Hiragana

Hiragana is the basic Japanese phonetic script. It represents every sound in the Japanese language. Therefore, you can theoretically write everything in Hiragana. However, because Japanese is written with no spaces, this will create nearly indecipherable text.

Here is a table of Hiragana and similar-sounding English consonant-vowel pronunciations. It is read up to down and right to left, which is how most Japanese books are written. In Japanese, writing the strokes in the correct order and direction is important, especially for Kanji. Because handwritten letters look slightly different from typed letters (just like how 'a' looks totally different when typed), you will want to use a resource that uses handwritten style fonts to show you how to write the characters (see below for links). I must also stress the importance of correctly learning how to pronounce each sound. Since every word in Japanese is composed of these sounds, learning an incorrect pronunciation for a letter can severely damage the very foundation on which your pronunciation lies.

* = no longer used

You can listen to the pronunciation for each character by clicking on it in chart. If your browser doesn't support audio, you can also download them at http://www.guidetojapanese.org/audio/basic_sounds.zip. There are also other free resources with audio samples.

Hiragana is not too tough to master or teach and as a result, there are a variety of web sites and free programs that are already available on the web. I also suggest recording yourself and comparing the sounds to make sure you're getting it right.

When practicing writing Hiragana by hand, the important thing to remember is that the stroke order and direction of the strokes matter. There, I underlined, italicized, bolded, and highlighted it to boot. Trust me, you'll eventually find out why when you read other people's hasty notes that are nothing more than chicken scrawls. The only thing that will help you is that everybody writes in the same order and so the "flow" of the characters is fairly consistent. I strongly recommend that you pay close attention to stroke order from the beginning starting with Hiragana to avoid falling into bad habits. While there are many tools online that aim to help you learn Hiragana, the best way to learn how to write it is the old fashioned way: a piece of paper and pen/pencil. Below are handy PDFs for Hiragana writing practice.

• Hiragana trace sheets
• japanese-lesson.com
• Hiroshi & Sakura

※ As an aside, an old Japanese poem called 「いろは」 was often used as the base for ordering of Hiragana until recent times. The poem contains every single Hiragana character except for 「ん」 which probably did not exist at the time it was written. You can check out this poem for yourself in this wikipedia article. As the article mentions, this order is still sometimes used in ordering lists so you may want to spend some time checking it out.

The Muddied Sounds

Once you memorize all the characters in Hiragana, there are still some additional sounds left to be learned. There are five more consonant sounds that are written by either affixing two tiny lines similar to a double quotation mark called dakuten （濁点） or a tiny circle called handakuten （半濁点）. This essentially creates a "muddy" or less clipped version of the consonant (technically called a voiced consonant or 「濁り」, which literally means to become muddy).

All the voiced consonant sounds are shown in the table below.

The Small 「や」、「ゆ」、and 「よ」

You can also combine a consonant with a / ya / yu / yo / sound by attaching a small 「や」、「ゆ」、or 「よ」 to the / i / vowel character of each consonant.

The Small 「つ」

A small 「つ」 is inserted between two characters to carry the consonant sound of the second character to the end of the first. For example, if you inserted a small 「つ」 between 「び」 and 「く」 to make 「びっく」, the / k / consonant sound is carried back to the end of the first character to produce "bikku". Similarly, 「はっぱ」 becomes "happa", 「ろっく」 becomes "rokku" and so on and so forth.

Examples

1. トラック (to-rak-ku) - truck
2. ざっし (zas-shi) - magazine
3. カップ (kap-pu) - cup

The Long Vowel Sound

Whew! You're almost done. In this last portion, we will go over the long vowel sound which is simply extending the duration of a vowel sound. You can extend the vowel sound of a character by adding either 「あ」、「い」、or 「う」 depending on the vowel in accordance to the following chart.

For example, if you wanted to create an extended vowel sound from 「か」, you would add 「あ」 to create 「かあ」. Other examples would include: 「き → きい」, 「く → くう」, 「け → けい」, 「こ → こう」, 「さ → さあ」 and so on. The reasoning for this is quite simple. Try saying 「か」 and 「あ」 separately. Then say them in succession as fast as you can. You'll notice that soon enough, it sounds like you're dragging out the / ka / for a longer duration than just saying / ka / by itself. When pronouncing long vowel sounds, try to remember that they are really two sounds merged together.

It's important to make sure you hold the vowel sound long enough because you can be saying things like "here" （ここ） instead of "high school" （こうこう） or "middle-aged lady" （おばさん） instead of "grandmother" （おばあさん） if you don't stretch it out correctly!

Examples

1. がくせい (ga-ku-se) - student
2. せんせい (sen-se) - teacher
3. きょう (kyo) - today
4. おはよう (o-ha-yo) - good morning
5. おかあさん (o-ka-san) - mother

There are rare exceptions where an / e / vowel sound is extended by adding 「え」 or an / o / vowel sound is extended by 「お」. Some examples of this include 「おねえさん」、「おおい」、and 「おおきい」. Pay careful attention to these exceptions but don't worry, there aren't too many of them.

Katakana

As mentioned before, Katakana is mainly used for words imported from foreign languages. It can also be used to emphasize certain words similar to the function of italics. For a more complete list of usages, refer to the Wikipedia entry on katakana.

Katakana represents the same set of phonetic sounds as Hiragana except all the characters are different. Since foreign words must fit into this limited set of [consonants+vowel] sounds, they undergo many radical changes resulting in instances where English speakers can't understand words that are supposed to be derived from English! As a result, the use of Katakana is extremely difficult for English speakers because they expect English words to sound like... well... English. Instead, it is better to completely forget the original English word, and treat the word as an entirely separate Japanese word, otherwise you can run into the habit of saying English words with English pronunciations (whereupon a Japanese person may or may not understand what you are saying).

* = obsolete or rarely used

Katakana is significantly tougher to master compared to Hiragana because it is only used for certain words and you don't get nearly as much practice as you do with Hiragana. To learn the proper stroke order (and yes, you need to), here are links to practice sheets for Katakana.

• Katakana trace sheets
• japanese-lesson.com
• Hiroshi & Sakura

Also, since Japanese doesn't have any spaces, sometimes the symbol 「・」 is used to show the spaces like 「ロック・アンド・ロール」 for "rock and roll". Using the symbol is completely optional so sometimes nothing will be used at all.

The Long Vowel Sound

Long vowels have been radically simplified in Katakana. Instead of having to muck around thinking about vowel sounds, all long vowel sounds are denoted by a simple dash like so: ー.

Examples

1. ツアー (tsu-a) - tour
2. メール (me-ru) - email
3. ケーキ (ke-ki) - cake

The Small 「ア、イ、ウ、エ、オ」

Due to the limitations of the sound set in Hiragana, some new combinations have been devised over the years to account for sounds that were not originally in Japanese. Most notable is the lack of the / ti / di / and / tu / du / sounds (because of the / chi / tsu / sounds), and the lack of the / f / consonant sound except for 「ふ」. The / sh / j / ch / consonants are also missing for the / e / vowel sound. The decision to resolve these deficiencies was to add small versions of the five vowel sounds. This has also been done for the / w / consonant sound to replace the obsolete characters. In addition, the convention of using the little double slashes on the 「ウ」 vowel （ヴ） with the small 「ア、イ、エ、オ」 to designate the / v / consonant has also been established but it's not often used probably due to the fact that Japanese people still have difficulty pronouncing / v /. For instance, while you may guess that "volume" would be pronounced with a / v / sound, the Japanese have opted for the easier to pronounce "bolume" （ボリューム）. In the same way, vodka is written as "wokka" （ウォッカ） and not 「ヴォッカ」. You can write "violin" as either 「バイオリン」 or 「ヴァイオリン」. It really doesn't matter however because almost all Japanese people will pronounce it with a / b / sound anyway. The following table shows the added sounds that were lacking with a highlight. Other sounds that already existed are reused as appropriate.

Some examples of words in Katakana

Translating English words into Japanese is a knack that requires quite a bit of practice and luck. To give you a sense of how English words become "Japanified", here are a few examples of words in Katakana. Sometimes the words in Katakana may not even be correct English or have a different meaning from the English word it's supposed to represent. Of course, not all Katakana words are derived from English.

Kanji

What is Kanji?

In Japanese, nouns and stems of adjectives and verbs are almost all written in Chinese characters called Kanji. Adverbs are also fairly frequently written in Kanji as well. This means that you will need to learn Chinese characters to be able to read most of the words in the language. (Children's books or any other material where the audience is not expected to know a lot of Kanji is an exception to this.) Not all words are always written in Kanji however. For example, while the verb "to do" technically has a Kanji associated with it, it is always written in Hiragana.

This guide begins using Kanji from the beginning to help you read "real" Japanese as quickly as possible. Therefore, we will go over some properties of Kanji and discuss some strategies of learning it quickly and efficiently. Mastering Kanji is not easy but it is by no means impossible. The biggest part of the battle is mastering the skills of learning Kanji and time. In short, memorizing Kanji past short-term memory must be done with a great deal of study and, most importantly, for a long time. And by this, I don't mean studying five hours a day but rather reviewing how to write a Kanji once every several months until you are sure you have it down for good. This is another reason why this guide starts using Kanji right away. There is no reason to dump the huge job of learning Kanji at the advanced level. By studying Kanji along with new vocabulary from the beginning, the immense job of learning Kanji is divided into small manageable chunks and the extra time helps settle learned Kanji into permanent memory. In addition, this will help you learn new vocabulary, which will often have combinations of Kanji you already know. If you start learning Kanji later, this benefit will be wasted or reduced.

Learning Kanji

All the resources you need to begin learning Kanji are on the web for free at Jim Breen's WWWJDIC. In addition to its huge dictionaries, it has stroke order diagrams for the 1,945 jouyo Kanji (essentially almost all the Kanji you will need to know). Especially for those who are just starting to learn, you will want to repeatedly write out each Kanji to memorize the stroke order. Another important skill is learning how to balance the character so that certain parts are not too big or small. So make sure to copy the characters as close to the original as possible. Eventually, you will naturally develop a sense of the stroke order for certain types of characters allowing you to bypass the drilling stage. All the Kanji used in this guide can be easily looked up by copying and pasting to the WWWJDIC.

Reading Kanji

Almost every character has two different readings called 音読み （おんよみ） and 訓読み（くんよみ）. 音読み is the original Chinese reading while 訓読み is the Japanese reading. Kanji that appear in a compound or 熟語 is usually read with 音読み while one Kanji by itself is usually read with 訓読み. For example, 「力」（ちから） is read with the 訓読み while the same character in a compound word such as 「能力」 is read with the 音読み （which is 「りょく」 in this case）.

Certain characters (especially the most common ones) can have more than one 音読み or 訓読み. For example, in the word 「怪力」, 「力」 is read here as 「りき」 and not 「りょく」. Certain compound words also have special readings that have nothing to do with the readings of the individual characters. These readings must be individually memorized. Thankfully, these readings are few and far in between.

訓読み is also used in adjectives and verbs in addition to the stand-alone characters. These words often have a string of kana (called okurigana) that come attached to the word. This is so that the reading of the Chinese character stays the same even when the word is conjugated to different forms. For example, the past form of the verb 「食べる」 is 「食べた」. Even though the verb has changed, the reading for 「食」 remain untouched. (Imagine how difficult things could get if readings for Kanji changed with conjugation or even worse, if the Kanji itself changed.) Okurigana also serves to distinguish between intransitive and transitive verbs (more on this later).

Another concept that is difficult to grasp at first is that the actual readings of Kanji can change slightly in a compound word to make the word easier to say. The more common transformations include the / h / sounds changing to either / b / or / p / sounds or 「つ」 becoming 「っ」. Examples include: 「一本」、「徹底」、and 「格好」.

Yet another fun aspect of Kanji you'll run into are words that practically mean the same thing and use the same reading but have different Kanji to make just a slight difference in meaning. For example 「聞く」（きく） means to listen and so does 「聴く」（きく）. The only difference is that 「聴く」 means to pay more attention to what you're listening to. For example, listening to music almost always prefers 「聴く」 over 「聞く」. 「聞く」 can also mean 'to ask', as well as, "to hear" but 「訊く」（きく） can only mean "to ask". Yet another example is the common practice of writing 「見る」 as 「観る」 when it applies to watching a show such as a movie. Yet another interesting example is 「書く」（かく） which means "to write" while 描く （かく） means "to draw". However, when you're depicting an abstract image such as a scene in a book, the reading of the same word 「描く」 becomes 「えがく」. There's also the case where the meaning and Kanji stays the same but can have multiple readings such as 「今日」 which can be either 「きょう」、「こんじつ」, or 「こんにち」. In this case, it doesn't really matter which reading you choose except that some are preferred over others in certain situations.

Finally, there is one special character 々 that is really not a character. It simply indicates that the previous character is repeated. For example, 「時時」、「様様」、「色色」、「一一」 can and usually are written as 「時々」、「様々」、「色々」、「一々」.

In addition to these "features" of Kanji, you will see a whole slew of delightful perks and surprises Kanji has for you as you advance in Japanese. You can decide for yourself if that statement is sarcasm or not. However, don't be scared into thinking that Japanese is incredibly hard. Most of the words in the language usually only have one Kanji associated with it and a majority of Kanji do not have more than two types of readings.

Why Kanji?

Some people feel that the system of using separate, discrete symbols instead of a sensible alphabet is out-dated and overly complicated. In fact, it might not have been a good idea to adopt Chinese into Japanese since both languages are fundamentally different in structure. But the purpose of this guide is not to debate over the decisions made thousands of years ago but to explain why you must learn Kanji in order to learn Japanese. And by this, I mean more than just saying, "That's how it's done so get over it!".

Some people feel that Japanese should have just switched from Chinese to romaji to do away with all the complicated characters that was bewildering the foreign white devils. In fact, Korean has adopted their own alphabet to greatly simplify their written language to great success. So why didn't it work for Japanese? And I ask this in the past tense because I believe that the government did attempt to replace Kanji with romaji shortly after the second world war with little success. I think anyone who has typed at any length in Japanese can easily see why this did not work. At any one time, when you convert typed Hiragana into Kanji, you are presented with almost always at least two choices (two homophones) and sometimes even up to ten. (Try typing kikan). The 46 or so character alphabet of set sounds in Japanese makes it hard to avoid homophones. Compare this to the Korean alphabet which has 14 consonants and 10 vowels. Any of the consonants can be matched to any of the vowels giving 140 sounds. In addition, a third and sometimes even fourth consonant can be attached to create a single letter. This gives over 1960 sounds that can be created theoretically. (The sounds that are actually used is actually much less than that, though I don't know the exact number.)

Since you want to read at a much faster rate than you talk, you need some visual cues to instantly tell you what each word is. You can use the shape of words in English to blaze through text because most words have different shapes. Try this little exercise: Hi, enve thgouh all teh wrods aer seplled icorrenctly, can you sltil udsternand me?" Korean does this too because it has enough characters to make words with distinct and different shapes. However, because the visual cues are not distinct as Kanji, spaces needed to be added to remove ambiguities. (This presents another problem of when and where to set spaces.)

