nuseful for me (though it was still often substituted with 個!). You can just\nlearn the few most common ones and use 個 for everything else, learning the\nless common ones as you go.",
"comment_count": 9,
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] | 24 | null | 26 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "35",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "As per the title, what should I look for in a dictionary to help me study\nJapanese? Are there certain things that I should look for in the dictionary or\nare they all pretty much the same?\n\nTo elaborate a bit, what should one be looking for when they are at the\nfollowing stages?\n\n * Casual traveler who is visiting Japan and wants to be able to communicate but does not wish to learn the language.\n * Student who is just starting to learn the language.\n * Student who is looking to move to being fluent in the language.\n * Individual who is already fluent in conversational Japanese but is looking for more specialized knowledge (e.g. computers, engineering, medical, etc).",
"comment_count": 13,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:21:56.547",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 9,
"tags": [
"learning",
"resources",
"dictionary"
],
"title": "What should I look for in a dictionary to help me study?",
"view_count": 880
} | [
{
"body": "There are a couple things to keep in mind when looking for a dictionary:\n\n 1. **How easy is it to find what I am looking for?** A given dictionary might prove to cover every single word in the Japanese language, but if you can't find what you are looking for then you will think it is just a waste of money. Your best bet here is to look for ones that are used by other students and try and examine it yourself. Also, remember that you will need to get used to Japanese before you feel really comfortable using the dictionary unless you limit yourself to the romanized ones (i.e. [Random House Japanese-English English-Japanese Dictionary](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0679780017)).\n 2. **How long can I use the dictionary for?** If you are planning sticking with Japanese and learning the language then investing in a more expensive dictionary might prove useful (i.e. [The Kodansha Kanji Learner's Dictionary](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/4770028555)); however, if you just need a quick reference for a trip then you don't need an extensive one.\n 3. **How will the dictionary help me learn?** Beyond the obvious use of the dictionary to look-up new works that you are unfamiliar with, some might prove better than others for learning the words once you look them up. Having the furigana (i.e. [Kodansha's Furigana Japanese Dictionary](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/4770024800)) on hand with the kanji will help students in that they now see the words in question in two different scripts in addition to the the definition that they are looking for.\n\nBeyond that, a dictionary will come down to a bit of personal preference,\nwhile the ones previously mentioned could cover most of the basis and provide\na wide coverage of the language, you may eventually graduate to the point\nwhere a proper Japanese language dictionary is required or you may desire\nsomething a bit more exotic such as a loan-words only dictionary.",
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{
"body": "An online dictionary is much more useful than a paper one. Online dictionaries\ncan be updated with new words and meanings and searched more quickly. There\nare a few free online Japanese<->English dictionaries, but the best one (in my\nopinion) is <http://jisho.org/>.",
"comment_count": 8,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:34:12.797",
"id": "33",
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"body": "You will want:\n\n * No romaji. Romaji hurts your pronunciation and is a crutch. Get something with furigana, or even better, hiragana in parentheses.\n * Lots of example sentences. Context is invaluable in learning new words.\n * Electronic is better. It's faster and can be used mid conversation much more easily. Plus you can write in unknown characters with a stylus. Plus if you get a good one you might never need to replace it.\n * Once you are at a high enough level you will want to make use of a 国語辞典 (Japanese dictionary in Japanese). They are often more thorough, and some stuff is just hard to explain in English.",
"comment_count": 4,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:34:42.630",
"id": "35",
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"body": "In a kanji dictionary, or perhaps a J—E dictionary, make sure you're\ncomfortable with the method for looking up words, or use a dictionary that\noffers several methods.\n\nThere are methods such as looking up by the radical, the おんよみ and くんよみ, and\neven the number of strokes in the kanji.",
"comment_count": 0,
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] | 25 | 35 | 35 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "39",
"answer_count": 6,
"body": "I saw a sentence like:\n\n> 「それ使{つか}ってる **っ** す。」\n\nand none of my dictionaries have an entry for just \"っす\". Is it a verb form,\ngobi, or something else?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:36:31.970",
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"owner_user_id": "38",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 51,
"tags": [
"copula",
"contractions"
],
"title": "What does っす at the end of a sentence mean?",
"view_count": 18411
} | [
{
"body": "It's a contraction of です. It's not quite as polite as that though - it's\nalways sounded a bit like \"thinking that one needs to be polite but not\nbothering to do it properly\" to me. I guess it comes somewhere between\nteineigo-level polite and casual in the politeness spectrum.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"body": "It is a contraction of です--though as you'll note in your example sentence, it\nis often used in places where です would not be grammatically correct. It\nindicates politeness, but shows the (often young) speaker's ignorance of the\nproper polite forms. :)",
"comment_count": 2,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:44:02.207",
"id": "41",
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"body": "It is a contraction of です, but you will also hear (mostly younger guys)\nputting it (without the っ) on greetings.\nこんにちはす！こんばんはす！[Here's](http://ameblo.jp/tee-ameba/entry-10766309960.html) a\nreal example (written like it's spoken). っす Is _not_ normal polite Japanese.\nThink of it as almost using a です when the situation is uncertain; for example,\na group of young guys who've met fairly recently. です・ます are rather stilted,\nbut they don't know each other well enough to use complete casual style. The\ncontraction っす is a nice halfway point. In the context that you saw it, it\ncould be expanded to これを使っているのです. Then then の turns into ん and then\ndisappears. The \"のです\" construction is used a lot more often than regular old\nます. Technically the first one is considered an explanation of something, but\nit is also less stiff than the latter.",
"comment_count": 4,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:51:13.983",
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"body": "Similar to English, you can abbreviate common words with slang. I've heard\nおはよう become おっす, and similar. There isn't even a す in おはよう.",
"comment_count": 3,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:35:25.810",
"id": "93",
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"body": "As others have noted, it's a corrupted form of ーです. It's usually found in\nsocial situations where both humility and some roughness are apropos, like in\nyakuza movies, when a lower-level thug is talking to the boss. Another example\nis when addressing sempai in after-school clubs, particularly athletics.\nおはようございます -> おはようーっす！, お疲れさまです -> おつかれっす, etc.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-07-06T23:06:14.830",
"id": "1780",
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"body": "It's lazy polite form. Dropped for ease of use and to add a level of casual\nfeel. Used nationwide.\n\nWhen I worked in bars and a few host clubs this style commonly used in place\nof normal 敬語 as it is too stiff for young women, who are the majority of our\ncustomers. However, we always reverted back to normal 敬語 when an older male,\nfemale(ママさん) or couple was the customer.\n\nI suppose you can also think of this as a slightly flirtatious polite form.",
"comment_count": 0,
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}
] | 36 | 39 | 39 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "48",
"answer_count": 1,
"body": "I'm trying to understand why 先 is not the best choice to use in these\nsentences. Is it wrong to use it in this way?\n\n× 先、学校で何かが起こった。 \n○ 以前、学校で何かが起こった。\n\n× 先の書いた本から十年間が過ぎました。 \n○ 前に書いた本から十年間が過ぎました。",
"comment_count": 5,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T19:58:36.453",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 19,
"tags": [
"word-choice",
"adverbs"
],
"title": "What's the proper way to use 先 versus 前に or 以前?",
"view_count": 2365
} | [
{
"body": "I'm going to assume you mean 先 as in さっき. It's usually written in hiragana to\navoid confusion.\n\nI think the first sentences are just fine. The × one sounds like spoken\nlanguage and ○ one sounds more like written language.\n\nIn the second × sentence, though, さっき would not work because it's used for\nthings that happened \"just now\" and ten years ago is not \"just now\". Also, the\nの there is not correct, it's only used when さっき is used to modify a noun or a\nnoun-phrase. You could say e.g.「さっき書いたメール」 for \"an e-mail [I] wrote just now\"\nthough.",
"comment_count": 8,
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"id": "48",
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] | 44 | 48 | 48 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "159",
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"body": "There are loads of words in Japanese which end in 込{こ}む, like 吸{す}い込む,\n読{よ}み込む, 入{はい}り込む, 打{う}ち込む, 売{う}り込む, 送{おく}り込む, 押{お}し込む. How does adding ～込む\nchange the meaning? What is the meaning that links all these words?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:01:17.110",
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"owner_user_id": "36",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 42,
"tags": [
"meaning",
"verbs",
"suffixes"
],
"title": "What does -komu (～込む) at the end of a word mean?",
"view_count": 14353
} | [
{
"body": "Usually it means to do something more thoroughly, completely, or intensely.\n\nSometimes it can also be like adding \"into\" after the verb: 押す, \"to push\"\nbecomes 押し込む, \"to push into.\"",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:04:46.487",
"id": "47",
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"body": "The examples given by the OP are pretty clear-cut, and covered well by\nAmanda's answer. Where 〜込む can get difficult is in the verbs that don't\ndirectly relate to an action.\n\nFor example, 思い込む, per Amanda's explanation, would mean to \"think thoroughly,\ncompletely, intensely, or to be packed in\"... not exactly intuitive for the\nexact meaning of \"to wrongly convince oneself of/talk oneself into something\".",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:58:19.030",
"id": "102",
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{
"body": "込む by itself can be interpreted as a intransitive verb to mean \"jammed in\",\n\"packed in\", \"crowded\". For example 電車が込む\n\nHowever, when 込む is used with compound verbs it can have 3 different\ninterpretations.\n\n 1. ‘to enter; put something in/into’\n\nImplies a physical transition where an object (or a person) shifts from a\nplace into an enclosed location.\n\nExamples \n雨が吹き込む - Rain blows in. \n飛び込む - Jump in/Dive.\n\n 2. 'to do/become something thoroughly/fully/deeply/intensively'\n\nNormally denotes that someone undergoes a certain physical/psychological\noccurrence that produces physical/mental changes or development.\n\nExamples \n教え込む - Inculcate a thing (in a person’s mind); instill into (a person); give a\ngood training. \n思い込む - Be convinced; be under the impression; set one’s heart; fall in love.\n\n 3. ‘to continue an action within the same condition’\n\nIndicates that someone is involved in a physical recurrent action.\n\nExamples \n黙り込む - Fall silent; keep one’s mouth shut; clam up.\n\nReference: [高橋 直子, “Syntactic Complexity of _Komu_ -compounds in Japanese”,\n名古屋外国語大学外国語学部紀要 (Journal of School of Foreign Languages, Nagoya University of\nForeign Studies) 36 (2009), 169–193.](https://nufs-\nnuas.repo.nii.ac.jp/?action=pages_view_main&active_action=repository_view_main_item_detail&item_id=294&item_no=1&page_id=13&block_id=17)\n([PDF](https://nufs-\nnuas.repo.nii.ac.jp/?action=repository_uri&item_id=294&file_id=22&file_no=1))",
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"body": "The implication is often,I'd say, that the action is brusque, hasty or\nintrusive. E.g:\n\nはいる go in vs はいりこむ , burst in\n\nおもう think vs おもいこむ jump to a hasty conclusion\n\nのぞく peek, peer vs のぞきこむ peer intrusively in (through a keyhole or a gap in the\ncurtains)",
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}
] | 45 | 159 | 159 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "59",
"answer_count": 7,
"body": "I've heard some names pronounced with 〜さん added to them (such as 佐々木さん) and\nsome without it. I believe it is related to respect or the age of the person\nnamed. What would be the guidelines or general principles to follow regarding\n〜さん?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:07:54.773",
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"owner_user_id": "66",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 16,
"tags": [
"honorifics",
"names"
],
"title": "When should one add さん at the end of a name?",
"view_count": 3026
} | [
{
"body": "I would only use a persons name _without_ suffixing さん if I knew them very\nwell and they were at the same social standing (in whatever given context) as\nme.\n\nIn fact, scratch that, it would feel wierd not using -さん in any given\nsituation unless it was referring to family.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:11:47.643",
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},
{
"body": "The general guideline is to use さん whenever you're unsure. As a learner, you\ncannot really go wrong with it.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:12:48.183",
"id": "53",
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{