With Kanji, we don't have to worry about spaces and much of the problem of homophones is mostly resolved. Without Kanji, even if spaces were to be added, the ambiguities and lack of visual cues would make Japanese text much more difficult to read.

Expressing state-of-being

Declaring something is so and so using 「だ」

Vocabulary

1. 人 【ひと】 - person
2. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
3. 元気 【げん・き】 - healthy; lively
   ＊Used as a greeting to indicate whether one is well

One of the trickiest part of Japanese is that there is no verb for the state-of-being like the verb "to be" in English. You can, however, declare what something is by attaching the Hiragana character 「だ」 to a noun or na-adjective only. (We will learn about na-adjectives in the section on adjectives later.)

Examples

1. 人だ。
   Is person.
2. 学生だ。
   Is student.
3. 元気だ。
   Is well.

Seems easy enough. Here's the real kicker though.

You can say you're doing well or someone is a student without using 「だ」 at all. For example, below is an example of a very typical greeting among friends. Also notice how the subject isn't even specified when it's obvious from the context.

Typical casual greeting

Ａ：元気？
A: (Are you) well?

Ｂ：元気。
B: (I'm) well.

So you may be wondering, "What's the point of using 「だ」?" Well, the main difference is that a declarative statement makes the sentence sound more emphatic and forceful in order to make it more... well declarative. Therefore, it is more common to hear men use 「だ」 at the end of sentences.

The declarative 「だ」 is also needed in various grammatical structures where a state-of-being must be explicitly declared. There are also times when you cannot attach it. It's all quite a pain in the butt really but you don't have to worry about it yet.

Conjugating to the negative state-of-being

Vocabulary

1. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
2. 友達 【とも・だち】 - friend
3. 元気 【げん・き】 - healthy; lively
   ＊Used as a greeting to indicate whether one is well

In Japanese, negative and past tense are all expressed by conjugation. We can conjugate a noun or adjective to either its negative or past tense to say that something is not [X] or that something was [X]. This may be a bit hard to grasp at first but none of these state-of-being conjugations make anything declarative like 「だ」 does. We'll learn how to make these tenses declarative by attaching 「だ」 to the end of the sentence in a later lesson.

First, for the negative, attach 「じゃない」 to the noun or na-adjective.

Examples

1. 学生じゃない。
   Is not student.
2. 友達じゃない。
   Is not friend.
3. 元気じゃない。
   Is not well.

Conjugating to the past state-of-being

Vocabulary

1. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
2. 友達 【とも・だち】 - friend
3. 元気 【げん・き】 - healthy; lively
   ＊Used as a greeting to indicate whether one is well

We will now learn the past tense of the state-of-being. To say something was something, attach 「だった」 to the noun or na-adjective.

In order to say the negative past (was not), conjugate the negative to the negative past tense by dropping the 「い」 from 「じゃない」 and adding 「かった」.

Examples

1. 学生だった。
   Was student.
2. 友達じゃなかった。
   Was not friend.
3. 元気じゃなかった。
   Was not well.

Conjugation summary

We've now learned how to express state-of-being in all four tenses. Next we will learn some particles, which will allow us assign roles to words. Here is a summary chart of the conjugations we learned in this section.

Introduction to Particles

Defining grammatical functions with particles

We want to now make good use of what we learned in the last lesson by associating a noun with another noun. This is done with something called particles. Particles are one or more Hiragana characters that attach to the end of a word to define the grammatical function of that word in the sentence. Using the correct particles is very important because the meaning of a sentence can completely change just by changing the particles. For example, the sentence "Eat fish." can become "The fish eats." simply by changing one particle.

The 「は」 topic particle

Vocabulary

1. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
2. うん - yes (casual)
3. 明日 【あした】 - tomorrow
4. ううん - no (casual)
5. 今日 【きょう】 - today
6. 試験 【しけん】 - exam

The first particle we will learn is the topic particle. The topic particle identifies what it is that you're talking about, essentially the topic of your sentence. Let's say a person says, "Not student." This is a perfectly valid sentence in Japanese but it doesn't tell us much without knowing what the person is talking about. The topic particle will allow us to express what our sentences are about. The topic particle is the character 「は」. Now, while this character is normally pronounced as /ha/, it is pronounced /wa/ only when it is being used as the topic particle.

Example 1

ボブ：アリスは学生？
Bob: Is Alice (you) student?

アリス：うん、学生。
Alice: Yeah, (I) am.

Here, Bob is indicating that his question is about Alice. Notice that once the topic is established, Alice does not have to repeat the topic to answer the question about herself.

Example 2

ボブ：ジョンは明日？
Bob: John is tomorrow?

アリス：ううん、明日じゃない。
Alice: No, not tomorrow.

Since we have no context, we don't have enough information to make any sense of this conversation. It obviously makes no sense for John to actually be tomorrow. Given a context, as long as the sentence has something to do with John and tomorrow, it can mean anything. For instance, they could be talking about when John is taking an exam.

Example 3

アリス：今日は試験だ。
Alice: Today is exam.

ボブ：ジョンは？
Bob: What about John?

アリス：ジョンは明日。
Alice: John is tomorrow. (As for John, the exam is tomorrow.)

The last example shows how generic the topic of a sentence is. A topic can be referring to any action or object from anywhere even including other sentences. For example, in the last sentence from the previous example, even though the sentence is about when the exam is for John, the word "exam" doesn't appear anywhere in the sentence!

We'll see a more specific particle that ties more closely into the sentence at the end of this lesson with the identifier particle.

The 「も」 inclusive topic particle

Vocabulary

1. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
2. うん - yes (casual)
3. でも - but
4. ううん - no (casual)

Another particle that is very similar to the topic particle is the inclusive topic particle. It is essentially the topic particle with the additional meaning of "also". Basically, it can introduce another topic in addition to the current topic. The inclusive topic particle is the 「も」 character and its use is best explained by an example.

Example 1

ボブ：アリスは学生？
Bob: Is Alice (you) student?

アリス：うん、トムも学生。
Alice: Yeah, and Tom is also student.

The inclusion of 「も」 must be consistent with the answer. It would not make sense to say, "I am a student, and Tom is also not a student." Instead, use the 「は」 particle to make a break from the inclusion as seen in the next example.

Example 2

ボブ：アリスは学生？
Bob: Is Alice (you) student?

アリス：うん、でもトムは学生じゃない。
Alice: Yeah, but Tom is not student.

Below is an example of inclusion with the negative.

Example 3

ボブ：アリスは学生？
Bob: Is Alice (you) student?

アリス：ううん、トムも学生じゃない。
Alice: No, and Tom is also not student.

The 「が」 identifier particle

Vocabulary

1. 誰 【だれ】 - who
2. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
3. 私 【わたし】 - me; myself; I

Ok, so we can make a topic using the 「は」 and 「も」 particle. But what if we don’t know what the topic is? What if I wanted to ask, “Who is the student?” What I need is some kind of identifier because I don't know who the student is. If I use the topic particle, the question would become, “Is who the student?” and that doesn't make any sense because "who" is not an actual person.

This is where the 「が」 particle comes into play. It is also referred to as the subject particle but I hate that name since "subject" means something completely different in English grammar. Instead, I call it the identifier particle because the particle indicates that the speaker wants to identify something unspecified.

Example 1

ボブ：誰が学生？
Bob: Who is the one that is student?

アリス：ジョンが学生。
Alice: John is the one who is student.

Bob wants to identify who among all the possible candidates is a student. Alice responds that John is the one. Notice, Alice could also have answered with the topic particle to indicate that, speaking of John, she knows that he is a student (maybe not the student). You can see the difference in the next example.

Example 2

1. 誰が学生？
   Who is the one that is student?
2. 学生は誰？
   (The) student is who?

The first sentence seeks to identify a specific person for "student" while the second sentence is simply talking about the student. You cannot replace 「が」 with 「は」 in the first sentence because "who" would become the topic and the question would become, "Is who a student?"

The two particles 「は」 and 「が」 may seem very similar only because it is impossible to translate them directly into English. For example, the two sentences below have the same English translation.*

Example 3

1. 私は学生。
   I (am) student.
2. 私が学生。
   I (am) student.

However, they only seem similar because English cannot express information about the context as succinctly as Japanese sometimes can. In the first sentence, since 「私」 is the topic, the sentence means, "Speaking about me, I am a student".

However, the second sentence is specifying who the 「学生」 is. If we want to know who the student is, the 「が」 particle tells us it's 「私」. You can also think about the 「が」 particle as always answering a silent question. The second sentence might be answering a question, "Who is the student?" I often translate the topic particle as "as for; about" and the identifier particle as "the one; the thing" to illustrate the difference.

1. 私は学生。
   As for me, (I am) student.
2. 私が学生。
   I (am) the one (that is) student.

The 「は」 and 「が」 particles are actually quite different if you think of it the right way. The 「が」 particle identifies a specific property of something while the 「は」 particle is used only to bring up a new topic of conversation. This is why, in longer sentences, it is common to separate the topic with commas to remove ambiguity about which part of the sentence the topic applies to.

*Well technically, it's the most likely translation given the lack of context.

Adjectives

Properties of Adjectives

Now that we can connect two nouns together in various ways using particles, we want to describe our nouns with adjectives. An adjective can directly modify a noun that immediately follows it. It can also be connected in the same way we did with nouns using particles. All adjectives fall under two categories: na-adjectives and i-adjectives.

The na-adjective

Vocabulary

1. 静か 【しず・か】 (na-adj) - quiet
2. 人 【ひと】 - person
3. きれい (na-adj) - pretty; clean
4. 友達 【とも・だち】 - friend
5. 親切 【しん・せつ】 (na-adj) - kind
6. 魚 【さかな】 - fish
7. 好き 【す・き】 (na-adj) - likable; desirable
8. 肉 【にく】 - meat
9. 野菜 【や・さい】 - vegetables

The na-adjective is very simple to learn because it acts essentially like a noun. All the conjugation rules for both nouns and na-adjectives are the same. One main difference is that a na-adjective can directly modify a noun following it by sticking 「な」 between the adjective and noun. (Hence the name, na-adjective.)

Examples

1. 静かな人。
   Quiet person.
2. きれいな人。
   Pretty person.

You can also use adjectives with particles just like we did in the last lesson with nouns.

Examples

1. 友達は親切。
   Friend is kind.
2. 友達は親切な人だ。
   Friend is kind person.

As shown by the following examples, the conjugation rules for na-adjectives are the same as nouns.

Examples

1. ボブは魚が好きだ。
   Bob likes fish.
2. ボブは魚が好きじゃない。
   Bob does not like fish.
3. ボブは魚が好きだった。
   Bob liked fish.
4. ボブは魚が好きじゃなかった。
   Bob did not like fish.

If it bothers you that "like" is an adjective and not a verb in Japanese, you can think of 「好き」 as meaning "desirable". Also, you can see a good example of the topic and identifier particle working in harmony. The sentence is about the topic "Bob" and "fish" identifies specifically what Bob likes.

You can also use the last three conjugations to directly modify the noun. (Remember to attach 「な」 for positive non-past tense.)

Examples

1. 魚が好きな人。
   Person that likes fish.
2. 魚が好きじゃない人。
   Person that does not like fish.
3. 魚が好きだった人。
   Person that liked fish.
4. 魚が好きじゃなかった人。
   Person that did not like fish.

Here, the entire clause 「魚が好き」、「魚が好きじゃない」、etc. is modifying "person" to talk about people that like or dislike fish. You can see why this type of sentence is useful because 「人は魚が好きだ」 would mean "People like fish", which isn't always the case.

We can even treat the whole descriptive noun clause as we would a single noun. For instance, we can make the whole clause a topic like the following example.

Examples

1. 魚が好きじゃない人は、肉が好きだ。
   Person who does not like fish like meat.
2. 魚が好きな人は、野菜も好きだ。
   Person who likes fish also like vegetables.

The i-adjective

Vocabulary

1. 嫌い 【きら・い】 (na-adj) - distasteful, hateful
2. 食べ物 【た・べ・もの】 - food
3. おいしい (i-adj) - tasty
4. 高い 【たか・い】 (i-adj) - high; tall; expensive
5. ビル - building
6. 値段 【ね・だん】 - price
7. レストラン - restaurant
8. あまり - not very (when used with negative)
9. 好き 【す・き】 (na-adj) - likable; desirable
10. いい (i-adj) - good
11. 彼 【かれ】 - he; boyfriend
12. かっこいい (i-adj) - cool; handsome

All i-adjectives always end in the Hiragana character: 「い」. However, you may have noticed that some na-adjectives also end in 「い」 such as 「きれい（な）」. So how can you tell the difference? There are actually very few na-adjectives that end with 「い」 that is usually not written in Kanji. Two of the most common include: 「きれい」 and 「嫌い」. Almost all other na-adjectives that end in 「い」 are usually written in Kanji and so you can easily tell that it's not an i-adjective. For instance, 「きれい」 written in Kanji looks like 「綺麗」 or 「奇麗」. Since the 「い」 part of 「麗」 is part of a Kanji character, you know that it can't be an i-adjective. That's because the whole point of the 「い」 in i-adjectives is to allow conjugation without changing the Kanji. In fact, 「嫌い」 is one of the rare na-adjectives that in 「い」 without a Kanji. This has to do with the fact that 「嫌い」 is actually derived from the verb 「嫌う」.

Unlike na-adjectives, you do not need to add 「な」 to directly modify a noun with an i-adjective.

Examples

1. 嫌いな食べ物。
   Hated food.
2. おいしい食べ物。
   Tasty food.

Remember how the negative state-of-being for nouns also ended in 「い」 （じゃない）? Well, just like the negative state-of-being for nouns, you can never attach the declarative 「だ」 to i-adjectives.

Now that we got that matter cleared up, below are the rules for conjugating i-adjectives. Notice that the rule for conjugating to negative past tense is the same as the rule for the past tense.

Examples

1. 高いビル。
   Tall building.
2. 高くないビル。
   Not tall building.
3. 高かったビル。
   Building that was tall.
4. 高くなかったビル。
   Building that was not tall.

Note that you can make the same type of descriptive noun clause as we have done with na-adjectives. The only difference is that we don't need 「な」 to directly modify the noun.

Example

• 値段が高いレストランはあまり好きじゃない。
  Don't like high price restaurants very much.

In this example, the descriptive clause 「値段が高い」 is directly modifying 「レストラン」.

An annoying exception

There is one i-adjective meaning "good" that acts slightly differently from all other i-adjectives. This is a classic case of how learning Japanese is harder for beginners because the most common and useful words also have the most exceptions. The word for "good" was originally 「よい（良い）」. However, with time, it soon became 「いい」. When it is written in Kanji, it is usually read as 「よい」 so 「いい」 is almost always Hiragana. That's all fine and good. Unfortunately, all the conjugations are still derived from 「よい」 and not 「いい」. This is shown in the next table.

Another adjective that acts like this is 「かっこいい」 because it is an abbreviated version of two words merged together: 「格好」 and 「いい」. Since it uses the same 「いい」, you need to use the same conjugations.

Take care to make all the conjugations from 「よい」 not 「いい」.

Examples

1. 値段があんまりよくない。
   Price isn't very good.
2. 彼はかっこよかった！
   He looked really cool!

Verb Basics

Role of Verbs

Vocabulary

1. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
2. 分かる 【わ・か】 (u-verb) - to understand
3. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see
4. 寝る 【ね・る】 (ru-verb) - to sleep
5. 起きる 【お・きる】 (ru-verb) - to wake; to occur
6. 考える 【かんが・える】 (ru-verb) - to think
7. 教える 【おし・える】 (ru-verb) - to teach; to inform
8. 出る 【で・る】 (ru-verb) - to come out
9. いる (ru-verb) - to exist (animate)
10. 着る 【き・る】 (ru-verb) - to wear
11. 話す 【はな・す】 (u-verb) - to speak
12. 聞く 【き・く】 (u-verb) - to ask; to listen
13. 泳ぐ 【およ・ぐ】 (u-verb) - to swim
14. 遊ぶ 【あそ・ぶ】 (u-verb) - to play
15. 待つ 【ま・つ】 (u-verb) - to wait
16. 飲む 【の・む】 (u-verb) - to drink
17. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
18. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
19. 死ぬ 【し・ぬ】 (u-verb) - to die
20. する (exception) - to do
21. 来る 【く・る】 (exception) - to come
22. お金 【お・かね】 - money
23. 私 【わたし】 - me, myself, I
24. 猫 【ねこ】 - cat

We've now learned how to describe nouns in various ways with other nouns and adjectives. This gives us quite a bit of expressive power. However, we still cannot express actions. This is where verbs come in. Verbs, in Japanese, always come at the end of clauses. Since we have not yet learned how to create more than one clause, for now it means that any sentence with a verb must end with the verb. We will now learn the three main categories of verbs, which will allow us to define conjugation rules. Before learning about verbs, there is one important thing to keep in mind.

Or to rephrase, unlike English, the only thing you need to make a grammatically complete sentence is a verb and nothing else! That's why even the simplest, most basic Japanese sentence cannot be translated into English!

A grammatically complete sentence:

• 食べる。
  Eat. (possible translations include: I eat/she eats/they eat)

Classifying verbs into ru-verbs and u-verbs

Before we can learn any verb conjugations, we first need to learn how verbs are categorized. With the exception of only two exception verbs, all verbs fall into the category of ru-verb or u-verb.

All ru-verbs end in 「る」 while u-verbs can end in a number of u-vowel sounds including 「る」. Therefore, if a verb does not end in 「る」, it will always be an u-verb. For verbs ending in 「る」, if the vowel sound preceding the 「る」 is an /a/, /u/ or /o/ vowel sound, it will always be an u-verb. Otherwise, if the preceding sound is an /i/ or /e/ vowel sound, it will be a ru-verb in most cases. A list of common exceptions are at the end of this section.

Examples

1. 食べる - 「べ」 is an e-vowel sound so it is a ru-verb
2. 分かる - 「か」 is an a-vowel sound so it is an u-verb

If you're unsure which category a verb falls in, you can verify which kind it is with most dictionaries. There are only two exception verbs that are neither ru-verbs nor u-verbs as shown in the table below.

Examples

Here are some example sentences using ru-verbs, u-verbs, and exception verbs.

1. アリスは食べる。
   As for Alice, eat.
2. ジムが来る。
   Jim is the one that comes.
3. ボブもする。
   Bob also do.
4. お金がある。
   There is money. (lit: As for money, it exists.)
5. 私は買う。
   As for me, buy.
6. 猫はいる。
   There is cat. (lit: As for cat, it exists.)

Appendix: iru/eru u-verbs

Vocabulary

1. 要る 【い・る】 - to need
2. 帰る 【かえ・る】 - to go home
3. 切る 【き・る】 - to cut
4. しゃべる - to talk
5. 知る 【し・る】 - to know
6. 入る 【はい・る】 - to enter
7. 走る 【はし・る】 - to run
8. 減る 【へ・る】 - to decrease
9. 焦る 【あせ・る】 - to be in a hurry
10. 限る 【かぎ・る】 - to limit
11. 蹴る 【け・る】 - to kick
12. 滑る 【すべ・る】 - to slippery
13. 握る 【にぎ・る】 - to grasp
14. 練る 【ね・る】 - to knead
15. 参る 【まい・る】 - to go; to come
16. 交じる 【まじ・る】 - to mingle
17. 嘲る 【あざけ・る】 - to ridicule
18. 覆る 【くつがえ・る】 - to overturn
19. 遮る 【さえぎ・る】 - to interrupt
20. 罵る 【ののし・る】 - to abuse verbally
21. 捻る 【ひね・る】 - to twist
22. 翻る 【ひるが・える】 - to turn over; to wave
23. 滅入る 【めい・る】 - to feel depressed
24. 蘇る 【よみがえ・る】 - to be resurrected

Below is a list of u-verbs with a preceding vowel sound of /i/ or /e/ ("iru" or "eru" sound endings). The list is not comprehensive but it does include many of the more common verbs categorized roughly into three levels.

Negative Verbs

Now that we've seen how to declare things and perform actions with verbs, we want to be able to say the negative. In other words, we want to say that such-and-such action was not performed. This is done by conjugating the verb to the negative form just like the state-of-being for nouns and adjectives. However, the rules are a tad more complicated.

Conjugating verbs into the negative

Vocabulary

1. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
2. いる (ru-verb) - to exist (animate)
3. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
4. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
5. 待つ 【ま・つ】 (u-verb) - to wait
6. する (exception) - to do
7. 来る 【く・る】 (exception) - to come
8. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see
9. 寝る 【ね・る】 (ru-verb) - to sleep
10. 起きる 【お・きる】 (ru-verb) - to wake; to occur
11. 考える 【かんが・える】 (ru-verb) - to think
12. 教える 【おし・える】 (ru-verb) - to teach; to inform
13. 出る 【で・る】 (ru-verb) - to come out
14. 着る 【き・る】 (ru-verb) - to wear
15. 話す 【はな・す】 (u-verb) - to speak
16. 聞く 【き・く】 (u-verb) - to ask; to listen
17. 泳ぐ 【およ・ぐ】 (u-verb) - to swim
18. 遊ぶ 【あそ・ぶ】 (u-verb) - to play
19. 飲む 【の・む】 (u-verb) - to drink
20. 帰る 【かえ・る】 (u-verb) - to go home
21. 死ぬ 【し・ぬ】 (u-verb) - to die
22. お金 【お・かね】 - money
23. 私 【わたし】 - me, myself, I
24. 猫 【ねこ】 - cat

We will now make use of the verb classifications we learned in the last section to define the rules for conjugation. But before we get into that, we need to cover one very important exception to the negative conjugation rules: 「ある」.

• ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
• いる (ru-verb) - to exist (animate)

「ある」 is an u-verb used to express existence of inanimate objects. The equivalent verb for animate objects (such as people or animals) is 「いる」, which is a normal ru-verb. For example, if you wanted to say that a chair is in the room, you would use the verb 「ある」, but if you wanted to say that a person is in the room, you must use the verb 「いる」 instead. These two verbs 「ある」 and 「いる」 are quite different from all other verbs because they describe existence and are not actual actions. You also need to be careful to choose the correct one based on animate or inanimate objects.

Anyway, the reason I bring it up here is because the negative of 「ある」 is 「ない」 (meaning that something does not exist). The conjugation rules for all other verbs are listed below as well as a list of example verbs and their negative forms.

＊ = exceptions particular to this conjugation

Examples

Here are the example sentences from the last section conjugated to the negative form.

1. アリスは食べない。
   As for Alice, does not eat.
2. ジムが遊ばない。
   Jim is the one that does not play.
3. ボブもしない。
   Bob also does not do.
4. お金がない。
   There is no money. (lit: Money is the thing that does not exist.)
5. 私は買わない。
   As for me, not buy.
6. 猫はいない。
   There is no cat. (lit: As for cat, does not exist.)

Past Tense

We will finish defining all the basic properties of verbs by learning how to express the past and past-negative tense of actions. I will warn you in advance that the conjugation rules in this section will be the most complex rules you will learn in all of Japanese. On the one hand, once you have this section nailed, all other rules of conjugation will seem simple. On the other hand, you might need to refer back to this section many times before you finally get all the rules. You will probably need a great deal of practice until you can become familiar with all the different conjugations.

Past tense for ru-verbs

Vocabulary

1. 出る 【で・る】 (ru-verb) - to come out
2. 捨てる 【すて・る】 (ru-verb) - to throw away
3. ご飯 【ご・はん】 - rice; meal
4. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
5. 映画　【えい・が】 - movie
6. 全部 【ぜん・ぶ】 - everything
7. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see

We will start off with the easy ru-verb category. To change a ru-verb from the dictionary form into the past tense, you simply drop the 「る」 and add 「た」.

Examples

1. ご飯は、食べた。
   As for meal, ate.
2. 映画は、全部見た。
   As for movie, saw them all.

Past tense for u-verbs

Vocabulary

1. 話す 【はな・す】 (u-verb) - to speak
2. 書く 【か・く】 (u-verb) - to write
3. 泳ぐ 【およ・ぐ】 (u-verb) - to swim
4. 飲む 【の・む】 (u-verb) - to drink
5. 遊ぶ 【あそ・ぶ】 (u-verb) - to play
6. 死ぬ 【し・ぬ】 (u-verb) - to die
7. 切る 【き・る】 (u-verb) - to cut
8. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
9. 持つ 【も・つ】 (u-verb) - to hold
10. する (exception) - to do
11. 来る 【く・る】 (exception) - to come
12. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
13. 今日 【きょう】 - today
14. 走る 【はし・る】 (u-verb) - to run
15. 友達　【とも・だち】 - friend
16. 私 【わたし】 - me, myself, I
17. 勉強 【べん・きょう】 - study

Changing a u-verb from dictionary form to the past tense is difficult because we must break up u-verbs into four additional categories. These four categories depend on the last character of the verb. The table below illustrates the different sub-categories. In addition, there is one exception to the rules, which is the verb 「行く」. I've bundled it with the regular exception verbs 「する」 and 「来る」 even though 「行く」 is a regular u-verb in all other conjugations.

* exceptions particular to this conjugation

Examples

1. 今日は、走った。
   As for today, ran.
2. 友達が来た。
   Friend is the one that came.
3. 私も遊んだ。
   I also played.
4. 勉強は、した。
   About homework, did it.

Past-negative tense for all verbs

Vocabulary

1. 捨てる 【すて・る】 (ru-verb) - to throw away
2. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
3. 食べる 【たべ・る】 - to eat
4. する (exception) - to do
5. お金 【お・かね】 - money
6. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
7. 私 【わたし】 - me, myself, I
8. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
9. 猫　【ねこ】 - cat
10. いる (ru-verb) - to exist (animate)

The conjugation rules for the past-negative tense are the same for all verbs. You might have noticed that the negative of just about everything always end in 「ない」. The conjugation rule for the past-negative tense of verbs is pretty much the same as all the other negatives that end in 「ない」. You simply take the negative of any verb, remove the 「い」 from the 「ない」 ending, and replace it with 「かった」.

Examples

1. アリスは食べなかった。
   As for Alice, did not eat.
2. ジムがしなかった。
   Jim is the one that did not do.
3. ボブも行かなかった。
   Bob also did not go.
4. お金がなかった。
   There was no money. (lit: As for money, did not exist.)
5. 私は買わなかった。
   As for me, did not buy.
6. 猫はいなかった。
   There was no cat. (lit: As for cat, did not exist.)

Particles used with verbs

In this section, we will learn some new particles essential for using verbs. We will learn how to specify the direct object of a verb and the location where a verb takes place whether it's physical or abstract.

The direct object 「を」 particle

Vocabulary

1. 魚 【さかな】 - fish
2. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
3. ジュース - juice
4. 飲む 【の・む】 (u-verb) - to drink
5. 街 【まち】 - town
6. ぶらぶら - wandering; aimlessly
7. 歩く 【ある・く】 (u-verb) - to walk
8. 高速 【こう・そく】 - high-speed
9. 道路 【どう・ろ】 - route
10. 走る 【はし・る】 (u-verb) - to run
11. 毎日 【まい・にち】 - everyday
12. 日本語 【に・ほん・ご】 - Japanese (language)
13. 勉強 【べん・きょう】 - study
14. する (exception) - to do
15. メールアドレス - email address
16. 登録 【とう・ろく】 - register

The first particle we will learn is the object particle because it is a very straightforward particle. The 「を」 character is attached to the end of a word to signify that that word is the direct object of the verb. This character is essentially never used anywhere else. That is why the katakana equivalent 「ヲ」 is almost never used since particles are always written in hiragana. The 「を」 character, while technically pronounced as /wo/ essentially sounds like /o/ in real speech. Here are some examples of the direct object particle in action.

Examples

1. 魚を食べる。
   Eat fish.
2. ジュースを飲んだ。
   Drank juice.

Unlike the direct object we're familiar with in English, places can also be the direct object of motion verbs such as 「歩く」 and 「走る」. Since the motion verb is done to the location, the concept of direct object is the same in Japanese. However, as you can see by the next examples, it often translates to something different in English due to the slight difference of the concept of direct object.

1. 街をぶらぶら歩く。
   Aimlessly walk through town. (Lit: Aimlessly walk town)
2. 高速道路を走る。
   Run through expressway. (Lit: Run expressway)

When you use 「する」 with a noun, the 「を」 particle is optional and you can treat the whole [noun+する] as one verb.

1. 毎日、日本語を勉強する。
   Study Japanese everyday.
2. メールアドレスを登録した。
   Registered email address.

The target 「に」 particle

Vocabulary

1. 日本 【に・ほん】 - Japan
2. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
3. 家 【1) うち; 2) いえ】 - 1) one's own home; 2) house
4. 帰る 【かえ・る】 (u-verb) - to go home
5. 部屋 【へや】 - room
6. 来る 【く・る】 (exception) - to come
7. アメリカ - America
8. 宿題 【しゅく・だい】 - homework
9. 今日 【きょう】 - today
10. 明日 【あした】 - tomorrow
11. 猫 【ねこ】 - cat
12. いる (ru-verb) - to exist (animate)
13. いす - chair
14. 台所 【だい・どころ】 - kitchen
15. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
16. いい (i-adj) - good
17. 友達 【とも・だち】 - friend
18. 会う 【あう】 (u-verb) - to meet
19. 医者 【い・しゃ】 - doctor
20. なる (u-verb) - to become
21. 先週 【せん・しゅう】 - last week
22. 図書館 【と・しょ・かん】 - library
23. 来年 【らい・ねん】 - next year

The 「に」 particle can specify a target of a verb. This is different from the 「を」 particle in which the verb does something to the direct object. With the 「に」 particle, the verb does something toward the word associated with the 「に」 particle. For example, the target of any motion verb is specified by the 「に」 particle.