"body": "If you're talking with someone you don't really know, you definitely want to\nadd さん. If you add it for friends and family, it might upset them as it may\nmake the two of you seem a little distant with one another.\n\nAs to your age/respect thing, if you're below them, then just add さん. Like\nMatti said above, if you're just starting, you can't really go wrong with\nappending the さん after the name.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:15:16.693",
"id": "55",
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"body": "If you're talking to somebody who is not an extremely good friend, use さん, but\nif you're about to start a fight with someone, you should drop the さん. If\nyou're a foreigner and are on good terms with someone, you can often use their\nfirst name without さん, but using their family name like that will sound rude\nand abrasive. If you need to attract someone's attention in an emergency\nsituation, you can drop the さん too, as well as adding an imperitive\n(おい、山田！速く逃げろ！).\n\nOne of the exceptions is when talking about someone in your group (company or\nfriends) to someone outside your group. In that case, even when talking about\nyour boss, you drop the さん (or 社長, 部長, etc.) and just refer to them by their\nname. So if I'm talking to 鈴木さん (a person at another company) about my boss,\nYamada, I would say \"山田\", not \"山田さん\". (I'm not certain about this rule, so\ncorrect me if I'm wrong).",
"comment_count": 3,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:28:41.020",
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"body": "\"-さん\" is an honorific suffix added to give respect. It can be used either with\n_males_ and _females_ , and also with given names and family names, **not** to\nyour own name, though.\n\nIt can be even used attached to the name of the occupation and titles.\n\nIt's ok to use it with people that you are familiar with, but it's kind of\nmandatory when you are talking to people you aren't familiar with or people\nthat are not close.\n\nFinally, as stated in this page about the \"[Proper use of\n\"-san\"](http://ezinearticles.com/?Japanese-Language-Learning-Tips---Proper-\nUse-of--San&id=3090046)\", don't drop the -さん suffix unless you're being\nspecifically invited to. You can see further info in that link I just gave\nyou.",
"comment_count": 5,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:32:11.020",
"id": "59",
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"body": "Also, while さん is right for almost all cases, [先]{せん}[生]{せい} should be used\nfor:\n\nDoctors, lawyers, politicians, professors, of course teachers, or anyone else\nthat's (a) a direct mentor or (b) has some serious professional qualifications\n(ala a professor).",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-02T12:59:13.123",
"id": "417",
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"body": "San, always a sign of respect, is used in a few other situations such as 象さん,\nthe elephant, precisely the kind of animal you do not want to make angry :-)",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-20T06:56:40.577",
"id": "1357",
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] | 49 | 59 | 59 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "3157",
"answer_count": 5,
"body": "Looking at [this](http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/verbparticles),\nit seems that when the word 何 is used with the で particle, it roughly\ntranslates into \"by means of what\" or \"in what context.\" Personally, that\nsounds like asking \"how\". Is this assumption correct? Or can it change based\non situation? Also, would it be appropriate to add の/ん だ/です to the end of\nsentences that use this combination (since it seems that an explanation is\nbeing asked.)\n\nWould a sentence like this be correct?: 何で医者になったの？ (How did you become a\ndoctor?)\n\nThanks!",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:09:24.133",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 11,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"usage"
],
"title": "Can 何で mean \"how\"?",
"view_count": 1793
} | [
{
"body": "Short answer is yes, 何で can mean 'how' as in 'How did you become a doctor?'.\nIt does however also mean 'Why did you become a doctor?' so it's a little\nambiguous.\n\nTo avoid that confusion you can use 「どうやって」 instead i.e.\n\nどうやってお医者さんになりましたか？\n\nHope this helps.",
"comment_count": 2,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:14:08.567",
"id": "54",
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"body": "Short answer: no. From your link: \"It is also written as 「何で」 but it is read\nas 「なんで」. This is a completely separate word and has nothing to do with the\n「で」 particle.\"\n\nLong answer: \"何で\" can be translated as \"how,\" but a more accurate translation\nwould be \"by means of what object\"? So from the link you posted, \"何できた？\" is\ncorrect, because it is asking \"By means of what object (bus, train, bike,\netc.) did you come?\"\n\nBut one does not become a doctor by means of an object; one becomes a doctor\nby taking an action. So as Ali said, a better way to ask this question would\nbe \"どうやって\": \" _What did you do_ to become a doctor?\"",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:19:36.133",
"id": "56",
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"body": "Another example of the overlap you can often hear is 何でわかった？, which literally\nwould be \"Why did you know?\" but is best expressed in English as \"How did you\nknow?\".",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-07-09T13:24:50.807",
"id": "1825",
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"body": "I agree overall with the other three answers, but I feel there is a difference\ndepending on how it is read.\n\n * [何]{なん}で 'why'\n * [何]{なに}で 'by what'\n\nTherefore, `何で医者になったの` has different meanings depending on how it is read.\n\n> [何]{なん}で医者になったの \n> 'Why did you become a doctor?'\n>\n> [何]{なに}で医者になったの \n> 'By what did you become a doctor?' \n> Possible answer: [Supposing (counterfactually) that there are several other\n> routes for becoming a doctor] 医師国家試験で 'By passing the medical license test'",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-09-16T20:30:10.910",
"id": "3157",
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"body": "From my experience, なんで can be used as how, but it is context dependent and\ncan lead to confusion.\n\n> Native speaker: なんで帰る？ \n> Me: ?? Uh, because it's late... Oh wait, you mean \"how am I getting home?\"\n> Gotcha. By car.",
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}
] | 50 | 3157 | 56 |
{
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"answer_count": 8,
"body": "I have progressed pretty far in Japanese, but when I construct Japanese\nsentences, I still get these two particles mixed up. For example, when talking\nabout being inside something, I don't know when to use \"の中に\" and when to use\n\"の中で.\" Likewise, when speaking about being next to something, I sometimes\ndon't know if I should use \"となりに\" or \"となりで.\" How do you know which one to use\nin a sentence?\n\nWhich of these is correct?\n\n> 部屋の中 **に** 泣いている。\n\nor\n\n> 部屋の中 **で** 泣いている。",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:36:57.090",
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"score": 61,
"tags": [
"usage",
"particles",
"particle-に",
"particle-で",
"に-and-で"
],
"title": "Particles: に vs. で",
"view_count": 29653
} | [
{
"body": "They are pretty similar, but で usually indicates that an action took place at\nthat location. So you use に when you're talking about _being_ inside or next\nto something, etc. and で when you talk about _doing something_ inside or next\nto something.\n\n**Edited to add** : 部屋の中で泣いている is correct, because the room is the location of\nan action (crying).",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:39:21.053",
"id": "62",
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"body": "This can depend on the arguments a verb takes. For example, いる uses に for\nlocation. かべでいる would make no sense. 書く takes an argument for something to be\nwritten on; 「壁に書く」 means \"write on a wall\", and 「壁で書く」 means \"write at a\nwall\".\n\nFor the 泣く example, you really could use either one, but で may be clearer\nbecause 泣く can take an argument marked by に to indicate cause, object or\nmonetary amount. For example, 「彼が｛借金・訃報・千円｝に泣く」(From [LCS\ndatabase](http://cl.it.okayama-u.ac.jp/rsc/lcs/) distributed by Okayama\nUniversity). 「部屋に泣いている」 could potentially mean \"he's suffering for/because of\nroom\".",
"comment_count": 5,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:07:48.223",
"id": "71",
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{
"body": "> 部屋の中で泣いている\n\nis correct because 泣いている is an _action_ which takes place in 部屋の中.\n\nA good check for whether a short phrase is correct is to just Google it.\nGoogle has over 200,000 hits for the correct で version, and none for the\nincorrect に variation. Although.. I imagine Google will soon index this page!\n:)",
"comment_count": 3,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:54:12.683",
"id": "85",
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"body": "In general, で is where an action is performed and に is the \"direction\"\ntoward/to/into which the result of an action happens.\n\n> * 部屋の中で泣いています → I'm crying in the room / \"The place where I'm at while I'm\n> crying is in the room\"\n> * 部屋の中に泣いています → I'm crying into the room (meaning like, your tears are\n> flowing from your face into the room). This doesn't make sense unless you\n> happen to be talking about where your tears flow when you cry. In the case\n> of the English saying \"crying in my beer\", ビールの中に泣いています **would** make\n> sense, although that's an idiom that you probably wouldn't directly\n> translate.\n>\n\nThe other example\n\n> * 部屋の中にいます → I'm in the room (\"My existence results in something being in\n> the room (namely, me)\" -- ??)\n> * 部屋の中でいます → \"The place where I am doing my existence is the room\" - Since\n> existing is not really a (one-time) \"performable\" action, this doesn't make\n> sense.\n>",
"comment_count": 2,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:18:06.933",
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"body": "What I have been taught in the college is that に is only used for verbs that\nimply motions which destination/position is required to be specified.\n\nFor example, if you say \"ikimasu\" (I'm going), unless already in the context,\nyou need to specify the destination otherwise the sentence does not make\nsense. So, you use \"ni\": \"asoko ni ikimasu\"\n\nOn the other hand, で is used when the location of the action verbs is just\nadditional information. For example, you can say 泣いています without specifying\nwhere you are crying and the sentence still makes sense.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:51:43.590",
"id": "195",
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"body": "I think the use of の中 here is anti-idiomatic. I would just say 部屋で泣いている。",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-07-25T13:56:03.823",
"id": "2188",
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"body": "* に is to indicate an interaction between two objects that are noticeably separate, initially, and that remain somewhat separate. \n\n * で is used to indicate objects from or becoming to similar groups, working in close unison to form some result.\n\nBetween English and Japanese, the most accurate analog I have found is:\nに:で;each other:themselves.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-07-25T15:30:18.603",
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"body": "に and で can be confusing in other uses as well, but since the example is about\nlocation, I will focus on that.\n\n**に:**\n\nspecifies a location into/toward which a movement takes place:\n\n * 部屋に入る enter the room\n * 学校に行く go to school\n\nspecifies a location where something exists (used with verbs いる, ある and 住む,\nbut not only). Focus is on _existence_ , not _action_ :\n\n * 彼は部屋にいる he is in the room\n * 本は机の上にある the book is on the table\n * 庭に木が立っている a tree is standing in the garden\n * 空に雲が浮いている clouds are floating in the sky\n\n**で:**\n\nspecifies a location where an action takes place (Focus is on _action_ , not\n_existence_ ):\n\n * 彼女は部屋で泣いている she is crying in the room\n * 子供が川で泳いでいる children are swimming in the river\n\n**Note that** there are cases where both で and に are possible, but the nuance\nis different:\n\n * 東京にアパートを借りた I rented an apartment in Tokyo (an apartment located in Tokyo)\n * 東京でアパートを借りた I rented an apartment in Tokyo (when I was in Tokyo)",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2012-02-07T13:45:39.957",
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}
] | 60 | 105 | 105 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "67",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "Studying Japanese on my own, I've learned that in order to make a question,\nyou usually add the particle \"~か\", like this:\n\n> 今何時ですか。\n\nIt's also true that a question can be asked without it, using the rising tone\nof voice.\n\nBut then I found out that in certain contexts, the use of \"~か\" can be seen as\nsarcastic. My questions are:\n\n 1. Is this actually true?\n 2. And how do we decide when to choose which alternative?\n\nReference sites are appreciated.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:42:34.860",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 24,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"particles",
"questions",
"sentence-final-particles",
"particle-か"
],
"title": "Questions with ~か or without: how to choose?",
"view_count": 5891
} | [
{
"body": "You may want to look\n[here](http://jaerik.tatersalad.org/japanese/Particles/particlesexplained.html)\nand [here](http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/question).\n\nOutside of polite language, か should be used with care. Generally, it has a\nvery masculine and rough sounding atmosphere. Generally, in informal language,\nit only used when being very direct or sarcastic.\n\nHere's a good example taken from the second link:\n\nそんなのは、あるかよ！(Do you think (I) would have that kind of thing!?)\n\nEither way, it doesn't have a really \"happy\" tone to it.\n\nHope I helped :)",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:54:13.810",
"id": "67",
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{
"body": "The difference is more or less whether you're using casual forms or polite\nforms. With polite forms like your example question, it's a straightforward\nquestion. With a casual form like 今何時か it might be seen a little rude, or that\nyou're expressing surprise/frustration.\n\nIn casual speech if you want to ask a straightforward question you should use\nthe rising tone of voice or the explanation-seeking の？",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:54:48.313",