Examples

1. ボブは日本に行った。
   Bob went to Japan.
2. 家に帰らない。
   Not go back home.
3. 部屋にくる。
   Come to room.

As you can see in the last example, the target particle always targets "to" rather than "from". If you wanted to say, "come from" for example, you would need to use 「から」, which means "from". If you used 「に」, it would instead mean "come to". 「から」 is also often paired with 「まで」, which means "up to".

1. アリスは、アメリカからきた。
   Alice came from America.
2. 宿題を今日から明日までする。
   Will do homework from today to tomorrow.

The idea of a target in Japanese is very general and is not restricted to motion verbs. For example, the location of an object is defined as the target of the verb for existence （ある and いる）. Time is also a common target. Here are some examples of non-motion verbs and their targets

1. 猫は部屋にいる。
   Cat is in room.
2. 椅子が台所にあった。
   Chair was in the kitchen.
3. いい友達に会った。
   Met good friend.
4. ジムは医者になる。
   Jim will become doctor.
5. 先週に図書館に行った。
   Went to library last week.

Note: Don't forget to use 「ある」 for inanimate objects such as the chair and 「いる」 for animate objects such as the cat.

While the 「に」 particle is not always required to indicate time, there is a slight difference in meaning between using the target particle and not using anything at all. In the following examples, the target particle makes the date a specific target emphasizing that the friend will go to Japan at that time. Without the particle, there is no special emphasis.

1. 友達は、来年、日本に行く。
   Next year, friend go to Japan.
2. 友達は、来年に日本に行く。
   Friend go to Japan next year.

The directional 「へ」 particle

Vocabulary

1. 日本 【に・ほん】 - Japan
2. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
3. 家 【1) うち; 2) いえ】 - 1) one's own home; 2) house
4. 帰る 【かえ・る】 (u-verb) - to go home
5. 部屋 【へや】 - room
6. 来る 【く・る】 (exception) - to come
7. 医者 【い・しゃ】 - doctor
8. なる (u-verb) - to become
9. 勝ち 【か・ち】 - victory
10. 向かう 【むか・う】 (u-verb) - to face; to go towards

While 「へ」 is normally pronounced /he/, when it is being used as a particle, it is always pronounced /e/ （え）. The primary difference between the 「に」 and 「へ」 particle is that 「に」 goes to a target as the final, intended destination (both physical or abstract). The 「へ」 particle, on the other hand, is used to express the fact that one is setting out towards the direction of the target. As a result, it is only used with directional motion verbs. It also does not guarantee whether the target is the final intended destination, only that one is heading towards that direction. In other words, the 「に」 particle sticks to the destination while the 「へ」 particle is fuzzy about where one is ultimately headed. For example, if we choose to replace 「に」 with 「へ」 in the first three examples of the previous section, the nuance changes slightly.

Examples

1. ボブは日本へ行った。
   Bob headed towards Japan.
2. 家へ帰らない。
   Not go home toward house.
3. 部屋へくる。
   Come towards room.

Note that we cannot use the 「へ」 particle with verbs that have no physical direction. For example, the following is incorrect.

• 医者へなる。
  （Grammatically incorrect version of 「医者になる」.）

This does not mean to say that 「へ」 cannot set out towards an abstract concept. In fact, because of the fuzzy directional meaning of this particle, the 「へ」 particle can also be used to talk about setting out towards certain future goals or expectations.

• 勝ちへ向かう。
  Go towards victory.

The contextual 「で」 particle

Vocabulary

1. 映画館 【えい・が・かん】 - movie theatre
2. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see
3. バス - bus
4. 帰る 【かえ・る】 (u-verb) - to go home
5. レストラン - restaurant
6. 昼ご飯 【ひる・ご・はん】 - lunch
7. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
8. 何 【なに／なん】 - what
9. 暇 【ひま】 - free　(as in not busy)

The 「で」 particle will allow us to specify the context in which the action is performed. For example, if a person ate a fish, where did he eat it? If a person went to school, by what means did she go? With what will you eat the soup? All of these questions can be answered with the 「で」 particle. Here are some examples.

Examples

1. 映画館で見た。
   Saw at movie theater.
2. バスで帰る。
   Go home by bus.
3. レストランで昼ご飯を食べた。
   Ate lunch at restaurant.

It may help to think of 「で」 as meaning "by way of". This way, the same meaning will kind of translate into what the sentence means. The examples will then read: "Saw by way of movie theater", "Go home by way of bus", and "Ate lunch by way of restaurant."

Using 「で」 with 「何」

The word for "what" （何） is quite annoying because while it's usually read as 「なに」, sometimes it is read as 「なん」 depending on how it's used. And since it's always written in Kanji, you can't tell which it is. I would suggest sticking with 「なに」 until someone corrects you for when it should be 「なん」. With the 「で」 particle, it is read as 「なに」 as well. (Hold the mouse cursor over the word to check the reading.)

1. 何できた？
   Came by the way of what?
2. バスできた。
   Came by the way of bus.

Here's the confusing part. There is a colloquial version of the word "why" that is used much more often than the less colloquial version 「どうして」 or the more forceful 「なぜ」. It is also written as 「何で」 but it is read as 「なんで」. This is a completely separate word and has nothing to do with the 「で」 particle.

1. 何できた？
   Why did you come?
2. 暇だから。
   Because I am free (as in have nothing to do).

The 「から」 here meaning "because" is different from the 「から」 we just learned and will be covered later in the compound sentence section. Basically the point is that the two sentences, while written the same way, are read differently and mean completely different things. Don't worry. This causes less confusion than you think because 95% of the time, the latter is used rather than the former. And even when 「なにで」 is intended, the context will leave no mistake on which one is being used. Even in this short example snippet, you can tell which it is by looking at the answer to the question.

When location is the topic

Vocabulary

1. 学校 【がっ・こう】 - school
2. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
3. 図書館 【と・しょ・かん】 - library
4. どこ - where
5. イタリア - Italy
6. レストラン - restaurant
7. どう - how

There are times when the location of an action is also the topic of a sentence. You can attach the topic particle （「は」 and 「も」） to the three particles that indicate location （「に」、「へ」、「で」） when the location is the topic. We'll see how location might become the topic in the following examples.

Example 1

ボブ：学校に行った？
Bob: (Did you) go to school?

アリス：行かなかった。
Alice: Didn't go.

ボブ：図書館には？
Bob: What about library?

アリス：図書館にも行かなかった。
Alice: Also didn't go to library.

In this example, Bob brings up a new topic (library) and so the location becomes the topic. The sentence is actually an abbreviated version of 「図書館には行った？」 which you can ascertain from the context.

Example 2

ボブ：どこで食べる？
Bob: Eat where?

アリス：イタリアレストランではどう？
Alice: How about Italian restaurant?

Bob asks, "Where shall we eat?" and Alice suggests an Italian restaurant. A sentence like, "How about..." usually brings up a new topic because the person is suggesting something new. In this case, the location (restaurant) is being suggested so it becomes the topic.

When direct object is the topic

Vocabulary

1. 日本語 【に・ほん・ご】 - Japanese (language)
2. 習う 【なら・う】 (u-verb) - to learn

The direct object particle is different from particles related to location in that you cannot use any other particles at the same time. For example, going by the previous section, you might have guessed that you can say 「をは」 to express a direct object that is also the topic but this is not the case. A topic can be a direct object without using the 「を」 particle. In fact, putting the 「を」 particle in will make it wrong.

Examples

1. 日本語を習う。
   Learn Japanese.
2. 日本語は、習う。
   About Japanese, (will) learn it.

Please take care to not make this mistake.

• 日本語をは、習う。
  (This is incorrect.)

Transitive and Intransitive Verbs

In Japanese, sometimes there are two types of the same verb often referred to as transitive and intransitive verbs. The difference between the two is that one verb is an action done by an active agent while the other is something that occurs without a direct agent. In English, this is sometimes expressed with the same verb, such as: "The ball dropped" vs "I dropped the ball" but in Japanese it becomes　「ボールが落ちた」 vs 「ボールを落とした」.　Sometimes, the verbs changes when translated into English such as "To put it in the box" (箱に入れる） vs "To enter the box" （箱に入る） but this is only from the differences in the languages. If you think in Japanese, intransitive and transitive verbs have the same meaning except that one indicates that someone had a direct hand in the action (direct object) while the other does not. While knowing the terminology is not important, it is important to know which is which in order to use the correct particle for the correct verb.

Since the basic meaning and the kanji is the same, you can learn two verbs for the price of just one kanji! Let's look at a sample list of intransitive and transitive verbs.

Pay attention to particles!

The important lesson to take away here is to learn how to use the correct particle for the correct type of verb. It might be difficult at first to grasp which is which when learning new verbs or whether there even is a transitive/intransitive distinction. The good news is that the WWWJDIC now indicates whether a verb is transitive (vt) or intransitive (vi) when the distinction applies. However, I have not tested how extensive the coverage is so I recommend looking at examples sentences from either the WWWJDIC or Yahoo!辞書. For example, looking at example sentences for 「つける」 from the WWWJDIC or Yahoo!辞書, you can see that it is a transitive verb from the use of the 「を」 particle.

Examples

1. 私が電気をつけた。
   I am the one that turned on the lights.
2. 電気がついた。
   The lights turned on.
3. 電気を消す。
   Turn off the lights.
4. 電気が消える。
   Lights turn off.
5. 誰が窓を開けた？
   Who opened the window?
6. 窓がどうして開いた？
   Why has the window opened?

The important thing to remember is that intransitive verbs cannot have a direct object because there is no direct acting agent. The following sentences are grammatically incorrect.

1. 電気をついた。
   （「を」 should be replaced with 「が」 or 「は」）
2. 電気を消える。
   （「を」 should be replaced with 「が」 or 「は」）
3. どうして窓を開いた？
   （「を」 should be replaced with 「が」 or 「は」）

The only time you can use the 「を」 particle for intransitive verbs is when a location is the direct object of a motion verb as briefly described in the previous section.

1. 部屋を出た。
   I left room.

Subordinate Clauses and Sentence Order

Treating verbs and state-of-being like adjectives

Have you noticed how, many forms of verbs and the state-of-being conjugate in a similar manner to i-adjectives? Well, that is because, in a sense, they are adjectives. For example, consider the sentence: "The person who did not eat went to bank." The "did not eat" describes the person and in Japanese, you can directly modify the noun 'person' with the clause 'did not eat' just like a regular adjective. This very simple realization will allow us to modify a noun with any arbitrary verb phrase!

Using state-of-being subclauses as adjectives

Vocabulary

1. 国際 【こく・さい】 - international
2. 教育 【きょう・いく】 - education
3. センター - center
4. 登場 【とう・じょう】 - entry (on stage)
5. 人物 【じん・ぶつ】 - character
6. 立入 【たち・いり】 - entering
7. 禁止 【きん・し】 - prohibition, ban
8. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
9. 人 【ひと】 - person
10. 学校 【がっ・こう】 - school
11. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
12. 子供 【こ・ども】 - child
13. 立派 【りっ・ぱ】 (i-adj) - fine, elegant
14. 大人 【おとな】 - adult
15. なる (u-verb) - to become
16. 友達 【とも・だち】 - friend
17. いい (i-adj) - good
18. 先週 【せん・しゅう】 - last week
19. 医者 【い・しゃ】 - doctor
20. 仕事 【し・ごと】 - job
21. 辞める 【や・める】 (u-verb) - to quit

The negative, past, and negative past conjugations of verbs can be used just like adjectives to directly modify nouns. However, we cannot do this with the plain non-past state-of-being using 「だ」. (I told you this was a pain in the butt.) The language has particles for this purpose, which will be covered in the next section.

You can, however, have a string of nouns placed together when they're not meant to modify each other. For example, in a phrase such as "International Education Center" you can see that it is just a string of nouns without any grammatical modifications between them. It's not an "Education Center that is International" or a "Center for International Education", etc., it's just "International Education Center". In Japanese, you can express this as simply 「国際教育センタ」 (or 「センター」). You will see this chaining of nouns in many combinations. Sometimes a certain combination is so commonly used that it has almost become a separate word and is even listed as a separate entry in some dictionaries. Some examples include: 「登場人物」、「立入禁止」、or 「通勤手当」. If you have difficulties in figuring out where to separate the words, you can paste them into the WWWJDICs Translate Words in Japanese Text function and it'll parse the words for you (most of the time).

Examples

Here are some examples of direct noun modifications with a conjugated noun clause. The noun clause has been highlighted.

1. 学生じゃない人は、学校に行かない。
   Person who is not student do not go to school.
2. 子供だったアリスが立派な大人になった。
   The Alice that was a child became a fine adult.
3. 友達じゃなかったアリスは、いい友達になった。
   Alice who was not a friend, became a good friend.
4. 先週に医者だったボブは、仕事を辞めた。
   Bob who was a doctor last week quit his job.

Using subordinate verb clauses as adjectives

Vocabulary

1. 先週 【せん・しゅう】 - last week
2. 映画　【えい・が】 - movie
3. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see
4. 人 【ひと】 - person
5. 誰 【だれ】 - who
6. いつも - always
7. 勉強 【べん・きょう】 - study
8. する (exception) - to do
9. 赤い 【あか・い】 (i-adj) - red
10. ズボン - pants
11. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
12. 友達 【とも・だち】 - friend
13. 晩ご飯 【ばん・ご・はん】 - dinner
14. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
15. 銀行 【ぎん・こう】 - bank

Verbs clauses can also be used just like adjectives to modify nouns. The following examples show us how this will allow us to make quite detailed and complicated sentences. The verb clause is highlighted.

Examples

1. 先週に映画を見た人は誰？
   Who is person who watched movie last week?
2. ボブは、いつも勉強する人だ。
   Bob is a person who always studies.
3. 赤いズボンを買う友達はボブだ。
   Friend who buy red pants is Bob.
4. 晩ご飯を食べなかった人は、映画で見た銀行に行った。
   Person who did not eat dinner went to the bank she saw at movie.

Japanese Sentence Order

Vocabulary

1. 私 【わたし】 - me; myself; I
2. 公園 【こう・えん】 - (public) park
3. お弁当 【お・べん・とう】 - box lunch
4. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
5. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
6. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go

Now that we've learned the concept of subordinate clauses and how they are used as building blocks to make sentences, I can go over how Japanese sentence ordering works. There's this myth that keeps floating around about Japanese sentence order that continues to plague many hapless beginners to Japanese. Here's how it goes.

The most basic sentence structure in English can be described as consisting of the following elements in this specific order: [Subject] [Verb] [Object]. A sentence is not grammatically correct if any of those elements are missing or out of order.

Japanese students will tell you that Japanese, on the other hand, while frothing at the mouth, is completely backwards!! Even some Japanese teacher might tell you that the basic Japanese sentence order is [Subject] [Object] [Verb]. This is a classic example of trying to fit Japanese into an English-based type of thinking. Of course, we all know (right?) that the real order of the fundamental Japanese sentence is: [Verb]. Anything else that comes before the verb doesn't have to come in any particular order and nothing more than the verb is required to make a complete sentence. In addition, the verb must always come at the end. That's the whole point of even having particles so that they can identify what grammatical function a word serves no matter where it is in the sentence. In fact, nothing will stop us from making a sentence with [Object] [Subject] [Verb] or just [Object] [Verb]. The following sentences are all complete and correct because the verb is at the end of the sentence.

Grammatically complete and correctly ordered sentences

1. 私は公園でお弁当を食べた。
2. 公園で私はお弁当を食べた。
3. お弁当を私は公園で食べた。
4. 弁当を食べた。
5. 食べた。

So don't sweat over whether your sentence is in the correct order. Just remember the following rules.

Noun-related Particles

The last three particles (Not!)

We have already gone over very powerful constructs that can express almost anything we want. We will see the 「の」 particle will give us even more power by allowing us to define a generic, abstract noun. We will also learn how to modify nouns directly with nouns. The three particles we will cover can group nouns together in different ways.

This is the last lesson that will be specifically focused on particles but that does not mean that there are no more particles to learn. We will learn many more particles along the way but they may not be labeled as such. As long as you know what they mean and how to use them, it is not too important to know whether they are particles or not.

The Inclusive 「と」 particle

Vocabulary

1. ナイフ - knife
2. フォーク - fork
3. ステーキ - steak
4. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
5. 本 【ほん】 - book
6. 雑誌 【ざっ・し】 - magazine
7. 葉書 【はがき】 - postcard
8. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
9. 友達　【とも・だち】 - friend
10. 話す 【はな・す】 (u-verb) - to speak
11. 先生　【せん・せい】 - teacher
12. 会う 【あ・う】 (u-verb) - to meet

The 「と」 particle is similar to the 「も」 particle in that it contains a meaning of inclusion. It can combine two or more nouns together to mean "and".

1. ナイフとフォークでステーキを食べた。
   Ate steak by means of knife and fork.
2. 本と雑誌と葉書を買った。
   Bought book, magazine, and post card.

Another similar use of the 「と」 particle is to show an action that was done together with someone or something else.

1. 友達と話した。
   Talked with friend.
2. 先生と会った。
   Met with teacher.

The Vague Listing 「や」 and 「とか」 particles

Vocabulary

1. 飲み物 【の・み・もの】 - beverage
2. カップ - cup
3. ナプキン - napkin
4. いる (u-verb) - to need
5. 靴 【くつ】 - shoes
6. ナシャツ - shirt
7. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy

The 「や」 particle, just like the 「と」 particle, is used to list one or more nouns except that it is much more vague than the 「と」 particle. It implies that there may be other things that are unlisted and that not all items in the list may apply. In English, you might think of this as an "and/or, etc." type of listing.

1. 飲み物やカップやナプキンは、いらない？
   You don't need (things like) drink, cup, or napkin, etc.?
2. 靴やシャツを買う。
   Buy (things like) shoes and shirt, etc...

「とか」 also has the same meaning as 「や」 but is a slightly more colloquial expression.

1. 飲み物とかカップとかナプキンは、いらない？
   You don't need (things like) drink, cup, or napkin, etc.?
2. 靴とかシャツを買う。
   Buy (things like) shoes and shirt, etc...

The 「の」 particle

Vocabulary

1. 本 【ほん】 - book
2. アメリカ - America
3. 大学 【だい・がく】 - college
4. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
5. それ - that
6. その - abbreviation of 「それの」
7. ナシャツ - shirt
8. 誰 【だれ】 - who
9. これ - this
10. この - abbreviation of 「これの」
11. あれ - that (over there)
12. あの - abbreviation of 「あれの」
13. 白い 【し・ろい】 (i-adj) - white
14. かわいい (i-adj) - cute
15. 授業 【じゅ・ぎょう】 - class
16. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
17. 忘れる 【わす・れる】 (u-verb) - to forget
18. こと - event, matter
19. 毎日 【じゅ・ぎょう】 - every day
20. 勉強 【べん・きょう】 - study
21. する (exception) - to do
22. 大変 【たい・へん】 (na-adj) - tough, hard time
23. 同じ 【おな・じ】 - same
24. 物 【もの】 - object
25. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
26. 面白い 【おも・し・ろい】 (i-adj) - interesting
27. 静か 【しず・か】 (na-adj) - quiet
28. 部屋 【へや】 - room
29. 人 【ひと】 - person
30. 学校 【がっ・こう】 - school

The 「の」 particle has many uses and it is a very powerful particle. It is introduced here because like the 「と」 and 「や」 particle, it can be used to connect one or more nouns. Let's look at a few examples.

1. ボブの本。
   Book of Bob.
2. 本のボブ。
   Bob of book.

The first sentence essentially means, "Bob's book." (not a lost bible chapter). The second sentence means, "Book's Bob" which is probably a mistake. I've translated the first example as "book of Bob" because the 「の」 particle doesn't always imply possession as the next example shows.

1. ボブは、アメリカの大学の学生だ。
   Bob is student of college of America.

In normal English, this would translate to, "Bob is a student of an American college." The order of modification is backwards so Bob is a student of a college that is American. 「学生の大学のアメリカ」 means "America of college of student" which is probably an error and makes little sense. (America of student's college?)

The noun that is being modified can be omitted if the context clearly indicates what is being omitted. The following highlighted redundant words can be omitted.

1. そのシャツは誰のシャツ？
   Whose shirt is that shirt?
2. ボブのシャツだ。
   It is shirt of Bob.

to become:

1. そのシャツは誰の？
   Whose shirt is that?
2. ボブのだ。
   It is of Bob.

（「その」 is an abbreviation of 「それ+の」 so it directly modifies the noun because the 「の」 particle is intrinsically attached. Other words include 「この」 from 「これの」 and 「あの」 from 「あれの」.）

The 「の」 particle in this usage essentially replaces the noun and takes over the role as a noun itself. We can essentially treat adjectives and verbs just like nouns by adding the 「の」 particle to it. The particle then becomes a generic noun, which we can treat just like a regular noun.

1. 白いのは、かわいい。
   Thing that is white is cute.
2. 授業に行くのを忘れた。
   Forgot the event of going to class.

Now we can use the direct object, topic, and identifier particle with verbs and adjectives. We don't necessarily have to use the 「の」 particle here. We can use the noun 「物」, which is a generic object or 「こと」 for a generic event. For example, we can also say:

1. 白い物は、かわいい。
   Thing that is white is cute.
2. 授業に行くことを忘れた。
   Forgot the thing of going to class.

However, the 「の」 particle is very useful in that you don't have to specify a particular noun. In the next examples, the 「の」 particle is not replacing any particular noun, it just allows us to modify verb and adjective clauses like noun clauses. The subordinate clauses are highlighted.

1. 毎日勉強するのは大変。
   The thing of studying every day is tough.
2. 毎日同じ物を食べるのは、面白くない。
   It's not interesting to eat same thing every day.

Even when substituting 「の」 for a noun, you still need the 「な」 to modify the noun when a na-adjective is being used.

• 静かな部屋が、アリスの部屋だ。
  Quiet room is room of Alice.

becomes:

• 静かなのが、アリスの部屋だ。
  Quiet one is room of Alice.

*Warning: This may make things seem like you can replace any arbitrary nouns with 「の」 but this is not so. It is important to realize that the sentence must be about the clause and not the noun that was replaced. For example, in the last section we had the sentence, 「学生じゃない人は、 学校に行かない」. You may think that you can just replace 「人」 with 「の」 to produce 「学生じゃないのは、学校に行かない」. But in fact, this makes no sense because the sentence is now about the clause "Is not student". The sentence becomes, "The thing of not being student does not go to school" which is complete gibberish because not being a student is a state and it doesn't make sense for a state to go anywhere much less school.

The 「の」 particle as explanation

Vocabulary

1. 今 【いま】 - now
2. 忙しい 【いそが・しい】 (i-adj) - busy
3. 学生 【がく・せい】 - student
4. 飲む 【のむ】 - to drink
5. どこ - where
6. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
7. 授業 【じゅ・ぎょう】 - class
8. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
9. ううん - casual word for "no" (nah, uh-uh)
10. その - abbreviation of 「それの」
11. 人 【ひと】 - person
12. 買う 【か・う】 (u-verb) - to buy
13. 先生　【せん・せい】 - teacher
14. 朝ご飯 【あさ・ご・はん】 - breakfast
15. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
16. どうして - why

The 「の」 particle attached at the end of the last clause of a sentence can also convey an explanatory tone to your sentence. For example, if someone asked you if you have time, you might respond, "The thing is I'm kind of busy right now." The abstract generic noun of "the thing is..." can also be expressed with the 「の」 particle. This type of sentence has an embedded meaning that explains the reason(s) for something else.

The sentence would be expressed like so:

• 今は忙しいの。
  The thing is that (I'm) busy now.

This sounds very soft and feminine. In fact, adult males will almost always add a declarative 「だ」 unless they want to sound cute for some reason.

• 今は忙しいのだ。
  The thing is that (I'm) busy now.

However, since the declarative 「だ」 cannot be used in a question, the same 「の」 in questions do not carry a feminine tone at all and is used by both males and females.

• 今は忙しいの？
  Is it that (you) are busy now? (gender-neutral)

To express state of being, when the 「の」 particle is used to convey this explanatory tone, we need to add 「な」 to distinguish it from the 「の」 particle that simply means "of".

1. ジムのだ。
   It is of Jim. (It is Jim's.)
2. ジムなのだ。
   It is Jim (with explanatory tone).

Besides this one case, everything else remains the same as before.

In actuality, while this type of explanatory tone is used all the time, 「のだ」 is usually substituted by 「んだ」. This is probably due to the fact that 「んだ」 is easier to say than 「のだ」. This grammar can have what seems like many different meaning because not only can it be used with all forms of adjectives, nouns, and verbs it itself can also be conjugated just like the state of being. A conjugation chart will show you what this means.

There's really nothing new here. The first chart is just adding 「んだ」 (or 「なんだ」) to a conjugated verb, noun, or adjective. The second chart adds 「んだ」 (or 「なんだ」) to a non-conjugated verb, noun, adjective and then conjugates the 「だ」 part of 「んだ」 just like a regular state of being for nouns and na-adjectives. Just don't forget to attach the 「な」 for nouns as well as na-adjectives.

I would say that the past and past-negative forms for noun/na-adjective in the second chart are almost never used (especially with 「の」) but they are presented for completeness.

The crucial difference between using the explanatory 「の」 and not using anything at all is that you are telling the listener, "Look, here's the reason" as opposed to simply imparting new information. For example, if someone asked you, "Are you busy now?" you can simply answer, 「今は忙しい」. However, if someone asked you, "How come you can't talk to me?" since you obviously have some explaining to do, you would answer, 「今は忙しいの」 or 「今は忙しいんだ」. This grammar is indispensable for seeking explanations in questions. For instance, if you want to ask, "Hey, isn't it late?" you can't just ask, 「遅くない？」 because that means, "It's not late?" You need to indicate that you are seeking explanation in the form of 「遅いんじゃない？」.

Let's see some examples of the types of situations where this grammar is used. The examples will have literal translation to make it easier to see how the meaning stays the same and carries over into what would be very different types of sentences in normal English. A more natural English translation is provided as well because the literal translations can get a bit convoluted.

Example 1

アリス：どこに行くの？
Alice: Where is it that (you) are going?

ボブ：授業に行くんだ。
Bob: It is that (I) go to class.

Alice: Where are you going? (Seeking explanation)
Bob: I'm going to class. (Explanatory)

Example 2

アリス：今、授業があるんじゃない？
Alice: Isn't it that there is class now?

ボブ：今は、ないんだ。
Bob: Now it is that there is no class.

Alice: Don't you have class now? (Expecting that there is class)
Bob: No, there is no class now. (Explanatory)

Example 3

アリス：今、授業がないんじゃない？
Alice: Isn't it that there isn't class now?

ボブ：ううん、ある。
Bob: No, there is.

Alice: Don't you not have class now? (Expecting that there is no class)
Bob: No, I do have class.

Example 4

アリス：その人が買うんじゃなかったの？
Alice: Wasn't it that that person was the one to buy?

ボブ：ううん、先生が買うんだ。
Bob: No, it is that teacher is the one to buy.

Alice: Wasn't that person going to buy? (Expecting that the person would buy)
Bob: No, the teacher is going to. (Explanatory)

Example 5

アリス：朝ご飯を食べるんじゃなかった。
Alice: It is that breakfast wasn't to eat.

ボブ：どうして？
Bob: Why?

Alice: Should not have eaten breakfast, you know. (Explaining that breakfast wasn't to be eaten)
Bob: How come?

Don't worry if you are thoroughly confused by now, we will see many more examples along the way. Once you get the sense of how everything works, it's better to forget the English because the double and triple negatives can get quite confusing such as Example 3. However, in Japanese it is a perfectly normal expression, as you will begin to realize once you get accustomed to Japanese.

Adverbs and Sentence-ending particles

Properties of Adverbs

Vocabulary

1. 早い 【はや・い】 (i-adj) - fast; early
2. きれい (na-adj) - pretty; clean
3. 朝ご飯 【あさ・ご・はん】 - breakfast
4. 食べる 【た・べる】(ru-verb) - to eat
5. 自分 【じ・ぶん】 - oneself
6. 部屋 【へや】 - room
7. 映画 【えい・が】 - movie
8. たくさん - a lot (amount)
9. 見る　【み・る】 - to see; to watch
10. 最近 【さい・きん】 - recent; lately
11. 全然 【ぜん・ぜん】 - not at all (when used with negative)
12. 声 【こえ】 - voice
13. 結構 【けっ・こう】 - fairly, reasonably
14. 大きい 【おお・きい】(i-adj) - big
15. この - this （abbr. of これの）
16. 町 【まち】 - town
17. 変わる 【か・わる】(u-verb) - to change
18. 図書館 【と・しょ・かん】 - library
19. 中 【なか】 - inside
20. 静か 【しず・か】(na-adj) - quiet

Unlike English, changing adjectives to adverbs is a very simple and straightforward process. In addition, since the system of particles make sentence ordering flexible, adverbs can be placed anywhere in the clause that it applies to as long as it comes before the verb that it refers to. As usual, we have two separate rules: one for i-adjectives, and one for na-adjectives.

• ボブは朝ご飯を早く食べた。
  Bob quickly ate breakfast.