"id": "68",
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},
{
"body": "If you drop か, your rising intonation will indicate a question.\n\n * 今何時ですか。- canonical polite form\n * 今何時です- slightly less formal, feminine form.\n * 今何時- casual\n * 今何時だ- demanding and rude. Doesn't require rising intonation. Just watch something with gangsters and you'll hear it :)",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:12:27.890",
"id": "73",
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},
{
"body": "Slightly different, but on topic I believe: You in should never double up and\nwrite both か **and** a question mark, like so:\n\nどこですか？ (bad!)\n\nIt is better to use only one. Either the question mark if it is transcribed\nspeech, or the か for formal texts, or even a の if you try to be less brisk or\nmore feminine.",
"comment_count": 3,
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}
] | 64 | 67 | 73 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "69",
"answer_count": 2,
"body": "二十歳 is a (to me) bizarre exception to the usual number+さい rule for discussing\nage. Is this rooted in 20 being the Japanese age of majority?\n\n_Added:_ To be more specific: why _isn't_ it pronounced にじゅうさい like the rest\nof the さい words for age?",
"comment_count": 8,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T20:45:13.467",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "65",
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"owner_user_id": "38",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 38,
"tags": [
"numbers",
"words",
"readings"
],
"title": "Why is 二十歳 pronounced はたち?",
"view_count": 7069
} | [
{
"body": "The はた there is part of the same series of Japanese readings for numbers as\nひとつ、ふたつ、みっつ and so on. Where the ち comes from - that I do not know. It also\nmakes an appearance in some other common words, such as 二十日（はつか）, although in\na slightly mangled form.\n\nThere are readings for the tens after that as well - for instance 三十（みそ） makes\nan appearance in words such as 三十日（みそか） and 三十路（みそじ）. The rest of the tens are\nformed by adding そ to the corresponding \"ones\" stem: よそ いそ むそ ななそ やそ ここのそ.\n\nAlthough rarely used these days, the old way of counting was quite flexible.\n[Here's a Chiebukuro\nquestion](http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q117210981)\nthat explains the old way pretty nicely - including how to count hundreds,\nthousands and tens of thousands!",
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{
"body": "Some theories from <http://gogen-allguide.com/ha/hatachi.html>\n\nPlease forgive and correct any mistakes I made.\n\nTheory: はた means 20. For example: 二十歳 はたち、二十人 はたとり、二十年 はたとせ。 ち (個)is a counter\nfor the ひと、ふた、み counting system.\n\nTheory (folklore): The 旗乳 (はたち)folktale. During the Warring States period, a\nyoung soldier who turned 20 years old wore a banner (旗 はた）of his lords family\ncrest on his back into battle. On that banner he put 20 decorative things (乳 -\nち) to match his age. So the theory associates the age of 20 with being old\nenough to risk your life at war, an adult.\n\nTheory (folklore): If you count your fingers and toes you _end_ up with 20.\nDeriving from 果て （はて）, you reach _the end_ (はて) at 20.\n\nThere are more on that site.",
"comment_count": 0,
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] | 65 | 69 | 69 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "72",
"answer_count": 2,
"body": "Stolen _directly_ from Grigory M's question in the definition phase:\n\n<http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/7526?phase=definition>",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:05:18.160",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 16,
"tags": [
"kanji",
"verbs"
],
"title": "What is the difference in nuance and usage of the two kanji forms for なおす (naosu), 直す and 治す?",
"view_count": 5221
} | [
{
"body": "They both mean \"to fix\"/\"to repair\"/\"to correct\", but\n[治す](http://dic.yahoo.co.jp/dsearch?p=%E6%B2%BB%E3%81%99&stype=0&dtype=3) is\nused in the sense of \"to heal or cure\" (\"to fix a disease\").\n\"[直す](http://dic.yahoo.co.jp/dsearch?p=%E7%9B%B4%E3%81%99&stype=0&dtype=3)\" is\nused for fixing, not healing.\n\nEDIT: As per Tsuyoshi Ito's correction (confirmed with a bit of googling),\nI've removed a misleading bit about the object of these verbs.",
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{
"body": "治す is only used **to heal** or **to cure**.\n\n直す has more meanings, it can mean:\n\n1) to fix; to correct; to repair;\n\n2) to replace; to put back as it was;\n\n3) to convert (into a different state); to transform;\n\nExamples:\n\nその本をなおしなさい。= Put back the book where you found it.\n\n次の文章を日本語に直しなさい。= Put the following sentences into Japanese.\n\n==\n\nSource: <http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/cgi-\nbin/wwwjdic.cgi?1MUE%E6%B2%BB%E3%81%99>",
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] | 70 | 72 | 72 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "79",
"answer_count": 6,
"body": "I've always had trouble choosing which first person pronoun to use - 私\n(watashi), 僕 (boku), or 俺 (おれ). What kind of factors should I keep in mind\nwhen choosing between these? Is it common to vary one's choice by the social\ncontext, or do people tend to select one and stick with it all the time?",
"comment_count": 6,
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 28,
"tags": [
"first-person-pronouns",
"word-choice"
],
"title": "How should I select what first-person pronoun to use?",
"view_count": 7665
} | [
{
"body": "First off, if it's obvious from context that you're the subject of the\nsentence, then you do not need to say \"I\". If you need to use a pronoun, these\nare your most likely choices:\n\n * 私（わたし）- canonical, formal form. This should be your default.\n * 私（あたし）- same as わたし, but feminine (women can use it freely).\n * 私（わたくし） more formal and stiff than わたし. Good for business settings such as job interviews, etc.\n * 僕（ぼく）- This has a young boy feeling to it, though that doesn't limit its usage entirely to young boys. There are older men who use it regularly, as well as some young teenage girls (it's considered silly, but sometimes you want to be silly!).\n * 俺（おれ）- Many men use this as their default among friends; however, it is coarser than わたし and gives a sense of arrogance if used in an inappropriate context.\n\nUnder specialized circumstances (drama of some kind like cosplay or imitating\nan anime, etc.), you might use these less common options:\n\n * 俺様（おれさま）- overly dramatic egotist. Listen to some Dragonball Z and you'll find it.\n * わし- old people, male and female. The stereotype is that as they get older men and women start to sound the same.\n * 拙者（せっしゃ）- for samurais. Listen to some conversations in Rurouni Kenshin to hear this one.",
"comment_count": 3,
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{
"body": "The social context is absolutely the deciding factor, but your personality\naffords you some additional flexibility. Just like deciding whether to use 〜さん\nor not, your choice of pronoun depends on how familiar you are with the people\nin your audience, and relative social status.\n\nThat said, I personally still gravitate towards 僕 over 私 even amongst new\npeople since I'm a relatively young man and I feel like I can get away with\nit. :)\n\nAlso don't forget that not using the first-person pronoun is usually an option\nas well, which can nicely sidestep this issue.",
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{
"body": "Are you a man? Are you a manly man? Use ore (俺). Are you a girly man? Use boku\n(僕). Are you being formal, unwilling to commit to 俺 or 僕, or just starting to\nlearn Japanese? Use watashi (私).\n\nAre you a girl? Are you a girly girl? Use atashi (あたし). (This rule isn't as\nfixed as the male rule). Are you a tomboy? Use boku (僕). Otherwise use\nwatashi.\n\nAre you speaking to a crowd, or being highly polite? Use watakushi (私,\nconfusingly).",
"comment_count": 4,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:37:40.770",
"id": "78",
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"body": "It depends a lot on the situation. I try to keep it simple and only use three\nmost practical forms of the pronoun:\n\n僕 (boku) :: I use it whenever I am not at work\n\n俺 (ore) :: Almost never use 俺 unless most people around me are already using\n俺, too informal.\n\n私 (watashi) :: What I always use at work. Never ever use _boku_ at work, or in\nan email, since somebody could consider that you are being rude and not too\nformal. (Happened to me a couple of times when I was a new graduate at a\nJapanese company).",
"comment_count": 4,
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{
"body": "わたし (私) - Typical, everyday, formal/informal \"I.\" Err to this whenever\npossible.\n\nあたし (私) - Same kanji, used only for females. Same feel as _watashi_.\n\nわたくし (私） - Hyperformalized version of _watashi_. It is surely not to be used\nin all formal situations, but rather only to express extreme politeness.\n\n[僕]{ぼく} - Masculine (though not exlusively) \"I\" used to give informal\natmosphere. Not polite save for certain situations.\n\n[俺]{おれ} - In terms of masculinity, it runs along the lines of 僕. I will go as\nfar to say this is a rude expression. Unless you are sure that it is\nacceptable in any given situation, I would not use it, unless you're trying to\nbe mean or rude. However, when used acceptably, it is excellent to portray a\nvery informal mood.\n\nKeep in mind there are many more ways to say \"I,\" and these are only some of\nthe most common.",
"comment_count": 4,
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{
"body": "Some others that people are missing:\n\n * うち： Very informal, but relatively gender-free. Great for otaku.\n * あたえ/あたい: Colloquial female, related to わたし\n * [Name or Title] - You can use your own name or title as a pronoun: マリはあのおもちゃが欲しいの！ 先生はおこっていますよ。\n * おら - Regional male (or regional, colloquial female). \n\nSome pedants won't want to admit use of these informal pronouns, but you\nshould know that they exist and that people use them (even in 2014!).",
"comment_count": 12,
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] | 74 | 79 | 79 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "84",
"answer_count": 8,
"body": "Can you use へ and に interchangeably, as in:\n\n> 北海道 **へ** 行く\n\nand\n\n> 北海道 **に** 行く ?\n\nAre there any subtle differences in the use of these two?",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:46:23.797",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 65,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"particles",
"particle-に",
"particle-へ"
],
"title": "When going somewhere, is there any difference between e (へ) and ni (に)?",
"view_count": 27655
} | [
{
"body": "There is a very subtle difference between the two--with に, the destination is\nmore important; with へ, the journey is more important. You might use に if you\nwant to say you're going \" _to_ the store\" and へ if you want to say you're\ngoing \" _in the direction of_ the store [and ending up there].\"\n\nIs there a lot of practical difference in how they are used? Not really.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:50:03.940",
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"body": "I've always seen に as meaning going somewhere directly without any intention\nof stopping, whereas へ shows that they are going that way, but if they see\nsomething interesting they may stop or make a detour.",
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:51:10.893",
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{
"body": "* に emphasizes the location\n * へ emphasizes the direction\n * まで emphasizes the process or journey",
"comment_count": 10,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:53:00.243",
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{
"body": "へ is also used to soften に in some cases, since it's slightly more vague. For\ninstance, at a restaurant I saw a sign posted over a counter that used\nsomething like 「こちらへ食器をお返し下さい」.",
"comment_count": 3,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:56:09.473",
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"body": "Side note to the question but relevant:\n\nUse **only** へ when you want to use the grammatical construct 〜への〜.\n\n> ◯ 改札口への階段はどこですか。 Where are the steps to the ticket gate?\n>\n> × 改札口にの階段はどこですか。",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:02:50.950",
"id": "128",
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"last_edit_date": "2020-06-17T08:18:27.500",
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"body": "Those 2 threads asking the same question should be merged and maybe become\nwiki to be edited easily (particles questions are recurrent)\n\nsee also: [How to use へ (-e), に (-ni), まで (made) and の方 (no-hō) with\ndestination and\ndirection?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/275/how-to-use-e-ni-\nmade-and-no-h-with-destination-and-directi)\n\nTo sum up and try to correct some of the answers already given:\n\n-へ is the direction particle. You could say it focuses on the journey\n\n-に is the destination particle. It focuses on the destination.\n\n-まで Is a final destination particle as well but implies that you're coming **from** somewhere (から) and thus that there's some distance between the 2 points.\n\n-のほう（の方） means in the direction of. It could be used in a case where you are giving direction to someone:\n\n郵便局の方へ３００メートルをあるいて、中学が右に見えます。\n\n(walk 300m towards the post office and you will see the middle school on your\nright)",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T10:22:48.243",
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{
"body": "On a pedantic note, there is an old saying the goes like\n\n> 京へ、筑紫に、坂東さ (ca 1609)\n>\n> 京に、つくしへ、坂東さ (ca 1496)\n>\n> [[Source](http://oshiete.goo.ne.jp/qa/1274740.html)]\n\nwhich shows how each dialect used different particle to say 北海道○行く around that\ntime. 京 is for Kyoto, 筑紫(つくし) is Kyushu and 坂東 is Kanto/Tohoku.\n\nBeing just a layperson on Japanese linguistics, I'll just stop here, but I'm\nsure a more learned person will have a lot to say about why the place of に and\nへ are different between the two quotes above, and how these regional\ndifferences came about.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-14T10:24:12.193",
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{