The adverb 「早く」 is a little different from the English word 'fast' in that it can mean quickly in terms of speed or time. In other words, Bob may have eaten his breakfast early or he may have eaten it quickly depending on the context. In other types of sentences such as 「早く走った」, it is quite obvious that it probably means quickly and not early. (Of course this also depends on the context.)

• アリスは自分の部屋をきれいにした。
  Alice did her own room toward clean.

The literal translation kind of gives you a sense of why the target particle is used. There is some argument against calling this an adverb at all but it is convenient for us to do so because of the grouping of i-adjectives and na-adjectives. Thinking of it as an adverb, we can interpret the sentence to mean: "Alice did her room cleanly." or less literally: "Alice cleaned her room." （「きれい」 literally means "pretty" but if it helps, you can think of it as, "Alice prettied up her own room."）

Note: Not all adverbs are derived from adjectives. Some words like 「全然」 and 「たくさん」 are adverbs in themselves without any conjugation. These words can be used without particles just like regular adverbs.

1. 映画をたくさん見た。
   Saw a lot of movies.
2. 最近、全然食べない。
   Lately, don't eat at all.

Examples

Here are some more examples of using adverbs.

1. ボブの声は、結構大きい。
   Bob's voice is fairly large.
2. この町は、最近大きく変わった。
   This town had changed greatly lately.
3. 図書館の中では、静かにする。
   Within the library, [we] do things quietly.

Sentence-ending particles

Vocabulary

1. いい (i-adj) - good
2. 天気 【てん・き】 - weather
3. そう - so
4. 面白い 【おも・しろ・い】(i-adj) - interesting
5. 映画 【えい・が】 - movie
6. 全然 【ぜん・ぜん】 - not at all (when used with negative)
7. 時間 【じ・かん】 - time
8. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
9. 大丈夫 【だい・じょう・ぶ】 (na-adj) - ok
10. 今日 【きょう】 - today
11. うん - yes (casual)
12. でも - but
13. 明日 【あした】 - tomorrow
14. 雨 【あめ】 - rain
15. 降る 【ふ・る】(u-verb) - to precipitate
16. 魚 【さかな】 - fish
17. 好き 【す・き】 (na-adj) - likable

Sentence-ending particles are particles that always come at the end of sentences to change the "tone" or "feel" of a sentence. In this section, we will cover the two most commonly used sentence-ending particles.

「ね」 sentence ending

People usually add 「ね」 to the end of their sentence when they are looking for (and expecting) agreement to what they are saying. This is equivalent to saying, "right?" or "isn't it?" in English.

Example 1

ボブ：いい天気だね。
Bob: Good weather, huh?

アリス：そうね。
Alice: That is so, isn't it?

The literal translation of 「そうね」 sounds a bit odd but it basically means something like, "Sure is". Males would probably say, 「そうだね」.

Example 2

アリス：おもしろい映画だったね。
Alice: That was interesting movie, wasn't it?

ボブ：え？全然おもしろくなかった。
Bob: Huh? No, it wasn't interesting at all.

Since Alice is expecting agreement that the movie was interesting Bob is surprised because he didn't find the movie interesting at all. (「え」 is a
sound of surprise and confusion.)

「よ」 sentence ending

When 「よ」 is attached to the end of a sentence, it means that the speaker is informing the listener of something new. In English, we might say this with a, "You know..." such as the sentence, "You know, I'm actually a genius."

Example 1

アリス：時間がないよ。
Alice: You know, there is no time.

ボブ：大丈夫だよ。
Bob: It's ok, you know.

Example 2

アリス：今日はいい天気だね。
Alice: Good weather today, huh?

ボブ：うん。でも、明日雨が降るよ。
Bob: Yeah. But it will rain tomorrow, you know.

Combining both to get 「よね」

You can also combine the two particles we just learned to create 「よね」. This is essentially used when you want to inform the listener of some new point you're trying to make and when you're seeking agreement on it at the same time. When combining the two, the order must always be 「よね」. You cannot reverse the order.

Example

アリス：ボブは、魚が好きなんだよね。
Alice: You know, you like fish, dontcha?

ボブ：そうだね。
Bob: That is so, huh?

Polite Form and Verb Stems

Not being rude in Japan

Vocabulary

1. 丁寧語 【ていねいご】 - polite language
2. 尊敬語 【そんけいご】 - honorific language
3. 謙譲語 【けんじょうご】 - humble language
4. はい - yes (polite)
5. いいえ - no (polite)

The Japanese we have learned so far is all well and good if you're 5-years old. Unfortunately, adults are expected to use a politer version of the language (called 丁寧語) when addressing certain people. People you will probably use 丁寧語 with are: 1) people of higher social rank, and 2) people you are not familiar with. Deciding when to use which language is pretty much a matter of "feel". However, it is a good idea to stick with one form for each person.

Later (probably much later), we will learn an even politer version of the language called honorific （尊敬語） and humble （謙譲語） form. It will be more useful than you may think because store clerks, receptionists, and such will speak to you in those forms. But for now, let's concentrate on just 丁寧語, which is the base for 尊敬語 and 謙譲語.

Fortunately, it is not difficult to change casual speech to polite speech. There may be some slight changes to the vocabulary (for example, "yes" and "no" become 「はい」 and 「いいえ」 respectively in polite speech), and very colloquial types of sentence endings are not used in polite speech. (We will learn about sentence endings in a later section.) Essentially, the only main difference between polite and casual speech comes at the very end of the sentence. You cannot even tell whether a person is speaking in polite or casual speech until the sentence is finished.

The stem of verbs

Vocabulary

1. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
2. 泳ぐ 【およ・ぐ】 (u-verb) - to swim
3. する (exception) - to do
4. 来る 【く・る】 (exception) - to come
5. 怒る 【おこ・る】 (u-verb) - to get angry
6. 鉄拳 【てっ・けん】 - fist
7. 休み 【やす・み】 - rest; vacation
8. 飲む 【の・む】 (u-verb) - to drink
9. 明日 【あした】 - tomorrow
10. 映画　【えい・が】 - movie
11. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see
12. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
13. 友達　【とも・だち】 - friend
14. 遊ぶ 【あそ・ぶ】 (u-verb) - to play
15. 楽しむ 【たの・しむ】 (u-verb) - to enjoy
16. 出す 【だ・す】 (u-verb) - to bring out
17. 走る 【はし・る】 (u-verb) - to run
18. 走り出す 【はし・り・だ・す】 (u-verb) - to break into a run
19. 着る 【き・る】 (ru-verb) - to wear
20. 替える 【か・える】 (ru-verb) - to switch
21. 着替える 【き・が・える】 (ru-verb) - to change (clothes)
22. 付ける 【つ・ける】 (ru-verb) - to attach
23. 加える 【くわ・える】 (ru-verb) - to add
24. 付け加える 【つ・け・くわ・える】 (ru-verb) - to add one thing to another
25. 言う 【い・う】 (u-verb) - to say
26. 言い出す 【い・い・だ・す】 (u-verb) - to start talking

In order to conjugate all u-verbs and ru-verbs into their respective polite forms, we will first learn about the stem of verbs. This is often called the masu-stem in Japanese textbooks but we will call it just the stem because it is used in many more conjugations than just its masu-form. The stem is really great because it's very easy to produce and is useful in many different types of grammar.

The stem when used by itself can be a very specialized and limited way of creating nouns from verbs. While the 「の」 particle allows you to talk about verbs as if they were nouns, the stem actually turns verbs into nouns. In fact, in very rare cases, the stem is used more often than the verb itself. For example, the stem of 「怒る」（いかる） is used more often than the verb itself. The movie, "Fists of Fury" is translated as 「怒りの鉄拳」 and not 「怒る鉄拳」. In fact, 「怒る」 will most likely be read as 「おこる」, a completely different verb with the same meaning and kanji! There are a number of specific nouns (such as 「休み」) that are really verb stems that are used like regular nouns. However, in general we cannot take any verb and make it into a noun. For example, the following sentence is wrong.

• 飲みをする。
  (This sentence makes sense but no one talks like this)

However, a useful grammar that works in general for stems of all verbs is using the stem as a target with a motion verb (almost always 「行く」 and 「来る」 in this case). This grammar means, "to go or to come to do [some verb]". Here's an example.

1. 明日、映画を見に行く。- Tomorrow, go to see movie.

「見に」 is the stem of 「見る」 combined with the target particle 「に」.

The motion target particle 「へ」 sounds like you're literally going or coming to something while the 「に」 particle implies that you are going or coming for the purpose of doing something.

1. 昨日、友達が遊びへきた。
   Yesterday, friend came to a playing activity. (Sounds a bit strange)
2. 昨日、友達が遊びにきた。
   Yesterday, friend came to play.

The expression 「楽しみにする」 meaning "to look forward to" is formed from grammar similar to this but is a special case and should be considered a set expression.

Other verbs are also sometimes attached to the stem to create new verbs. For example, when 「出す」 is attached to the stem of 「走る」, which is 「走り」, you get 「走り出す」 meaning "to break out into a run". Other examples include 「切り替える」, which means "to switch over to something else", and 「付け加える」, which means "to add something by attaching it". You can see how the separate meanings of the two verbs are combined to create the new combined verb. For example, 「言い出す」 means "to start talking", combining the meaning, "to speak" and "to bring out". There are no general rules here, you need to just memorize these combined verbs as separate verbs in their own right.

Things that are written in a formal context such as newspaper articles also use the stem as a conjunctive verb. We will come back to this later in the formal expression lesson.

Using 「～ます」 to make verbs polite

Vocabulary

1. 明日 【あした】 - tomorrow
2. 大学 【だい・がく】 - college
3. 行く 【い・く】 (u-verb) - to go
4. 先週 【せん・しゅう】 - last week
5. 会う 【あ・う】 (u-verb) - to meet
6. 晩ご飯 【ばん・ご・はん】 - dinner
7. 食べる 【た・べる】 (ru-verb) - to eat
8. 面白い 【おも・しろ・い】(i-adj) - interesting
9. 映画　【えい・が】 - movie
10. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see

Of course, the reason I introduced the verb stem is to learn how to conjugate verbs into their polite form... the masu-form! The masu-form must always come at the end of a complete sentence and never inside a modifying subordinate clause. When we learn compound sentences, we will see that each sub-sentence of the compound sentence can end in masu-form as well.

To conjugate verbs into the masu-form, you attach different conjugations of 「ます」 to the stem depending on the tense. Here is a chart.

Examples

1. 明日、大学に行きます。
   Tomorrow, go to college.
2. 先週、ボブに会いましたよ。
   You know, met Bob last week.
3. 晩ご飯を食べませんでしたね。
   Didn't eat dinner, huh?
4. 面白くない映画は見ません。
   About not interesting movies, do not see (them).

Using 「です」 for everything else

Vocabulary

1. かわいい (i-adj) - cute
2. 静か 【しず・か】 (na-adj) - quiet
3. 子犬 【こ・いぬ】 - puppy
4. とても - very
5. 好き 【す・き】 (na-adj) - likable; desirable
6. 昨日【きのう】 - yesterday
7. 時間 【じ・かん】 - time
8. ある (u-verb) - to exist (inanimate)
9. その - that （abbr of 「それの」）
10. 部屋 【へや】 - room
11. 先週 【せん・しゅう】 - last week
12. 見る 【み・る】 (ru-verb) - to see
13. 映画　【えい・が】 - movie
14. 面白い 【おも・しろ・い】(i-adj) - interesting

For any sentence that does not end in a ru-verb or u-verb, the only thing that needs to be done is to add 「です」 or 「でした」. You can also do this for substituted nouns (both 「の」 and 「ん」) by just treating them like regular nouns. Another important thing to remember is that if there is a declarative 「だ」, it must be removed. In being polite, I guess you can't be so bold as to forwardly declare things the way 「だ」 does. Just like the masu-form, this must also go at the end of a complete sentence. Here is a chart illustrating the conjugations.

※ Notice in the case of noun/na-adjective only, the past tense becomes 「でした」. A very common mistake is to do the same for i-adjectives. Remember 「かわいいでした」 is wrong!

Examples

1. 子犬はとても好きです。
   About puppies, like very much. (The most natural translation is that someone likes puppies very much but there is not enough context to rule out that the puppies like something very much.)
2. 昨日、時間がなかったんです。
   It was that there was no time yesterday.
3. その部屋はあまり静かじゃないです。
   That room is not very quiet.
4. 先週に見た映画は、とても面白かったです。
   Movie saw last week was very interesting.

※ Reality Check

I have heard on a number of occasions that the negative non-past conjugation as given here is not an "officially" correct conjugation. Instead what's considered to be a more "correct" conjugation is to actually replace the 「ないです」 part with 「ありません」. The reasoning is that the polite negative form of the verb 「ある」 is not 「ないです」 but 「ありません」. Therefore, 「かわいくない」 actually becomes 「かわいくありません」 and 「静かじゃない」 becomes 「静かじゃありません」.

The reality of today's Japanese is that what's supposed to be the "official" conjugation sounds rather stiff and formal. In normal everyday conversations, the conjugation presented here will be used almost every time. While you should use the more formal conjugations for written works using the polite form, you'll rarely hear it in actual speech. In conclusion, I recommend studying and becoming familiar with both types of conjugations.

Examples

1. その部屋はあまり静かじゃないですよ。
   You know, that room is not very quiet.
2. その部屋はあまり静かじゃありませんよ。
   You know, that room is not very quiet.

「です」 is NOT the same as 「だ」

Vocabulary

1. その - so
2. 思う 【おも・う】 (u-verb) - to think
3. はい - yes (polite)
4. 答える 【こた・える】 (ru-verb) - to answer

Many of you who have taken Japanese classes have probably been taught that 「です」 is the polite version of 「だ」. However, I want to point some several key differences here and the reasons why they are in fact completely different things. It is impossible to fully explain the reasons why they are fundamentally different without discussing grammar that have yet to be covered so I would like to target this toward those who have already started learning Japanese and have been incorrectly misinformed that 「だ」 is the casual version of 「です」. For the rest of you new to this, you can easily skip this part.

I'm sure most of you have learned the expression 「そう」 by now. Now, there are four ways to make a complete sentence using the state-of-being with 「そう」 to produce a sentence that says, "That is so."

Different ways to say, "That is so."

1. そう。
2. そうだ。
3. そうです。
4. そうでございます。

The first 「そう」 is the implied state of being and 「そうだ」 is the declarative. As I've stated before, the non-assuming soft spoken 「そう」 is often used by females while the more confident 「そうだ」 is often used by males.

「そうです」 is the polite version of 「そう」, created by attaching 「です」 to the noun. 「そうです」 is not the polite version of 「そうだ」 where the 「だ」 is replaced by 「です」 and I'll explain why.

Perhaps we wanted to make that sentence into a question instead to ask, "Is that so?" There are several ways to do this but some possibilities are given in the following. (This grammar is covered in a later section.)

Different ways to ask, "Is that so?"