"body": "へ is the direction に is the purpose\n\nWhen I say デパートへ行きます, I am just heading towards the department store. When I\nsay デパートに行きます, I am going to the department store with a purpose. The\ndepartment store is the location where I will complete my purpose.\n\nIt is the same as saying 買い物に行きます or 仕事に行きます Shopping and work are not\nphysical places but merely activities or purposes in this sentence. に cannot\nbe replaced by へ in that case.\n\nBut when we are speaking about a location, we could either used へ or に as we\nusually go to a place with a purpose. Japanese people tend to never use へ in a\nconversation but rather に",
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] | 80 | 84 | 84 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "96",
"answer_count": 1,
"body": "Whenever I communicate with my Japanese coworkers, I always finish my emails\nwith どうぞよろしくお願いします。I guess in the context of an email in English it could be\nakin to saying \"Cheers\" \"Regards\", so I unless I write どうぞよろしくお願いします, I will\nbe worrying that I was being too informal to that person.\n\nWhen writing an email in Japanese, is there an scenario when finishing with\nどうぞよろしくお願いします would be considered as being out of place or context?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T21:52:16.297",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 14,
"tags": [
"set-phrases",
"business-japanese",
"greetings"
],
"title": "At work, when is it not ok to finish an email with どうぞよろしくお願いします?",
"view_count": 2366
} | [
{
"body": "Your question is \"is there a scenario when finishing with [] would be\nconsidered out of place or context?\".\n\nAs you noted, 宜しくお願い is similar to \"Cheers\" or \"Regards\", but the main\ndifference is that neither of the latter are calls to action, whereas the\nformer has more of a feeling of asking something.\n\nAccordingly, among coworkers, it's fine to use when you're asking for\nsomething clearly scope of Things You're Allowed To Ask. I understand that may\nsound subjective, but that's part of the nature of the Japanese workplace:\nunderstanding your position.\n\nOn the other hand, if you're asking your boss to do something for you\npersonally, it may be too direct as it implies you think that the other side\nwill comply with your asking. In those more sensitive contexts, it may be\nbetter to say 〜して頂け[ますと/れば]幸い[です／に思います], literally translating as \"if you did\nindeed do that, I'd be happy\" without asking for it so directly.",
"comment_count": 3,
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}
] | 83 | 96 | 96 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "95",
"answer_count": 3,
"body": "When on business in Japan last year, a Japanese colleague said よろしくおねがいします to\nme as the group were leaving after dinner.\n\nI'm aware of its usage in initial greetings, as is usually taught in\ntextbooks, but what is its English meaning in this context?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:04:17.530",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 20,
"tags": [
"translation",
"set-phrases"
],
"title": "What does よろしくおねがいします mean when departing?",
"view_count": 26640
} | [
{
"body": "Very roughly it translates I believe to 'treat me well please' but without the\nnuance those words carry in English.\n\nI think in the context you're describing it conveyed a feeling of wanting to\ncontinue a good (working!) relationship in the future.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:34:46.463",
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"body": "In that context, I would interpret it as a wish for continuing good relations.\nIt's particularly applicable if you had discussed working together on\nsomething.\n\nIn general, it's most often used as a wish for everything to go well, when\ndoing something together or just being together, and very often when expecting\nsome form of support from somebody (or the general public). \"I wish you will\ntreat me (us) well\".",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:34:54.803",
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{
"body": "よろしくおねがいします can mean many things in different contexts.\n\nThe phrase is often first learned as a component of introductions, and thus\nmay be translated as \"pleased to meet you\" or \"how do you do?\" but its literal\ntranslation is \"please [treat me] well/favorably.\"\n\nOutside of introductions you'll often hear it:\n\n * When starting a new project with someone: \"Please be a good teammate to me.\"\n * When you've agreed to help someone or do them a favor: \"Thanks, and please help me like you promised.\"\n * When you're about to start playing a game with someone: \"Please don't cheat.\" :)\n\nDid you agree to help your colleague with something during dinner? That might\naccount for it.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:41:17.060",
"id": "95",
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}
] | 87 | 95 | 95 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "109",
"answer_count": 1,
"body": "Sometime in the early 20th century, usage of the now-historical kana ゐ and ゑ\n(and their katakana equivalents) dropped off, being replaced with い and え in\nmodern Japanese. What exactly happened here and why?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:20:42.663",
"favorite_count": 0,
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 64,
"tags": [
"kana",
"history",
"obsolete-kana",
"language-reform"
],
"title": "Why were ゐ and ゑ eliminated?",
"view_count": 5427
} | [
{
"body": "Because the pronunciation was lost. \"Wi\" and \"we\" are still in some dialects,\nbut standard Japanese does not have those sounds. These characters were just\nspelling. Similarly in English, we pronounce \"through\" as \"thru\" because the\n\"gh\" sound is long gone and \"thru\" is now a common variant spelling used in\nthe US (I.E. Drive Thru)\n\nAfter World War II there was a massive language overhaul, and they\nchanged/standardized spelling and also made the Toyo (revised to Joyo) [kanji\nlist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_j%C5%8Dy%C5%8D_kanji).",
"comment_count": 8,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:24:14.067",
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}
] | 88 | 109 | 109 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "113",
"answer_count": 2,
"body": "The verb わかる can be written using either 分かる, 判る, or 解る - what's the semantic\ndifference between these forms, if any?",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:23:21.390",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 29,
"tags": [
"kanji",
"word-choice",
"homophonic-kanji"
],
"title": "What's the difference between the kanji forms for わかる?",
"view_count": 5599
} | [
{
"body": "The answer lies in the kanji. This data is from EDICT/Jim Breen's kanji\nlookup:\n\n * 分: \"...understand; know...\"\n * 解: \"unravel...explanation; understanding; untie; undo; solve; answer...explain...\"\n * 判: \"judgement; signature; stamp; seal\"\n\n分かる is clearly the most common - just to know or understand something:\n\n> 私は日本語が分かります。 I know/understand Japanese.\n\n解る implies understanding of a problem, not simple knowledge.\n\n> やっとあの数学の問題が解りました。 At last (I) figured out that math problem.\n\nWhich implies to me that you solved the problem. If I read the same sentence\nwith 分かりました, I might not think twice -- but it could also mean that you didn't\nspend any time solving it at all; you already knew how to solve it (and\ntherefore did so immediately).\n\n判る is probably the least common use I've seen in the wild.\n\nBecause the word \"judgement\" is connected to it, ala 判断 (はんだん), so if a\njudgement was made that something WAS something, that might be 判る. A cursory\nGoogle search yielded [this Yahoo!\npage](http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1152090766)\nwhich indicated the same.\n\n> 現場で指紋が見つかったからには、犯人が判るのも時間の問題です。 \n> Now that (we) found fingerprints at the scene, it's only a matter of time\n> before (we) know/figure out who the criminal is.\n\nDISCLAIMER: These sentences and translations are my own, and I'm no\ntranslator, nor a native speaker!",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:35:17.417",
"id": "113",
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},
{
"body": "First, before getting into the semantic difference, it's worth noting that 分かる\nis rarely written with the two alternate kanji you listed. The general\nconsensus (after searching through several Japanese Q&A sites, since this is a\nquestion that native Japanese have about their own language) is that 分かる is\nuniversal enough to cover all situations. (And if you're not sure, you can\nalways resort to わかる, which is perfectly acceptable.)\n\nThis said, the difference can be summed up as follows:\n\n * 分かる: understand, know (a concept, a fact, etc)\n * 判る: (think 判断できる) judge, discriminate (between right and wrong, between two similar things, etc)\n * 解る: (think 理解できる) comprehend (a concept, an answer, etc)\n\nAs you can see, there's some overlap between 分かる and 解る, and depending on the\ncontext you could substitute them for each other. But while most people may be\nable to read all three versions, the safe choice is to stick with 分かる unless\nyou have a good reason not to.\n\nSources:\n\n * <http://oshiete.goo.ne.jp/qa/1676345.html>\n * <http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1213146462>\n * <http://okwave.jp/qa/q54600.html>",
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:43:50.140",
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}
] | 89 | 113 | 113 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "748",
"answer_count": 3,
"body": "I've heard this used (also as 寝ぼけんじゃねぇよ！) in informal situations with nothing\nbut smiles all around. But when I tried to use it in an informal situation\nwith a colleague, I got the distinct feeling I'd just insulted him. I know\nit's tough (for me, at least) always to accurately gauge just how\n\"friendly/informal\" to be, and I try to err on the side of politeness always,\nbut this one just stumped me. How friendly do you have to be with someone\nbefore you can use this expression?",
"comment_count": 13,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:39:46.923",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "94",
"last_activity_date": "2011-12-27T01:14:01.510",
"last_edit_date": "2011-12-27T01:14:01.510",
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "85",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 9,
"tags": [
"usage",
"formality"
],
"title": "How rude is it to say 寝ぼけてるんじゃねぇよ！",
"view_count": 1607
} | [
{
"body": "This phrase is definitely too informal for using with a colleague at work, for\nthree reasons:\n\n 1. It makes the assumption that the listener's mind is fuzzy from drowsiness, which (unless this detail is offered by the listener) is kind of a rude thing to assume.\n\n 2. It uses a strong negative command form (～んじゃない), further emphasized by the sentence-ending よ.\n\n 3. The ない is pronounced as ねぇ, which drops the formality level another notch.\n\nYou should reserve constructions like this for situations where your position\nrelative to the listener justifies your use of this form (i.e. when you are\nwell above the listener), or among very good friends who can take a verbal jab\nin good humor (since this sentence has a sharp bite to it).",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:20:19.407",
"id": "106",
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"score": 6
},
{
"body": "the 「じゃねぇよ」 part is very very impolite as it is like yelling at them for even\nsuggesting that you were 寝ぼけ in the first place. It's how you would respond if\nyou were falsely accused of something. 「じゃないよ」 is much more more appropriate",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:20:54.417",
"id": "107",
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"score": 1
},
{
"body": "Trust yourself. If you have to apologize for being too casual, that's fine.\nThat's just how you learn what's appropriate. Everyone here is just guessing\nat what they would do, etc. You're the only one who was there and really felt\nthe atmosphere.\n\nAlso, it may be hard to tell if he was insulted or if he was just surprised\nthat you would use that phrase. Maybe he's insulted that you're getting better\nand more confident in Japanese and don't fit into his impression of you\nanymore. (totally speculating)",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-07T22:14:07.947",
"id": "748",
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"post_type": "answer",
"score": 5
}
] | 94 | 748 | 106 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "99",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "I was told a story where a male westerner learnt Japanese from his girlfriend\nand ended up speaking more like a female. The storyteller thought this was\nhilarious.\n\nWhat important differences should I look for between male and female speech?",
"comment_count": 5,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:47:59.243",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "97",
"last_activity_date": "2016-04-12T18:16:17.920",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 34,
"tags": [
"pronunciation",
"register",
"gender",
"particle-わ"
],
"title": "What differences should I look out for between male vs female speech?",
"view_count": 6411
} | [
{
"body": "It's not so much pronunciation as it is word selection. This includes things\nsuch as あたし vs. 僕, かしら vs. かな, わ vs. よ, and so on.",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:51:16.510",
"id": "98",
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{
"body": "There are almost too many to list, but the simple (grammatical) ones are:\n\n 1. Men should never use わ at the end of a sentence in place of よ. If you're REALLY good at Japanese as a man, you can get away with わ only when you're saying something to yourself aloud, such as 疲れたわ in passing, right before you decide to leave work, et al.\n 2. Women can end sentences with the nominalizer の (何しているの？). Men can informally (e.g. with their partners, family), but really should avoid it for the most part.\n 3. Young men sometimes transform ない into ねー (it's a sound change, nothing grammatical - basically anything ending in \"ai\", such as \"nai\", \"tai\" can become \"nee\" or \"tee\"). I've never heard a woman do this.\n\nWord selection is also important, but most dictionaries indicate this.",
"comment_count": 8,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:51:54.473",
"id": "99",
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{
"body": "There are a number of differences between masculine and feminine speech, but\nhere are some of the common markers of feminine speech:\n\n * Ending a question with の (instead of か or のか)\n * Using the sentence-ending particle わ (instead of よ)\n * Using the sentence-ending particle かしら (instead of かな)",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:53:14.020",
"id": "100",
"last_activity_date": "2011-05-31T22:53:14.020",
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"score": 4
},
{
"body": "Probably too vast a question to cover exhaustively, but I can offer a couple\npointers picked from experience (mine and foreigners I've met):\n\n 1. [First-person pronouns](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/first-person-pronoun) (kinda obvious, really). Beside straight-up pronouns, the use of your own name to address yourself is a big tell-tale of female speech (some older grandpas can get away with it, but I doubt that applies to you).\n\n 2. Sentence endings: generally stay away from 「わ」 and 「かしら」. Conversely, there are some typical male sentence endings, such as 「ぜ」,「ぞ」, 「い」(as in 「だい」,「かい」)...\n\n 3. Some very connoted colloquial expressions (ちょー etc.), which are sometimes acceptable by teenage boys as well as girls, but will mostly make you sound like a teenage girl if you use them as a grown man.\n\n 4. Gender-infused grammar forms (especially for questions/rhetorical questions): is an incredibly complex and vast topic, with a fair bit of subjective thrown in, but I have often heard that the over-use of \"soft\" forms (such as 「〜のです」, 「〜です？」) or even the over-use of full verbal forms (when they can be omitted) tends to make you sound effeminate.\n\nOverall, I'd say: pay attention to points 1~3 above and don't worry too much\nabout 4 until you reach a fairly advanced level.\n\n**Edit:** on a more general note, it is worth pointing that, if guy-foreigners\nusing feminine speech is the most common side of this (by virtue of the male-\nto-female ratio being high in this category), the opposite (women learning\nfrom native men and using male speech patterns) also exists and is not any\nless derided. In fact, unfair as it is, Japanese (esp. of the opposite sex)\nwill tend to be a lot more accepting of foreign-men-that-speak-like-women than\nthe converse.",
"comment_count": 6,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-13T07:44:40.473",
"id": "1014",
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"score": 14
}
] | 97 | 99 | 99 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "125",
"answer_count": 3,
"body": "Are there web sites that transliterate Japanese text (katakana, hiragana and\nkanji) into romaji characters without translating the words into the English\nlanguage?\n\n(Note to moderators: I'm merely asking a yes/no question, not asking what\nsomeone's favorite transliterator is)",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T22:54:43.950",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "101",
"last_activity_date": "2013-01-05T12:24:21.777",
"last_edit_date": "2013-01-05T12:24:21.777",
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "91",
"post_type": "question",
"score": -1,
"tags": [
"resources",
"website"
],
"title": "Do machine transliteration websites exist?",
"view_count": 977
} | [
{
"body": "I don't know of a website that does this, but I do know of software that does\nit. A Japanese guy in the early 2000s created something called \"kana2rom\". It\nhad been long neglected.\n\nMy coworker rescued it, transformed it slightly, and it is now a [Ruby open\nsource project on GitHub](https://github.com/LongWeekend/kana2rom/). Buyer\nbeware - programming required to get it up and running, but it was used to\nfully translate all of the hiragana in each EDICT entry to romaji for my\ncompany's Japanese study software.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:15:28.910",
"id": "103",
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"score": 3
},
{
"body": "[Here's](http://www.romaji.org/) one, though not perfect.\n[Here's](http://sanjiscripts.com/jtr/) another.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:16:55.650",
"id": "104",
"last_activity_date": "2011-05-31T23:16:55.650",
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"score": 2
},
{
"body": "You can try [Google Translate](http://translate.google.com/#)'s 'read\nphonetically' or 'listen' options.\n\nIf you need/want an offline tool as well\n[mecab](http://mecab.sourceforge.net/) can do this, among other things. For\nexample, if I enter これはミーカッブの変換機能テストです, it can produce:\n\n```\n\n これ 指示詞,名詞形態指示詞,*,*,これ,これ,*\n は 助詞,副助詞,*,*,は,は,*\n ミーカッブ 名詞,普通名詞,*,*,*,*,*\n の 助詞,接続助詞,*,*,の,の,*\n 変換 名詞,サ変名詞,*,*,変換,へんかん,代表表記:変換\n 機能 名詞,サ変名詞,*,*,機能,きのう,代表表記:機能\n の 助詞,接続助詞,*,*,の,の,*\n テスト 名詞,サ変名詞,*,*,テスト,てすと,代表表記:テスト\n です 判定詞,*,判定詞,デス列基本形,だ,です,*\n EOS\n \n```\n\nWith the right command-line flags it will produce raw hiragana. It can,\nhowever, be quite confused if it comes across words not in its dictionary.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:58:33.463",
"id": "125",
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"score": 2
}
] | 101 | 125 | 103 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "111",
"answer_count": 7,
"body": "Is it a nuance difference? Is it formality?\n\n**EDIT**\n\nFor example:\n\n> 請求書のお支払いは現金のみとなりますので、ご了承くださいませ。\n>\n> 請求書のお支払いは現金のみになりますので、ご了承くださいませ。\n\nI just made that example up, but for some reason, my gut tells me it's the\nfirst one, even though I don't see anything grammatically wrong with the\nsecond, either. Is it formality level only?",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:21:40.987",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "108",
"last_activity_date": "2022-04-20T04:25:01.657",
"last_edit_date": "2020-06-17T08:18:27.500",
"last_editor_user_id": "-1",
"owner_user_id": "87",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 58,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"particles",
"particle-と",
"particle-に"
],
"title": "What is the difference between 〜となる and 〜になる?",
"view_count": 19591
} | [
{
"body": "Pretty finely nuanced, I'd say. と is a quotative particle, but is also used to\ndescribed the manner in which something is done, often figurative. ～となる can be\nused to mean \"become like a ~\" while ～になる is literally \"become a ~\".",
"comment_count": 5,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:29:07.493",
"id": "111",
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"post_type": "answer",
"score": 8
},
{
"body": "`～となる` is also limited to nouns, I believe. The way I've heard it most often\nused is when the thing it becomes kind of fulfills some purpose. Kind of hard\nto explain. Here's my best example:\n\n> * 私は先生になります → I will become a teacher.\n> * 寄付となる金を貯金します → I deposit all money that will be (used for) donated.\n>",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 4.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:10:06.943",
"id": "132",
"last_activity_date": "2021-03-02T22:53:30.740",
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"score": 5
},
{
"body": "From what I have learned and observed, ～となる implies a \"suppose if\"\nconditional, something similar to \"suppose if it is the case that [X] would\nbecome [Y] then\" where as ～になる simply means \"[X] becomes [Y]\".\n\n「請求書のお支払いは現金のみとなりますので、ご了承くださいませ。」 would mean something like \"Suppose if you\nneed to pay your purchase by cash, we hope to get your understanding.\". This\nimplies that there are times that the shop does allow you to pay using other\nmeans than cash.\n\n「請求書のお支払いは現金のみになりますので、ご了承くださいませ。」 lacks the \"suppose if\" connotation so it\nsimply means \"As a matter of fact, you need to pay your purchase by cash, so\nwe hope to get your understanding.\".",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T03:43:28.053",
"id": "233",
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"body": "I've heard that ~となります is popular to use because \"it sounds formal\", but\nactually its usage is incorrect, since です should be used instead. I'd guess\nthat the same thing happens with になります、which would be just another form of\nsaying です incorrectly (in this context).\n\nFormalish way : 請求書のお支払いは現金のみとなりますので、ご了承くださいませ。\n\nCorrect way : 請求書のお支払いは現金のみですので、ご了承くださいませ。\n\nLink: <http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1119559566>",
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"body": "I've asked this very question in the past and my research led me to the\nfollowing definition which (surprisingly) differs from every other answer here\nso far:\n\n**～となる expresses a discrete change, while ～になる can express either a discrete\nor a continuous change.**\n\nYou can feasibly use ～になる for everything, since it covers all cases, but in\ncases where you want to use the most suitable grammatical phrasing (such as in\nformal situations), you often see this distinction made.\n\nExamples:\n\n> その島は去年、無人島 **となった** 。 (～となる because the change from \"inhabited\" to\n> \"uninhabited\" is discrete and happens the instant the last person leaves.)\n>\n> デビューした後、彼はだんだん人気者 **になっていった** 。 (～になる because popularity changes\n> continuously in unmeasurable steps.)\n>\n> スカイツリーは現在、日本一高い建造物 **となっている** 。 (～となる because the title of \"tallest building\n> in Japan\" applies to exactly one building, and a building cannot gradually\n> become the tallest. It either is or it isn't.)\n>\n> 季節はこれから夏 **になっていく** 。 (～になる because the change in seasons is a gradual,\n> progressive one.)\n>\n> 電線事故のため、新山口駅は終点 **となります** 。 (～となる because the title of \"terminal station\"\n> only belongs to one station, and a station can't hold it partially.)\n\nYour example in the question illustrates a discrete change in state (or more\nprecisely, a discrete difference between 現金 and all other forms of payment),\nso both ～となる and ～になる are acceptable. However, since ～となる is \"built\" for such\nsituations as these, it sounds more \"proper\" to use ～となる.\n\nI suspect this rule also applies to the ～とする and ～にする forms, but I would have\nto do more research to confirm this.",
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"body": "According to \"A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese\", there are only 2\ndifferences between になる and となる.\n\n(1) となる is more formal and only used in written Japanese.\n\n(2) となる cannot be used with な-adjectives.",
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"creation_date": "2017-11-07T18:46:33.187",
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"body": "There's another distinction between になる and となる: when the resultant state of\nthe change is _irreversible_ or final, となる is preferable. See [this related\nanswer](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/82134/32952).",
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] | 108 | 111 | 739 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "116",
"answer_count": 5,
"body": "I've noticed that there seems to be different usage for 下さい and ください. Is this\npurely a personal preferences or is there an actual difference their usage?\n\nThis was actually a question the Japanese people at my work had a discussion\nabout, but couldn't come to a consensus.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:26:45.357",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 41,
"tags": [
"word-choice",
"kanji",
"spelling"
],
"title": "When do you use 下さい as opposed to ください",
"view_count": 8596
} | [
{
"body": "Almost purely personal preference. Also, more Chinese characters gives a more\nformal feeling to a document. This has been compared to the way we use\nLatin/Greek for formal (\"salutations\") and Anglo-Saxon for less formal\n(\"hello\"). This is easier to see when sino-Japanese words are over native\nJapanese ones, but the rule I think still applies.",
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"body": "Personal preference, but if it's a written communication, I always use the\nkanji to imply formality if I am making a request of a superior/customer/etc.\n\nIn the exact opposite way, I use hiragana to subordinates or coworkers to\nimply familiarity and a casual \"よろしくね\" attitude.",
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:38:20.943",
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"body": "There is a usage difference when writing.\n\n * \"下さい\" is supposed to used when you request an item (Please give me the apple)\n\n * \"ください\" is supposed to used when you ask to do something (Please help/teach me, etc..)",
"comment_count": 15,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:42:59.230",
"id": "116",
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"body": "In my company (Japanese company, I am the only foreigner), our policy is to\nalways use \"ください\" for emails, even though we often have to write very\nformally.\n\nSo I would say it is more a matter of personal choice and consistency rather\nthan a different level of formality.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:33:54.597",
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"body": "I'm surprised that none of the answers so far have touched on the actual\nsource of the distinction.\n\nThe rule is: ください when it attaches to the te form of a verb, and 下さい\notherwise. That's why 下さい is used in requesting an item, because it's not\nbeing used after the te form of a verb (それを下さい). The same goes for other verbs\nthat attach to the te form... the general rule is to write it in kana even if\nyou would write it in kanji if it were standing alone. For instance, if you\nwere to say \"I'm getting bored of my job\", the preferred way to write it is\n仕事に飽きてきている, not 飽きて来ている.\n\nIn practice, this rule is often ignored and ください and 下さい are completely\ninterchangeable. In fact, I've seen one page of a manga that was written\nentirely in kana _except_ for 下さい, despite it being used with the te form.",
"comment_count": 2,
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}
] | 110 | 116 | 116 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "122",
"answer_count": 5,
"body": "I have heard that Japanese has the largest number of words of any language\nbecause every Chinese word can also be a Japanese word. Is there any truth to\nthis statement?",
"comment_count": 8,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:37:09.200",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 11,
"tags": [
"chinese",
"loanwords"
],
"title": "Chinese words in Japanese",
"view_count": 7020
} | [
{
"body": "The _Chinese_ calligraphy came to Japan approximately 1,500~2,000 years ago,\nso I'd argue that that statement goes the other way: Chinese people can read\nmany Japanese words and grasp quickly what they mean.\n\nChinese, on the other hand, uses many, many kanji that are not found in\nJapanese's ~2,000 常用漢字 _joyo-kanji_ taught in the education system. So, I\ndon't think it's true that Japanese people, without proper study, can read\nChinese words, nor does it mean that for that reason Japanese has so many\nwords.\n\nYou are correct in noting that Japanese does have a lot of words because\nvarious nuances can be formed by combining slightly different kanji with\nsimilar meanings. When I was learning about 状態, I was very frustrated to find\nthat 実態, 事態, 状況, 実況, and 事情 all more-or-less translated as \"circumstances\" or\n\"situation\" in my dictionary at the time.\n\nSoapbox: that's why learning kanji can be good for your vocabulary - it\nbecomes about understanding the nuance of the kanji, not rote memorization of\na bunch of words.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:45:43.507",