1. そう？
2. そうか？
3. そうですか？

As I've explained before, the 「だ」 is used to declare what one believes to be a fact. Therefore, 「そうだか？」 is not a valid way to ask a question because it is declaring a fact and asking a question at the same time. But the fact that 「そうですか」 is a valid question shows that 「です」 and 「だ」 are essentially different. 「そうです」, in showing respect and humbleness, is not as assertive and is merely the polite version of 「そう」.

Besides the difference in nuance between 「だ」 and 「です」, another key difference is that 「だ」 is used in many different types of grammar to delineate a subordinate clause. 「です」, on the other hand, is only used at the end of a sentence to designate a polite state-of-being. For instance, consider the two following sentences. (This grammar is covered in a later section.)

• そうだと思います
  I think that is so.
• そうですと思います
  (Incorrect sentence)

「そうだと思います」 is valid while 「そうですと思います」 is not because 「です」 can only go at the end of the sentence. 「です」 can only be in a subordinate clause when it is a direct quote of what someone said such as the following.

• 「はい、そうです」と答えた。

In conclusion, replacing 「です」 with 「だ」, thinking one is the polite equivalent of the other or vice-versa will potentially result in grammatically incorrect sentences. It is best to think of them as totally separate things (because they are).

Addressing People

Not only is it important to use the right type of language with the right people, it is also important to address them by the right name. It is also important to address yourself with the proper level of politeness. Japanese is special in that there are so many ways of saying the simple words, "I" and "you". We will go over some of ways to refer to yourself and others.

Referring to yourself

There are many ways to say "I" in Japanese. Some of these words are not as common and others are hopelessly outdated. We will go over the most common ones that are in use today. The usages of all the different words for "I" is separated into two categories: gender and politeness. In other words, there are words that are usually used by males and words that are usually only used by females and they all depend on the social context.

Before going into this: a note about the word 「私」. The official reading of the kanji is 「わたくし」. This is the reading you is used in a formal context (for example, a speech by the president of a company). This reading will probably be accompanied with honorific and humble forms, which we will cover later. In all other situations, it is usually read as 「わたし」. This is the most generic reference to "I" in terms of politeness and gender; therefore it is usually one of the first words taught to students of Japanese.

Here is a list of the most common words for "I" and how they are used:

1. 私（わたくし） - Used by both males and females for formal situations.
2. 私（わたし） - Used by both males and females for normal polite situations.
3. 僕 - Used primarily by males from fairly polite to fairly casual situations.
4. 俺 - A very rough version of "I" used almost exclusively by males in very casual situations.
5. あたし - A very feminine and casual way to refer to oneself. Many girls have decided to opt for 「わたし」 instead because 「あたし」 has a cutesy and girly sound.
6. One's own name - Also a very feminine and kind of childish way to refer to oneself.
7. わし - Usually used by older men well in their middle-ages.

Let's see how different types of sentences use the appropriate version of "I". 「わたくし」 is left out because we have yet to go over very formal grammatical expressions.

1. 私の名前はキムです。
   My name is Kim. (Neutral, polite)
2. 僕の名前はキムです。
   My name is Kim. (Masculine, polite)
3. 僕の名前はボブだ。
   My name is Bob. (Masculine, casual)
4. 俺の名前はボブだ。
   My name is Bob. (Masculine, casual)
5. あたしの名前はアリス。
   My name is Alice. (Feminine, casual)

Referring to others by name

Japanese does not require the use of "you" nearly as much as English does. I hope that the examples with Bob, Alice, and Jim have shown that people refer to other people by their names even when they are directly addressing that person. Another common way to address people is by their title such as 「社長」、「課長」、「先生」, etc. The word 「先生」 is used to generally mean any person who has significant knowledge and expertise in something. For example, people usually use 「先生」 when directly addressing doctors or teachers (obviously). You can also include the person's last name such as 「田中先生」 (teacher Tanaka). In the case where your relationship with the person doesn't involve any title, you can use their name (usually their last name) attached with 「さん」 to show politeness. If calling them by their last name seems a little too polite and distant, the practice of attaching 「さん」 to their first name also exists. More endearing and colloquial versions of 「さん」 include 「くん」 and 「ちゃん」. 「くん」 is usually attached to the name of males who are of equal or lower social position. (For example, my boss sometimes calls me 「キムくん」). 「ちゃん」 is a very endearing way to refer to usually females of equal or lower social position.

Referring to others with "you"

Please do not use 「あなた」 just like you would use the word "you" in English. In directly addressing people, there are three levels of politeness: 1) Using the person's name with the appropriate suffix, 2) Not using anything at all, 3) Using 「あなた」. In fact, by the time you get to three, you're dangerously in the area of being rude. Most of the time, you do not need to use anything at all because you are directly addressing the person. Constantly pounding the listener with "you" every sentence sounds like you are accusing the person of something.

「あなた」 is also an old-fashioned way for women to refer to their husband or lover. Unless you are a middle-aged women with a Japanese husband, I doubt you will be using 「あなた」 in this fashion as well.

Here is a list of some words meaning "you" in English. You will rarely need to use any of these words, especially the ones in the second half of the list.

1. あなた - Generally only used when there is no way to physically address the person or know the person's name. For example, direct questions to the reader on a form that the reader must fill out would use 「あなた」.
2. 君 - Can be a very close and assuming way to address girls (especially by guys). Can also be kind of rude.
3. お前 - A very rough and coarse way to address someone. Usually used by guys and often changed to 「おめえ」.
4. あんた - A very assuming and familiar way to address someone. The person using this is maybe miffed off about something.
5. 手前 - Very rude. Like 「お前」, to add extra punch, people will usually say it like, 「てめ～～」. Sounds like you want to beat someone up. I've only seen this one used in movies and comic books. In fact, if you try this on your friends, they will probably laugh at you and tell you that you've probably been reading too many comic books.
6. 貴様 - Very, very rude. Sounds like you want to take someone out. I've also only seen this one used in comic books. I only go over it so you can understand and enjoy comic books yourself!

Referring to others in third person

You can use 「彼」 and 「彼女」 for "he" and "she" respectively. Notice that 「彼」 and 「彼女」 can also mean "boyfriend" and "girlfriend". So how can you tell which meaning is being used? Context, of course. For example, if someone asks, 「彼女ですか？」 the person is obviously asking if she is your girlfriend because the question, "Is she she?" doesn't make any sense. Another less commonly used alternative is to say 「ガールフレンド」 and 「ボーイフレンド」 for, well, I'm sure you can guess what they mean.

Referring to family members

Referring to family members is a little more complicated than English. (It could be worse, try learning Korean!) For the purpose of brevity, (since this is a grammar guide and not a vocabulary guide) we will only go over the immediate family. In Japanese, you refer to members of other people's family more politely than your own. This is only when you are talking about members of your own family to others outside the family. For example, you would refer to your own mother as 「母」 to people outside your family but you might very well call her 「お母さん」 at home within your own family. There is also a distinction between older and younger siblings. The following chart list some of the most common terms for family members. There may also be other possibilities not covered in this chart.

Another word for wife, 「家内」 is often considered politically incorrect because the kanji used are "house" and "inside" which implies that wives belong in the home. Amen. (Just kidding)

The Question Marker

Questions in polite form

The question marker is covered here because it is primarily used to clearly indicate a question in polite sentences. While it is entirely possible to express a question even in polite form using just intonation, the question marker is often attached to the very end of the sentence to indicate a question. The question marker is simply the hiragana character 「か」 and you don't need to add a question mark. For previously explained reasons, you must not use the declarative 「だ」 with the question marker.

Example 1

田中さん：お母さんはどこですか。
Tanaka-san: Where is (your) mother?

鈴木さん：母は買い物に行きました。
Suzuki-san: (My) mother went shopping.

Example 2

キムさん：イタリア料理を食べに行きませんか。
Kim-san: Go to eat Italian food?

鈴木さん：すみません。ちょっと、お腹がいっぱいです。
Suzuki-san: Sorry. (My) stomach is a little full.

Here the question is actually being used as an invitation just like how in English we say, "Won't you come in for a drink?" 「すみません」 is a polite way of apologizing. Slightly less formal is 「ごめんなさい」 while the casual version is simply 「ごめん」.

The question marker in casual speech

It makes sense to conclude that the question marker would work in exactly the same way in casual speech as it does in polite speech. However, this is not the case. The question marker 「か」 is usually not used with casual speech to make actual questions. It is often used to consider whether something is true or not. Depending on the context and intonation, it can also be used to make rhetorical questions or to express sarcasm. It can sound quite rough so you might want to be careful about using 「か」 for questions in the plain casual form.

Examples

1. こんなのを本当に食べるか？
   Do you think [he/she] will really eat this type of thing?
2. そんなのは、あるかよ！
   Do I look like I would have something like that?!

Instead of 「か」, real questions in casual speech are usually asked with the explanatory の particle or nothing at all except for a rise in intonation, as we have already seen in previous sections.

1. こんなのを本当に食べる？
   Are you really going to eat something like this?
2. そんなのは、あるの？
   Do you have something like that?

「か」 used in subordinate clauses

Another use of the question marker is simply grammatical and has nothing to do with the politeness. A question marker attached to the end of a subordinate clause makes a mini-question inside a larger sentence. This allows the speaker to talk about the question. For example, you can talk about the question, "What did I eat today?" In the following examples, the question that is being considered is in red.

1. 昨日何を食べたか忘れた。
   Forgot what I ate yesterday.
2. 彼は何を言ったかわからない。
   Don't understand what he said.
3. 先生が学校に行ったか教えない？
   Won't you inform me whether teacher went to school?

In sentences like example 3 where the question being considered has a yes/no answer, it is common (but not necessary) to attach 「どうか」. This is roughly equivalent to saying, "whether or not" in English. You can also include the alternative as well to mean the same thing.

1. 先生が学校に行ったかどうか知らない。
   Don't know whether or not teacher went to school.
2. 先生が学校に行ったか行かなかったか知らない。
   Don't know whether teacher went to school or didn't.

Using question words

While we're on the topic of questions, this is a good time to go over question words (where, who, what, etc.) and what they mean in various contexts. Take a look at what adding the question marker does to the meaning of the words.

Examples

As you can see by the following examples, you can treat these words just like any regular nouns.

1. 誰かがおいしいクッキーを全部食べた。
   Someone ate all the delicious cookies.
2. 誰が盗んだのか、誰か知りませんか。
   Doesn't anybody know who stole it?
3. 犯人をどこかで見ましたか。
   Did you see the criminal somewhere?
4. この中からどれかを選ぶの。
   (Explaining) You are to select a certain one from inside this (selection).

Question words with inclusive meaning

The same question words in the chart above can be combined with 「も」 in a negative sentence to mean "nobody" （誰も）, "nothing" （何も）, "nowhere" （どこも）, etc.

「誰も」 and 「何も」 are primarily used only for negative sentences. Curiously, there is no way to say "everything" with question words. Instead, it is conventional to use other words like 「全部」. And although 「誰も」 can sometimes be used to mean "everybody", it is customary to use 「皆」 or 「皆さん」

The remaining three words 「いつも」 (meaning "always") and 「どれも」 (meaning "any and all"), and 「どこも」 (meaning everywhere) can be used in both negative and positive sentences.

Examples

1. この質問の答えは、誰も知らない。
   Nobody knows the answer of this question.
2. 友達はいつも遅れる。
   Friend is always late.
3. ここにあるレストランはどれもおいしくない 。
   Any and all restaurants that are here are not tasty.
4. 今週末は、どこにも行かなかった。
   Went nowhere this weekend.

(Grammatically, this 「も」 is the same as the topic particle 「も」 so the target particle 「に」 must go before the topic particle 「も」 in ordering.)

Question words to mean "any"

The same question words combined with 「でも」 can be used to mean "any". One thing to be careful about is that 「何でも」 is read as 「なんでも」 and not 「なにでも」

Examples

1. この質問の答えは、誰でも分かる。
   Anybody understands the answer of this question.
2. 昼ご飯は、どこでもいいです。
   About lunch, anywhere is good.
3. あの人は、本当に何でも食べる。
   That person really eats anything.

Compound Sentences

In this section, we will learn various ways to combine multiple simple sentences into one complex sentence. For example, we will learn how to chain separate sentences together to express multiple actions or states. In other words, if we have two simple sentences with the same subject, "I ran" and "I ate", we will learn how to group them together to mean, "I ran and ate." We will also learn how to do this with adjectives and nouns. (Ex: He is rich, handsome, and charming.)

Expressing a sequence of states

It is very easy to combine a chain of nouns and adjectives to describe a person or object. For example, in English if we wanted to say, "He is X. He is Y. He is Z." since all three sentences have the same noun, we would usually say, "He is X, Y, and Z." In Japanese, we can do the same thing by conjugating the noun or adjective. The last noun or adjective remains the same as before.

Examples

1. 私の部屋は、きれいで、静かで、とても好き。
   My room is clean, quiet, and I like it a lot.
2. 彼女は、学生じゃなくて、先生だ。
   She is not a student, she is a teacher.
3. 田中さんは、お金持ちで、かっこよくて、魅力的ですね。
   Tanaka-san is rich, handsome, and charming, isn't he?

As you can see, the 「で」 attached to 「お金持ち」 obviously cannot be the context particle 「で」 here because there is no verb. It might be helpful to think of 「で」 as merely a substitution for 「だ」 that can be chained together.

Expressing a sequence of verbs with the te-form

In a similar fashion, you can express multiple actions. It is usually interpreted as a sequence of event. (I did [X], then I did [Y], then I finally did [Z].) There are two forms: positive and negative. The tense of all the actions is determined by the tense of the last verb.

Examples

1. 食堂に行って、昼ご飯を食べて、昼寝をする。
   I will go to cafeteria, eat lunch, and take a nap.
2. 食堂に行って、昼ご飯を食べて、昼寝をした。
   I went to cafeteria, ate lunch, and took a nap.
3. 時間がありまして、映画を見ました。
   There was time and I watched a movie.

Expressing reason or causation using 「から」 and 「ので」

You can connect two complete sentences using 「から」 to indicate a reason for something. The two sentences are always ordered [reason] から [result]. When the reason is a non-conjugated noun or na-adjective, you must add 「だ」 to explicitly declare the reason in the form of 「(noun/na-adjective)だから」. If you forget to add the declarative 「だ」 to 「から」, it will end up sounding like the 「から」 meaning "from" which was first introduced in the section on particles, earlier.

Examples

1. 時間がなかったからパーティーに行きませんでした。
   There was no time so didn't go to party.
2. 友達からプレゼントが来た。
   Present came from friend.
3. 友達だからプレゼントが来た。
   Present came because (the person is) friend. (This sentence sounds a bit odd.)

Either the reason or the result can be omitted if it is clear from the context. In the case of polite speech, you would treat 「から」 just like a regular noun and add 「です」. When you omit the result, you must include the declarative 「だ」 or 「です」.

Example 1

田中さん：どうしてパーティーに行きませんでしたか。
Tanaka-san: Why didn't you go to the party?