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"body": "Not EVERY Chinese word. But lots and lots of them. China has always been the\ndominant culture in that area, so there are lots of Sino-Korean, Sino-\nVietnamese and Sino-Japanese words. Writing was imported from China and later\nadapted for Japanese. When the Dutch brought over all of their science and\nmedicine books, all of terms that didn't exist in Japanese were translated\nusing Sino-Japanese words.\n\nSlowly katakana English is taking over, however, meaning that there are a huge\nnumber of words with both English and Chinese counterparts. Even if Japanese\ndoesn't have the biggest vocabulary in the world (remember diglossia in Arabic\nsocieties, languages with morphology so complicated that it denies all\nattempts to count words, etc.) it still is huge.",
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:46:44.477",
"id": "120",
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"body": "Although it's true that there are a very, _very_ large number of kanji\ncompounds imported from Chinese to Japanese, it's not as direct as that\nstatement. There are Chinese words that don't exist in Japanese, and many\nChinese Kanji have different meanings or pronunciations, as well as\noccasionally being written slightly differently. These differences are\nparticularly profound in words with grammatical significance:\n\n * 你 (cn: nei5; jp: ni, ji, nanji) - Chinese for 'you'. Very common in Chinese, rare in Japanese (other words are used instead)\n * 我 (cn: ngo5; jp: wa, ware) - Chinese for 'me'. In Japanese carries a connotation of referring to yourself as a representative of a larger group, and is therefore somewhat uncommon.\n * 的 (cn: dik1; jp: teki) - Chinese possessive particle; has a function similar to の in Japanese. In Japanese, this is a suffix meaning 'the essence of'. You see this used in, eg, 攻撃的 or 積極的, but it is not used the same way as in Chinese at all.\n\nThere are also differences in usage patterns for modern inventions - eg,\nChinese uses 电脑 for 'computer', but in Japanese the katakana コンピューター is more\ncommon.\n\nAs for whether there are more words in Japanese than other languages, I\ncouldn't say. I would suspect, though, that if you looked at the set of\n_commonly used_ words, it would be about the same; if you were to include\nclassical words, loanwords, and rarely used native equivalents for loanwords,\nyou might see a bit more than the average language.",
"comment_count": 13,
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},
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"body": "You need to know that languages will evolve over time. Parts of the Japanese\nlanguage was largely influenced by classical Chinese, so a lot of Japanese\nwords you see will make sense in Chinese and vice versa. However Japanese and\nChinese are different language so even if they share similar volcabulary they\nare not simliar grammatically wise.\n\nSome words in Japanese means the same thing in Chinese and Japanese. This is\nthe case about 75% of the time. Then there are cases where Japanese words make\nsense in Chinese, but Chinese people tend to not use them. For example the\nword 上手 means to be skilled at something. If you say that in Chinese people\nwill (probably) understand you but it's not natural because it's like saying\n\"grand fries\" in English rather than \"large fries\"\n\nThen there are cases where Japanese words means something completely different\nin Chinese. For example 勉強 means to study in Japanese, but in Chinese it means\nreluctance.",
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"body": "This actually came up in class awhile back and our sensei (native speaker)\nanswered roughly as follows:\n\n> A Japanese person going to China will recognize enough kanji to be able to\n> get around and maybe get the gist of a newspaper article but since Japanese\n> uses a limited subset of the sinographs, they will not be able to read\n> everything they see and will also encounter problems in regards to\n> interpenetration due to the changes since when they were first introduced.\n> Likewise, Chinese person will recognize enough kanji that they can also get\n> around if they visit Japan, but will encounter the same problems with\n> interpretation and would also need to learn the hiragana and katakana.\n\nCouple this with the differences in grammar (i.e. verb-final vs. subject-verb-\nobject) and the meaning of a sentence can also be lost even if you have a\nrough idea as to what the kanji mean.",
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}
] | 114 | 122 | 122 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "133",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "Are there cases where gairaigo used in every day speech (`パン`, `アイスクリーム`,\netc...) have been ousted by native Japanese words?",
"comment_count": 2,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:44:29.440",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 13,
"tags": [
"loanwords"
],
"title": "外来語 (gairaigo) replaced by Japanese word?",
"view_count": 1736
} | [
{
"body": "Not all of them have one, but looks like \"アイスクリーム\" have this \"氷菓子\", but not\ncommonly used, so answer is No. They havn't ousted by native Japanese words.",
"comment_count": 2,
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"creation_date": "2011-05-31T23:50:19.870",
"id": "121",
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{
"body": "I can't think of any cases where this is the case. However, there is a current\ntrend, particularly in business, to use _waseigo_ or _gairaigo_ to appear more\n\"educated\". So going forward, one could assume that there are going to be more\nwords replaced by their _waseigo_ or _gairaigo_ equivalent.\n\nThere are cases where there is a _gairaigo_ , but the Chinese word is what is\nused in Japanese, like \"baseball\". Though I'm not sure what the timeline is\nfor 「ベースボール」 being replaced by 「野球」.",
"comment_count": 5,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:11:04.183",
"id": "133",
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},
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"body": "During world war two, there was [some movement to limit the use of foreign\nwords](http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1147223331)\n(since they belonged to the enemy) - this can be compared to the [\"Freedom\nFries\"](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_fries) in the US. For example\n(from the above-linked chiebukuro answer):\n\n * サイダー → [噴]{ふん}[出]{しゅっ}[水]{すい} \n * カレーライス → [辛]{から}[味]{み}[入]{い}り[汁]{しる}[掛]{か}け[飯]{めし}\n\nHowever, just like the \"freedom fries\" in the US, it never really caught on,\nand even the soldiers in the front lines kept on using katakana gairaigo in\ntheir everyday conversation.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T02:21:31.583",
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{
"body": "Maybe worth pointing out that before western loanwords became popular and\n\"trendy,\" the fad for over a thousand years was Chinese or faux-Chinese\nloanwords like \"電話.\" Though they may seem more Japanese than katakana words,\nthey're based on old Chinese borrowings (i.e. on-yomi, or the approximated\nChinese pronunciations for kanji characters) and not really purely \"native.\"",
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}
] | 118 | 133 | 133 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "139",
"answer_count": 5,
"body": "At work, it is wrong to simply say 分かる to say that you understand something.\nIn what situation should I opt to use one of the previously mentioned forms?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:03:50.183",
"favorite_count": 0,
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 18,
"tags": [
"nuances",
"honorifics",
"business-japanese"
],
"title": "What is the correct usage of 承知しました, 了解です and かしこまりました, the more formal forms of 分かる?",
"view_count": 35351
} | [
{
"body": "かしこまる／承知する are used mostly for answering requests from superiours (bosses,\nclients, etc.). Like, \"Yes, I understand what you're asking me to do (and I'll\ndo it).\" 分かる just implies you mentally understand.\n\n了解 is not formal as far as I know, and I hear it quite often. I learned it to\nmean almost like \"Roger!\" or \"copy that\".",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:15:26.810",
"id": "138",
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{
"body": "かしこまりました is by far the most formal, and is a humble form (謙遜語). It says that\nyou are inferior to the listener. Most specifically this should be used to\ninterface with customers (hence why wait staff at a restaurant may say it).\n\n承知しました is polite (〜します), but not humble. It is also appropriate to use with\ncustomers or superiors.\n\n了解です is also polite in form, and is not humble, but has a certain curt feeling\nto it (this could be from its usage by the armed services as \"Roger\").\nInformally friends and family often say/text 了解 (without the です) in a context\nwhere they want to say \"Yep, got it\".\n\nThe difference between the latter 2 is nuance, I suppose. Both seem to\ntranslate as \"I acknowledge and understand\". My gut feeling having worked in a\nJapanese office is that 了解です, while polite, isn't formal enough for customers.\n承知 is better for customers or superiors.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:16:14.747",
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"score": 19
},
{
"body": "Mostly the usage. Remember, first, that Sino-Japanese is almost always more\nformal than native Japanese.\n\n * かしこまる is for use with customers. \"Right away, sir.\" It literally means \"to take a humble/respectful attitude\" (新和英大辞典).\n * 了解 is used in the military. \"Affirmative/Understood\". See final fantasy VIII. Used all of the time by groups when they want to show that they understood and will follow what they are told. \n * 承知 is a very formal way of saying you understood. Also used very often in customer service.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"body": "I just want to add one point to other nice answers: 了解です is not a proper\npolite form for this meaning. The proper polite form is 了解しました. Saying 了解です\ninstead of 了解しました is acceptable and many young people use it but decreases the\nformality level. It shows an attempt to be polite, but at least if it is used\nby an educated native speaker of Japanese, it may imply that the speaker is\nnot bothering to use a proper form, which may decrease the politeness. If you\ngo this informality one step further, you get 了解っす which is even less formal\n(see [another question](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/36/what-\ndoes-at-the-end-of-a-sentence-mean)).",
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T02:59:32.470",
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{
"body": "In my experience\n\n→Ryoukai(了解）、most Polite:Ryoukaiitasimasita(了解致しました)is generally used when you\nsay ok and i will follow it or i will do it as accordingly. Generally after\nsaying this you are supposed do something. →Syouchi(承知しました）most\npolite:Syouchiitasimasita(承知致しました）is normally used when you need to say i\nunderstand.genrally after saying this you are supposed that you knew, learned\nsomething.",
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"creation_date": "2018-05-17T04:26:02.387",
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}
] | 129 | 139 | 139 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "137",
"answer_count": 5,
"body": "There are a number of verbs where there is a 〜xasu → xaseru transformation to\nproduce an transitive verb from an intransitive, eg:\n\n * 死なす→死なせる\n * 生かす→生かせる\n * 飲ます→飲ませる\n\nIs this some kind of generalized rule? (perhaps a classical conjugation?) Or\nis it something that must be handled on a case-by-case basis?",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:05:16.480",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 6,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"verbs",
"conjugations"
],
"title": "Is there a general rule for deriving xasu→xaseru intransitives such as 死なせる from 死なす?",
"view_count": 440
} | [
{
"body": "There is another base form before ~asu, and yes, there is rules for that.\n\n```\n\n - 死ぬ (die) ⇒ 死なす (let ~ die) \n ⇒ 死なせる (make ~ die)\n - 生きる (live) ⇒ 生かす (let ~ live) \n ⇒ 生かせる (make ~ live)\n - 飲みます(drink) ⇒ 飲ます (let ~ drink) \n ⇒ 飲ませる (make ~ drink)\n \n```",
"comment_count": 3,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:13:08.100",
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{
"body": "Here are some pointers:\n\n-Verbs ending in anything besides iru/eru can be called 五段, besides you conjugate them using the five rows in the kana table (one for each vowel). So use the five vowels for different contexts-\n\n * 死な- 死なない I won't die 死なせる To cause to die.\n * 死に- 死にますI'm gonna die now.\n * 死ぬ- 死ぬI'm gonna die/to die\n * 死ね- 死ね！ die! 死ね- 死ねば- if I die\n * 死の- 死のうとする to try to die\n\nFor most verbs that end in iru/eru, called 一段 because they conjugate on the\nsame vowel row, use these instead:\n\n * 食べない - I'm not gonna eat eat 食べさせる- To cause to eat\n * 食べます - I will eat\n * 食べる - I will eat\n * 食べろ - Eat!\n * 食べれば- If I eat\n * 食べようとする - to try to eat \n\nThese forms are called 未然形、連用形、終止形、連体形、仮定形、命令形, repectively.\n\nDon't forget, though: I say \"most\" because there are iru/eru verbs that are\n五段. 走る, for example; the negative is 走らない.",
"comment_count": 2,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:33:12.267",
"id": "174",
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"body": "It seems that there are several confusions in the question.\n\nFirst, 死なす and 死なせる are almost interchangeable (to make/let … die), and so are\n飲ます and 飲ませる (to make/let … drink). (I wrote “almost” just in case; honestly\nspeaking, I cannot think of any situation where one is correct is the other is\nnot.)\n\nSecond, the relation between 生かす (to make/let … live; to utilize) and 生かせる\n(can make … live; can utilize) is very different from the other two pairs of\nwords. The pair 生かす/生きさせる has the same relation as the two pairs 死なす/死なせる and\n飲ます/飲ませる.\n\nBoth 飲ます and 飲ませる are made from the verb 飲む. 飲ます is a verb derived from the\nverb 飲む (to drink). The derived verbs like 飲ます where the derivation adds the\nmeaning “make/let” are called 使役動詞 in the Japanese grammar. 飲ませる consists of\n飲ま (the 未然形 of 飲む) and an auxiliary verb せる (make/let). The same applies to\n死なす and 死なせる, both of which are made from the verb 死ぬ (to die).\n\nAlmost the same explanation applies to 生かす and 生きさせる, both of which are made\nfrom the verb 生きる (to live), but there are two complications here.\n\n * The verb 生かす has an additional meaning: to utilize. Therefore, 生かす and 生きさせる are not always interchangeable.\n * The phrase 生きさせる consists of 生き and させる. 生き is the 未然形 of 生きる, and させる is an auxiliary verb which has the same meaning as せる. The distinction between せる and させる depends on the verb to which it is attached, but I will not go into details now.\n\n生かせる is a verb derived from the verb 生かす using another method of derivation,\nand it means “can make … live” or “can utilize / can be utilized.”\n\n_Edit_ : In revision 1, I used the term “conjugation” incorrectly.",
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T04:26:48.420",
"id": "238",
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{
"body": "All three cases are actually different.\n\n> 死なす→死なせる\n\nIn the standard (Tokyo) dialect, `死なせる` is the correct form, and `死なす` is\nmarginal. If `死なす` is allowed in any case, then `死なせる` will not be allowed,\nand hence these should be considered different dialects/idiolects used with\nthe same meaning. It is the causative form of `死ぬ` (See below).\n\n> 生かす→生かせる\n\nIn the standard dialect, `生かす` is the correct form, and `生かせる` is completely\nungrammatical (unless you are talking about the potential form).\n\n> 飲ます→飲ませる\n\nHere, you see the **causative** morpheme `-(s)ase-`. When the verb stem ends\nwith a consonant, the form `-ase-` is used.\n\n> kak-ase-ru 'cause someone to write something'\n>\n> kag-ase-ru 'cause someone to smell something'\n>\n> kas-ase-ru 'cause someone to lend something to someone'\n>\n> kat-ase-ru 'cause someone to win'\n>\n> kam-ase-ru 'cause someone to bite something'\n>\n> sin-ase-ru 'cause someone to die'\n>\n> nom-ase-ru 'cause someone to drink'\n\nWhen the verb stem ends with a vowel (`i` or `e`), the form `-sase-` is used.\n\n> mi-sase-ru 'cause someone to see'\n>\n> tabe-sase-ru 'cause someone to eat something'",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-07-09T04:00:59.163",
"id": "1814",
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},
{
"body": "The basic answer:「せる」is the newer form and 「す」is classical. Both are correct\nand they have the same meaning.\n\nBut, as @user458 points out, the newer form is stronger in the Standard\nJapanese and the classical form is stronger in the Kansai dialect.\n\nAlso, as @Tsuyoshi Ito points out, some verbs have developed different\nmeanings for the two forms, even though historically they were the same.\n\nAlso, there are other, subtler reasons you prefer one over the other depending\non the verb.\n\nThe latter two are the reasons why the classical form is still sometimes used\nin the Standard Japanese.",
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}
] | 130 | 137 | 238 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "136",
"answer_count": 6,
"body": "I've seen both こんばんわ and こんばんは used; which is correct here? If we interpret\nthe は as the topic particle, は would seem correct, but it seems that わ is used\nquite frequently anyway...",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:09:34.680",
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"post_type": "question",
"score": 21,
"tags": [
"particle-は",
"spelling",
"greetings",
"kana-usage",
"lexicalization"
],
"title": "Which is correct: こんばんわ or こんばんは?",
"view_count": 53005
} | [
{
"body": "こんばんは is correct. The former is mostly a stylistic/emphatic usage.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:11:22.743",
"id": "135",
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},
{
"body": "[こんばんは](http://gogen-allguide.com/ko/konbanwa.html) is correct, according to\nthat page in Japanese.\n\nMy gut feeling is the same - 今晩は -> こんばんは.\n\nThat said, a cursory Google of こんばんは yielded 13M hits, whereas こんばんわ yielded\n26M.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:12:52.640",
"id": "136",
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"body": "こんばんは (今晩は) is the one in the dictionary for \"Good evening!\". I think that\nこんばんわ has a cuter feeling, maybe a little softer. It's a total guess, but it\nmight be related to the feminine わ at the end of sentences. Actually, [this\npage](http://gogen-allguide.com/ko/konbanwa.html) seems to be saying it's\nrelated to 和 (わ - peace) which gives it a nicer feeling.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:37:55.673",
"id": "150",
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{
"body": "こんばんわ is cuter. こんにちは is more correct/formal/proper.",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-07T21:01:27.733",
"id": "740",
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"body": "Both こんばんは and こんばんわ sound the same as the ha (は) in こんばんは sounds like wa with\nits current context so basically there is literally no difference between the\nfeeling that わ adds since it doesn't make the it sound any different, just\nmaking it clear not delivering hate.",
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"creation_date": "2019-08-01T03:24:44.577",
"id": "69809",
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"body": "The right way is always こんいちは, こんばんは with the particle \"HA, は\" It's like that\nbecause it's the old Japanese way to say \"good day\". the \"ha / は\" works the\nsame as \"is\": \"Anata ha, watashi ha\" 「あなたは」, 「わたしは」 meaning something like,\n\"today is a good day\" etc. After some time, it becomes fused in everyday\ncolloquial language. Also, we should not forgot that Japanese Kana only\nrepresents \"sounds of spelling\". We are allowed to write こんばんわ with \"wa\", but\nwe need to check where we are using it. This way of using \"wa\" can only appear\nin informal text such as web chats, with close friends, and manga. For any\ndocument that is official or with strangers it's mandatory to use the formal\nway, with \"ha\" and preferentially using kanji with the particle 今日は, 今晩は.",
"comment_count": 0,
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}
] | 131 | 136 | 135 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "146",
"answer_count": 4,
"body": "If you follow any Japanese speakers on Twitter, you'll almost certainly see\nthem use [なう](https://twitter.com/#search?q=%E3%81%AA%E3%81%86) at the end of\na sentence, to say \"I am in this place/doing this thing **now** \". Where does\nthis use come from? Who started it? Is it anything to do with the (e.g. bus)\nannouncements that say \"なう\"?",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:21:54.077",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "140",
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"last_edit_date": "2011-06-02T23:34:11.097",
"last_editor_user_id": "87",
"owner_user_id": "36",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 19,
"tags": [
"usage",
"slang",
"colloquial-language",
"internet-slang"
],
"title": "Where does なう on Twitter come from?",
"view_count": 2508
} | [
{
"body": "Twitter came from the US, so I'd argue that original Japanese twitter-ers\npicked it up from the English feeds that they followed. Additionally, \"now\" is\ncommon enough of a word that most Japanese know it in English, even if they\ndon't speak English fully, so I reckon it just caught on like that.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:23:27.417",
"id": "141",
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{
"body": "It's not clear exactly who or what started it on twitter, but なう does indeed\ncome from the English \"now\". It became popular in 2009, shortly after the\nrelease of twitter (according to [this\nsite](http://www.paradisearmy.com/doujin/pasok_now.htm)). Here are some\nJapanese articles exploring the usage:\n\n * <http://nanapi.jp/258/>\n * <http://zokugo-dict.com/21na/nau.htm>\n * <http://www.paradisearmy.com/doujin/pasok_now.htm>",
"comment_count": 0,
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},
{
"body": "I don't know for certain, but 「ナウい」(and later「ナウな」) was a trendy slang word\nbeginning in the 70's or so. (It is no longer trendy, and is in fact now very\ndated, so don't try using it to sound cool. :) So there was already a\nprecedence for this word.\n\n[Wikipedia article](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%8A%E3%82%A6%E3%81%84)",
"comment_count": 0,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-03T10:10:03.953",
"id": "488",
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"body": "The なう that you hear in the Bus announcements is actually \"なお\" meaning\n\"furthermore\" or \"in addition\". If I recall correctly, it is often used in the\npart of the announcement that is describing the locations near the next stop.",
"comment_count": 1,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-25T00:15:07.493",
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] | 140 | 146 | 146 |
{
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"answer_count": 5,
"body": "You see a lot of w and ww and even www in Twitter and casual chat. What does\nit mean? I've always thought it was わいわい but never found out. How is it\npronounced?\n\nHere's an example from\n[Twitter](https://twitter.com/ayav_v/status/75719460031430656)\n\n> なんでじゃろうねwwとりあえず電車なうだから間に合いそう笑",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:28:17.247",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "143",
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"owner_user_id": "36",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 30,
"tags": [
"slang",
"internet-slang",
"abbreviations"
],
"title": "What is the meaning of all those \"w\"s in email and SNSs?",
"view_count": 55437
} | [
{
"body": "www is Internet slang like lol in Japanese. It stands for warai (笑い), often\nused on online message boards\n\n笑 is like www, it's another internet slang, like lol in Japanese. You will\nalso see people adding 笑 at the end of sentences on the Internet just like the\nexample you gave.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:30:43.177",
"id": "144",
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},
{
"body": "They derive from 笑う(わらう). They're the Japanese equivalent of \"LOL\".",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:31:32.870",
"id": "145",
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"body": "It is an abbreviation for _warai_ (laugh), and it comes from gamer slang. It\ncan be translated as \"LOL.\"",
"comment_count": 3,
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"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:31:49.243",
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},
{
"body": "As the others have said, the \"w\" stands for 笑う(わらう).\n\n~~You might also see someone write \"ちょwww\" online. This is similar to somebody\nsaying \"ちょ~かわいい\" if you've seen that line before. In this case, the ちょ is\nactually 超(ちょう) so \"ちょwww\" would translate into something like \"so funny\" or\n\"very funny\" compared to the standard \"www\" or \"wwwwwwwww (ad infinitum)\"\nwhich would just be \"lol\" and \"roflmao\".~~",
"comment_count": 7,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:49:32.480",
"id": "156",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-10T13:56:20.060",
"last_edit_date": "2011-06-10T13:56:20.060",
"last_editor_user_id": "18",
"owner_user_id": "18",
"parent_id": "143",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 1
},
{
"body": "Incidentally, you can also use 草 (grass) instead of 笑 or www for the same\npurpose. This comes directly from the fact that www resembles sprouting grass:\n\n> 「www」と表現しているのが草が生えているように見えることから「草」と言われるようになりました。 Since it looks like\n> sprouting grass, people also started to say \"草\" to mean \"www\".\n\n[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/pRzAj.jpg)\n\n[source](https://www.hamuwo.com/netslang-warai-kusa/)",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 4.0",
"creation_date": "2022-05-03T19:35:54.147",
"id": "94354",
"last_activity_date": "2022-05-03T19:35:54.147",
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"parent_id": "143",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 2
}
] | 143 | 145 | 145 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "153",
"answer_count": 3,
"body": "Recently I came across this sentence in a computing-related technical\ndocument:\n\n> some software と連携させ、 some feature のカスタマイズを作成します。\n\nI get the meaning (after having integrated some product, we will customize\nsome feature), but my question is:\n\nIn this sentence, does させ come from the verb 刺す or just する ?",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:39:45.207",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "151",
"last_activity_date": "2011-07-09T04:33:32.733",
"last_edit_date": "2011-07-09T04:33:32.733",
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "107",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 5,
"tags": [
"grammar",
"conjugations"
],
"title": "Does \"させ\" comes from the verb 刺す or just する ?",
"view_count": 204
} | [
{
"body": "Just する. 連携する -> 連携させ is correct, 刺す has separate meaning.",
"comment_count": 1,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:41:30.200",
"id": "152",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T00:41:30.200",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "100",
"parent_id": "151",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 3
},
{
"body": "する--or to be more precise, させる. It is one way to abbreviate させる when used in\nthe middle of a sentence (more commonly you would see させて).",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T00:42:23.333",
"id": "153",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T00:42:23.333",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "28",
"parent_id": "151",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 4
},
{
"body": "I believe it comes from an old conjugation of す, which led to modern する. You\ncan see all of its conjugations\n[here](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%B5%E8%A1%8C%E5%A4%89%E6%A0%BC%E6%B4%BB%E7%94%A8).",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:11:16.897",
"id": "168",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:11:16.897",
"last_edit_date": null,
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"owner_user_id": "24",
"parent_id": "151",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 0
}
] | 151 | 153 | 153 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": null,
"answer_count": 3,
"body": "かしら is generally considered to be a question particle for use by females; are\nthere any situations or dialects in which it is usable by males? I'm aware\nthat historically, it was used by both male and female speakers; I'm mostly\nconcerned about modern usage.\n\nEdit: I'm quite aware that, normally, it sounds quite odd. I'm more concerned\nabout whether there are exceptional situations or dialects where male かしら\nusage is common enough not to sound odd.",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:03:03.273",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "164",
"last_activity_date": "2012-09-12T01:14:20.543",
"last_edit_date": "2012-09-12T01:14:20.543",
"last_editor_user_id": "501",
"owner_user_id": "76",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 13,
"tags": [
"word-choice",
"dialects",
"register",
"sentence-final-particles"
],
"title": "Are there any situations where かしら is considered appropriate/normal for males to use?",
"view_count": 1573
} | [
{
"body": "Well, you are always free to use かしら, whether if people think if you are a\nweird is a different matter.\n\nIt's not as much as being inappropriate(in a social sense) as to sounding\nweird.\n\nLinguistically it's usually used by female speakers and male speakers who are\ncross-dressers/gay as far as I know.",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:09:05.980",
"id": "165",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:09:05.980",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "23",
"parent_id": "164",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 6
},
{
"body": "Not that this answers your question, but it's quite possible. In the Kansai\narea (and possibly elsewhere) it's quite normal for men to end sentences in わ.\nSo maybe there are places where they use かしら as well. Of course, you\n(presumably you're a male) should probably stay away from it until you know\nfor sure.",
"comment_count": 7,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:09:35.603",
"id": "166",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:09:35.603",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "78",
"parent_id": "164",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 5
},
{
"body": "I did a search on this and found the following:\n\n> 昔、TBSの番組「ザ・ベスト10」で久米宏が なに気に 「〜かしら」と言ったのを見て初めは かなり衝撃でしたが\n> アナウンサーの業界では以外と使われている様です。 あと学者や解説者など、有識者や育ちのいい人が 今でも比較的違和感なく使っていますね。\n\nLoose translation:\n\n\"Back in the days, Kume Hiroshi used it quite frequently in the show \"The Best\n10\". While it may come as a shock to those who first experience it, it's\nactually used quite often by TV announcers.\"\n\nIt also mentions usage by scholars, commentators, and experts in their\nrespective fields.\n\n[Source](http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1111801521)\n\n**EDIT**\n\nAs an edition, this was often used by one of the main male characters in the\npopular manga series のび太くん, as shown here:\n\n",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-07T21:27:58.777",
"id": "744",
"last_activity_date": "2012-01-12T22:44:13.367",
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"last_editor_user_id": "921",
"owner_user_id": "180",
"parent_id": "164",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 8
}
] | 164 | null | 744 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "193",
"answer_count": 2,
"body": "「神{かみ}のみぞ知{し}るセカイ」 is the title of a manga/anime series but I'm not asking\nabout the anime. I'm just curious about the 「ぞ」 part in the title.\n\nI know there is a ぞ particle that is similar to よ, such that 行{い}くぞ is similar\nto 行くよ. But I have never encountered よ nor ぞ in the middle of a\nsentence/clause before, so this made me curious.\n\nWhich part of speech is that ぞ? What connotation does it bring and how do we\nuse it in a sentence?\n\np/s: I know the ぞ is not a part of のみぞ because when I entered のみぞ in my\nJapanese dictionary software it only returned のみ = “only\" so I deduced that\nthe ぞ is a separate word.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:28:44.457",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "170",
"last_activity_date": "2015-12-14T00:19:44.730",
"last_edit_date": "2015-12-14T00:19:44.730",
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "112",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 11,
"tags": [
"particles",
"idioms",
"parts-of-speech",
"particle-ぞ"
],
"title": "Which part of speech is the 「ぞ」 in 「神のみぞ知るセカイ」?",
"view_count": 1698
} | [
{
"body": "It's an emphatic particle from old Japanese. _Only_ God/Gods. There's another\none used with questions to show more uncertainty. \"どこぞで休んでいくか\" (デジタル大辞泉)",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:37:23.057",
"id": "182",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:37:23.057",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "24",
"parent_id": "170",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 10
},
{
"body": "If you look at koujien's entry for ぞ there are several uses (mostly outdated),\nbut I think the one which applies here is: 一つの事柄を特に指定し強調する｡ In other words, it\nplaces emphasis on something specific. So in reguards to this light\nnovel/anime series title I think it places emphasis on the fact that the/a\nworld which ONLY GOD knows about.\n\nAlso, this reminded me of a famous quote of Sakamoto Ryouma 世の人はわれは何ともいはばいへ\nわがなすことは我のみぞ知る something like \"No matter what society says, I know the meaning\nto my own actions\" basically, screw what society says, because I know the path\nI want to go down.\n\nI believe he's emphasizing that what matters is that HE knows what he should\nbe doing.",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:47:48.720",
"id": "193",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:47:48.720",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "109",
"parent_id": "170",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 10
}
] | 170 | 193 | 182 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "179",
"answer_count": 6,
"body": "I know the following two sentences give implication that \"not expecting me to\nunderstand (it)\" but I have a feeling that they give different nuances that I\njust can't put my finger on:\n\n> それは分{わ}かる **わけがない** でしょう。 _sore wa wakaru **wake ga nai** deshou._\n>\n> それは分{わ}かる **はずがない** でしょう。 _sore wa wakaru **hazu ga nai** deshou._\n\nWould someone explain what is the difference of the two sentences, and also\nhow to choose between using はず and わけ?",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:30:01.257",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "171",
"last_activity_date": "2015-11-14T02:26:06.467",
"last_edit_date": "2020-06-17T08:18:27.500",
"last_editor_user_id": "-1",
"owner_user_id": "112",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 24,
"tags": [
"word-choice",
"formal-nouns"
],
"title": "What is the difference between 「はずがない」 and 「わけがない」?",
"view_count": 9685
} | [
{
"body": "I believe the difference emphasis.\n\nそれは分かるわけがないでしょう。 sore ha wakaru wake ga nai deshou. - I'd read this as\nわかりようがない\n\nそれは分かるはずがないでしょう。 sore ha wakaru hazu ga nai deshou. - and this as he doesn't\nhave a chance to understand this. This is the stronger of the two.",
"comment_count": 4,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:32:41.857",
"id": "173",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:32:41.857",
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"post_type": "answer",
"score": 2
},
{
"body": "I would expect the わけ version to be stronger. If you look at the meaning of わけ\nand はず in isolation, わけ means 'reason' - eg, in the pattern of\n「どうしてそうなったの？／〜〜〜〜したわけ。」 はず however expresses an expectation - 「こうなるはず。」 Thus,\nif you use わけ, you imply that you can't understand why such a situation would\nhappen; with はず, you imply that you simply wouldn't _expect_ such a situation\nto happen (or, retrospectively, you express that you, previously, strongly\nexpected it not to happen)",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:33:52.110",
"id": "176",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:33:52.110",
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},
{
"body": "I'd translate them as follows:\n\n> 分かるわけがないでしょう。 _Wakaru wake ga nai deshō._\n\n\"There's no way _(he)_ can understand this.\" or \" _(He)_ surely doesn't\nunderstand this.\"\n\n> 分かるはずがないでしょう。 _Wakaru hazu ga nai deshō._\n\n\"I don't think _(he)_ understands this.\"\n\nはず is more of a personal inkling, while わけ is more of an\nobjective/direct/strong statement. Depending on how it's meant わけ can be used\ninsultingly:\n\n> 出来るわけないだろう。 _Dekiru wake nai darō._\n\n\" _(You)_ can't _(are unable to)_ do that!\" or \"Are _(you)_ crazy to think\n_(you)_ can do that?\"\n\n> 出来るはずはないけど… _Dekiru hazu wa nai kedo…_\n\n\" _(I)_ don't think _(you)_ can do it, but... _(maybe I'm wrong about that)_ \"\n\nMore, negated examples:\n\n> 出来ないわけがないでしょう。 _Dekinai wake ga nai deshō._\n\n\"It's not impossible, right?\" or \"It _should_ be possible, right?\"\n\n> 出来ないはずはないですが、今は難しいです。 _Dekinai hazu wa nai desu ga, ima wa muzukashii desu._\n\n\"I don't think it's impossible, but it's very difficult right now.\"",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:34:24.993",
"id": "178",
"last_activity_date": "2015-11-14T02:26:06.467",
"last_edit_date": "2015-11-14T02:26:06.467",
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"owner_user_id": "88",
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},
{
"body": "disclaimer: not a native speaker\n\nI think 'wake' implies that things happened as expected, where as 'hazu'\nimplies that what happened is not what was expected.\n\nOr, 'wake' is a bit more neutral, a \"matter of fact\", where as 'hazu' is more\nof a personal opinion/subjective kind of thing.\n\nThis is how I would understand the difference:\n\n> それは分かるわけがないでしょう。 sore ha wakaru wake ga nai deshou.\n\nYou're not meant to understand this .. it's normal.\n\n> それは分かるはずがないでしょう。 sore ha wakaru hazu ga nai deshou.\n\nI see no reason you could understand this .. so what's going on?",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:34:44.463",
"id": "179",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:45:30.260",
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},
{
"body": "Wake is a reason or cause; hazu is an expectation. They can be used in the\nsame context, but still have a different sense.\n\n分かるわけない！ \"How would you understand?!\" (there's no reason to think you would\nget this) わかるはずはない \"He shouldn't understand\" (I expect that he doesn't).",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:55:46.203",
"id": "196",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T01:55:46.203",
"last_edit_date": null,
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "24",
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"post_type": "answer",
"score": 5
},
{
"body": "Disclaimer: Not a native speaker.\n\nBased on how I hear it being used and also from the goo dictionary usage\nexplanation, I don't think the difference is that much (as to be worried about\nwhen to use which).\n\nEven if the dictionary gives different example sentences for the usage:\n\n[使い方]\n\n〔わけがない〕▽朝寝坊のあなたが、朝五時に起きられるわけがない\n\n〔はずがない〕▽小さい子供が四人もいるのだから、家の中がきれいなはずがないでしょ\n\nThey club it together in the \"proper use\" section\n\n[使い分け]\n【１】「わけがない」「はずがない」は、…する理由がない、…する道理がない、の意味で、ある事態の起こる可能性が全くないことを表わす。「わけはない」「はずもない」などの形もある。\n\nTo me, its as simple as:\n\nわかるはずがない： (I wasn't in town,so)How would I know?(what happened to him)\n\nわかるわけがない： (I wan't in town,so)No way of knowing(what happened to him)",
"comment_count": 0,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2015-10-02T00:05:03.640",
"id": "28427",
"last_activity_date": "2015-10-02T00:05:03.640",
"last_edit_date": null,
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"parent_id": "171",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 1
}
] | 171 | 179 | 179 |
{
"accepted_answer_id": "192",
"answer_count": 1,
"body": "`ご[馳走様]{ちそうさま}でした` is the greeting that people say after being offered a meal\nwhile `ご馳走` by itself means “a feast”.\n\nI looked up this word in the dictionary to learn more about the kanji\ncharacters. It turned out that both `馳` and `走` have the meaning of “run”, or\nmore specifically `馳` is “to gallop” and `走` is “to run”.\n\nSo how come two “run” kanji characters give the meaning of “a feast”? Would\nanyone explain the etymology of the word?\n\nP.S. `ご` is just a prefix you add to a noun to make it sound more polite.",
"comment_count": 3,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 4.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:31:21.227",
"favorite_count": 0,
"id": "172",
"last_activity_date": "2019-07-01T09:43:11.367",
"last_edit_date": "2019-07-01T09:43:11.367",
"last_editor_user_id": null,
"owner_user_id": "112",
"post_type": "question",
"score": 16,
"tags": [
"kanji",
"etymology"
],
"title": "About ご[馳走]{ちそう}: two “runs” would give you “a feast”?",
"view_count": 702
} | [
{
"body": "The original meaning is not a feast. 馳走 means to prepare food and treat\nguests, and also to run around doing a bunch of stuff. ご馳走 means that someone\nhas worked hard and treated their guests well.",
"comment_count": 2,
"content_license": "CC BY-SA 3.0",
"creation_date": "2011-06-01T01:46:20.193",
"id": "192",
"last_activity_date": "2011-06-01T08:30:25.970",
"last_edit_date": "2011-06-01T08:30:25.970",
"last_editor_user_id": "24",
"owner_user_id": "24",
"parent_id": "172",
"post_type": "answer",
"score": 13
}
] | 172 | 192 | 192 |
End of preview. Expand
in Dataset Viewer.
japanese-stackexchange
英語による日本語に関する質問ができる Japanese Stack Exchange のデータダンプ をもとにデータを加工し、質問文と回答文のペアになるように調整した QA データセット。
日本語翻訳された StackExchange ではないです。
データ構造
投稿本文は html2text を使ってマークダウン化されています。その際、
- コードブロックは ``` で囲まれるように変更されています。
- 画像 URL に base64 エンコードされた画像が含まれる場合、
[unk]に置き換えています。
default サブセット
id: 質問投稿の IDquestion: 質問投稿answers: 質問に対する回答投稿のリストaccepted_answer_id: 質問者に選ばれた回答のID。nullの可能性があるpopular_answer_id: もっともスコアが高かった回答のID。nullの可能性がある
simple サブセット
default サブセットから、 question と answers の辞書を展開しシンプルにしたもの。
id: 質問投稿の IDaccepted_answer_id: 質問者に選ばれた回答のID。nullの可能性があるpopular_answer_id: もっともスコアが高かった回答のID。nullの可能性があるtitle: 質問のタイトルquestion_body: 質問本文question_score: 質問のスコアtags: 質問に関連付けられたタグaccepted_answer_body: 質問者に選ばれた回答の本文。nullの可能性があるaccepted_answer_score: 質問者に選ばれた回答のスコア。nullの可能性があるpopular_answer_body: もっともスコアが高かった回答の本文。nullの可能性があるpopular_answer_score: もっともスコアが高かった回答のスコア。nullの可能性がある
使い方
datasets ライブラリを用いて簡単に利用できます。
from datasets import load_dataset
dataset = load_dataset("p1atdev/japanese-stackexchange", name="simple" split="train")
print(dataset)
#Dataset({
# features: ['id', 'accepted_answer_id', 'popular_answer_id', 'title', 'question_body', 'question_score', 'accepted_answer_body', 'accepted_answer_score', 'popular_answer_body', 'popular_answer_score', 'tags'],
# num_rows: 28428
#})
ライセンス
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