山田さん：時間がなかったからです。
Yamada-san: It's because I didn't have time.

Example 2

一郎：パーティーに行かなかったの？
Ichiro: You didn't go to the party?

直子：うん、時間がなかったから。
Naoko: Yeah, because I didn't have time.

Example 3

直子：時間がなかった。
Naoko: I didn't have time.

一郎：だからパーティーに行かなかったの？
Ichiro: Is that why you didn't go to the party?

Notice that we could have also used the explanatory 「の」 to express the same thing. In other words, 山田さん could have also said, 「時間がなかったのです」 or 「時間がなかったんです」 while 直子 could have said 「時間がなかったの」 (we'll assume she wants to use the more feminine form). In fact, this is where 「ので」 possibly came from. Let's say you want to combine two sentences: 「時間がなかったのだ」 and 「パーティーに行かなかった」. Remember we can treat the 「の」 just like a noun so we can use what we just learned in the first section of this lesson.

時間がなかったのだ＋パーティーに行かなかった
becomes:
時間がなかったのでパーティーに行かなかった。

In fact, 「ので」 is almost interchangeable with 「から」 with a few subtle differences. 「から」 explicitly states that the sentence preceding is the reason for something while 「ので」 is merely putting two sentences together, the first with an explanatory tone. This is something I call causation where [X] happened, therefore [Y] happened. This is slightly different from 「から」 where [Y] happened explicitly because [X] happened. This difference tends to make 「ので」 sound softer and slightly more polite and it is favored over 「から」 when explaining a reason for doing something that is considered discourteous.

• ちょっと忙しいので、そろそろ失礼します。
  Because I'm a little busy, I'll be making my leave soon.

（「失礼します」, which literally means "I'm doing a discourtesy", is commonly used as a polite way to make your leave or disturb someone's time.）

Reminder: Don't forget that the explanatory 「の」 requires a 「な」 for both non-conjugated nouns and na-adjectives. Review Particles 3 to see why.

1. 私は学生なので、お金がないんです。
   Because I'm a student, I have no money (lit: there is no money).
2. ここは静かなので、とても穏やかです。
   It is very calm here because it is quiet.
3. なので、友達に会う時間がない。
   That's why there's no time to meet friend.

Just like how the explanatory 「の」 can be shortened to 「ん」, in speech, the 「ので」 can be changed to 「んで」 simply because it's easier to slur the sounds together rather than pronouncing the / o / syllable.

1. 時間がなかったんでパーティーに行かなかった。
   Didn't go to the party because there was no time.
2. ここは静かなんで、とても穏やかです。
   It is very calm here because it is quiet.
3. なんで、友達に会う時間がない。
   That's why there's no time to meet friend.

Using 「のに」 to mean "despite"

Grammatically, 「のに」 is used exactly the same way as 「ので」. When used to combine two simple sentences together, it means "[Sentence 1] despite the fact that [Sentence 2]." However the order is reversed: [Sentence 2]のに[Sentence 1].

Examples

1. 毎日運動したのに、全然痩せなかった。
   Despite exercising every day, I didn't get thinner.
2. 学生なのに、彼女は勉強しない。
   Despite being a student, she does not study.

Expressing contradiction using 「が」 and 「けど」

Used in the same manner as 「から」 and 「ので」, 「が」 and 「けど」 also connect two sentences together but this time to express a contradiction. Just like 「から」 the declarative 「だ」 is required for nouns and na-adjectives. And just like 「から」 and 「ので」, either part of the contradiction can be left out.

Examples

1. デパートに行きましたが、何も欲しくなかったです。
   I went to department store but there was nothing I wanted.
2. 友達に聞いたけど、知らなかった。
   I asked (or heard from) a friend but he (or I) didn't know.
3. 今日は暇だけど、明日は忙しい。
   I'm free today but I will be busy tomorrow.
4. だけど、彼がまだ好きなの。
   That may be so, but it is that I still like him. [explanation, feminine tone]

It may seem odd but 「聞く」 can either mean "to listen" or "to ask". You may think this may become confusing but the meaning is usually clear within context. In the second example, we're assuming that the friend didn't know, so the speaker was probably asking the friend. Yet again we see the importance of context in Japanese because this sentence can also mean, "I heard from a friend but I didn't know" since there is neither subject nor topic.

Similar to the difference between 「から」 and 「ので」, 「が」 has a softer tone and is slightly more polite than 「けど」. Though this isn't a rule as such, it is generally common to see 「が」 attached to a 「～ます」 or 「～です」 ending and 「けど」 attached to a regular, plain ending. A more formal version of 「けど」 is 「けれど」 and even more formal is 「けれども」, which we may see later when we cover formal expressions.

Unlike the English word for contradiction such as "but" or "however", 「けど」 and 「が」 do not always express a direct contradiction. Often times, especially when introducing a new topic, it is used as a general connector of two separate sentences. For example, in the following sentences, there is no actual contradiction but 「が」 and 「けど」 are used simply to connect the sentences. Sometimes, the English "and" becomes a closer translation than "but".

1. デパートに行きましたが、いい物がたくさんありました。
   I went to the department store and there was a lot of good stuff.
2. マトリックスを見たけど、面白かった。
   I watched the "Matrix" and it was interesting.

Expressing multiple reasons using 「し」

When you want to list reasons for multiple states or actions you can do so by adding 「し」 to the end of each subordinate clause. It is very similar to the 「や」 particle except that it lists reasons for verbs and state of being. Again, for states of being, 「だ」 must be used to explicitly declare the state of being for any non-conjugated noun or na-adjective. Let's look at some examples.

Example 1

Ａ：どうして友達じゃないんですか？
A: Why isn't (he/she) friend [seeking explanation]?

Ｂ：先生だし、年上だし・・・。
B: Well, he's/she's the teacher, and older...

Example 2

Ａ：どうして彼が好きなの？
A: Why (do you) like him?

Ｂ：優しいし、かっこいいし、面白いから。
B: Because he's kind, attractive, and interesting (among other things).

Notice that 「優しくて、かっこよくて、面白いから。」 could also have worked but much like the difference between the 「と」 and 「や」 particle, 「し」 implies that there may be other reasons.

Expressing multiple actions or states using 「～たりする」

This is the verb version of the 「や」 particle. You can make an example list of verbs among a possible larger list by conjugating each verb into the past tense and adding 「り」. At the end, you need to attach the verb 「する」. Just like the 「や」 particle, the tense is determined by the last verb, which in this case will always be 「する」 (since you have to attach it at the end).

You can also use this with the state of being to say that you are a number of things at various random times among a larger list. Similar to regular verbs, you just take the noun or adjective for each state of being and conjugate it to the past state of being and then attach 「り」. Then finally, attach 「する」 at the end.

1. 映画を見たり、本を読んだり、昼寝したりする。
   I do things like (among other things) watch movies, read books, and take naps.
2. この大学の授業は簡単だったり、難しかったりする。
   Class of this college is sometimes easy, sometimes difficult (and other times something else maybe).

As you can see, the tense and negative/positive state is controlled by the last 「する」.

1. 映画を見たり、本を読んだりした。
   I did things like (among other things) watch movies, and read books.
2. 映画を見たり、本を読んだりしない。
   I don't do things like (among other things) watch movies, and read books.
3. 映画を見たり、本を読んだりしなかった。
   I didn't do things like (among other things) watch movies, and read books.

Other uses of the te-form

The te-form is incredibly useful as it is used widely in many different types of grammatical expressions. We will learn about enduring states with the 「～ている」 and 「～てある」 form. Even though we have learned various conjugations for verbs, they have all been one-time actions. We will now go over how one would say, for example, "I am running." We will also learn how to perform an action for the future using the 「～ておく」 expression and to express directions of actions using 「～ていく」 and 「～てくる」.

Using 「～ている」 for enduring states

We already know how to express a state of being using 「です」, 「だ」, etc. However, it only indicates a one-time thing; you are something or not. This grammar, however, describes a continuing state of an action verb. This usually translates to the gerund in English except for a few exceptions, which we will examine later. We can make good use of the te-form we learned in the last section because the only thing left to do is add 「いる」! You can then treat the result as a regular ru-verb.

This 「いる」 is the same ru-verb describing existence, first described in the negative verb section. However, in this case, you don't have to worry about whether the subject is animate or inanimate.

Example 1

Ａ：友達は何をしているの？
A: What is friend doing?

Ｂ：昼ご飯を食べている。
B: (Friend) is eating lunch.

Note that once you've changed it into a regular ru-verb, you can do all the normal conjugations. The examples below show the masu-form and plain negative conjugations.

Example 2

Ａ：何を読んでいる？
A: What are you reading?

Ｂ： 教科書を読んでいます。
B: I am reading textbook.

Example 3

Ａ： 話を聞いていますか。
A: Are you listening to me? (lit: Are you listening to story?)

Ｂ： ううん、聞いていない。
B: No, I'm not listening.

Since people are usually too lazy to roll their tongues to properly pronounce the 「い」, it is often omitted in conversational Japanese. If you are writing an essay or paper, you should always include the 「い」. Here are the abbreviated versions of the previous examples.

Example 4

Ａ：友達は何をしてるの？
A: What is friend doing?

Ｂ：昼ご飯を食べてる。
B: (Friend) is eating lunch.

Example 5

Ａ：何を読んでる？
A: What are you reading?

Ｂ：教科書を読んでいます。
B: I am reading textbook.

Example 6

Ａ：話を聞いていますか。
A: Are you listening to me? (lit: Are you listening to story?)

Ｂ：ううん、聞いてない。
B: No, I'm not listening.

Notice how I left the 「い」 alone for the polite forms. Though people certainly omit the 「い」 even in polite form, you might want to get used to the proper way of saying things first before getting carried away with casual abbreviations. You will be amazed at the extensive types of abbreviations that exist in casual speech. (You may also be amazed at how long everything gets in super polite speech.) Basically, you will get the abbreviations if you just act lazy and slur everything together. Particles also get punted off left and right.

For example:

1. 何をしているの？(Those particles are such a pain to say all the time...)
2. 何しているの？ (Ugh, I hate having to spell out all the vowels.)
3. 何してんの？ (Ah, perfect.)

Enduring state of being vs enduring state of action

There are certain cases where an enduring state doesn't translate into the gerund form. In fact, there is an ambiguity in whether one is in a state of doing an action versus being in a state that resulted from some action. This is usually decided by context and common practices. For example, although 「結婚している」 can technically mean someone is in a chapel currently getting married, it is usually used to refer to someone who is already married and is currently in that married state. We'll now discuss some common verbs that often cause this type of confusion for learners of Japanese.

「知る」

「知る」 means "to know". English is weird in that "know" is supposed to be a verb but is actually describing a state of having knowledge. Japanese is more consistent and 「知る」 is just a regular action verb. In other words, I "knowed" (action) something and so now I know it (state). That's why the English word "to know" is really a continuing state in Japanese, namely: 「知っている」.

「知る」 vs 「分かる」

「分かる」 meaning "to understand" may seem similar to 「知る」 in some cases. However, there is a difference between "knowing" and "understanding". Try not to confuse 「知っている」 with 「分かっている」. 「分かっている」 means that you are already in a state of understanding, in other words, you already get it. If you misuse this, you may sound pompous. ("Yeah, yeah, I got it already.") On the other hand, 「知っている」 simply means you know something.

Examples

1. 今日、知りました。
   I found out about it today. (I did the action of knowing today.)
2. この歌を知っていますか？
   Do (you) know this song?
3. 道は分かりますか。
   Do you know the way? (lit: Do (you) understand the road?)
4. はい、はい、分かった、分かった。
   Yes, yes, I got it, I got it.

Motion Verbs (行く、来る、etc.)

It is reasonable to assume the actions 「行っている」 and 「来ている」 would mean, "going" and "coming" respectively. But unfortunately, this is not the case. The 「～ている」 form of motion verbs is more like a sequence of actions we saw in the last section. You completed the motion, and now you exist in that state. (Remember, 「いる」 is the verb of existence of animate objects.) It might help to think of it as two separate and successive actions: 「行って」、and then 「いる」.

Examples

1. 鈴木さんはどこですか。
   Where is Suzuki-san?
2. もう、家に帰っている。
   He is already at home (went home and is there now).
3. 先に行っているよ。
   I'll go on ahead. (I'll go and be there before you.)
4. 美恵ちゃんは、もう来ているよ。
   Mie-chan is already here, you know. (She came and is here.)

Using 「～てある」 for resultant states

Appropriately enough, just like there is an 「ある」 to go with 「いる」, there is a 「～てある」 form that also has a special meaning. By replacing 「いる」 with 「ある」, instead of a continuing action, it becomes a resultant state after the action has already taken place. Usually, this expression is used to explain that something is in a state of completion. The completed action also carries a nuance of being completed in preparation for something else.

Since this grammar describes the state of a completed action, it is common to see the 「は」 and 「も」 particles instead of the 「を」 particle.

Example 1

Ａ：準備はどうですか。
A: How are the preparations?

Ｂ：準備は、もうしてあるよ。
B: The preparations are already done.

Example 2

Ａ：旅行の計画は終った？
A: Are the plans for the trip complete?

Ｂ：うん、切符を買ったし、ホテルの予約もしてある。
B: Uh huh, not only did I buy the ticket, I also took care of the hotel reservations.

Using the 「～ておく」 form as preparation for the future

While 「～てある」 carries a nuance of a completed action in preparation for something else, 「～ておく」 explicitly states that the action is done (or will be done) with the future in mind. Imagine this: you have made a delicious pie and you're going to place it on the window sill for it to cool so that you can eat it later. This image might help explain why the verb 「おく」 （置く）, meaning "to place", can be used to describe a preparation for the future. (It's just too bad that pies on window sills always seem to go through some kind of mishap especially in cartoons.) While 「置く」 by itself is written in kanji, it is customary to use hiragana when it comes attached to a conjugated verb (such as the te-form).

Examples

1. 晩ご飯を作っておく。
   Make dinner (in advance for the future).
2. 電池を買っておきます。
   I'll buy batteries (in advance for the future).

「ておく」 is also sometimes abbreviated to 「～とく」 for convenience.

1. 晩ご飯を作っとく。
   Make dinner (in advance for the future).
2. 電池を買っときます。
   I'll buy batteries (in advance for the future).

Using motion verbs （行く、来る） with the te-form

You can also use the motion verb "to go" （行く）and "to come" with the te-form, to show that an action is oriented toward or from someplace. The most common and useful example of this the verb 「持つ」 (to hold). While 「持っている」 means you are in a state of holding something (in possession of), when the 「いる」 is replaced with 「いく」 or 「くる」, it means you are taking or bringing something. Of course, the conjugation is the same as the regular 「行く」 and 「来る」.

Examples

1. 鉛筆を持っている？
   Do (you) have a pencil?
2. 鉛筆を学校へ持っていく？
   Are (you) taking pencil to school?
3. 鉛筆を家に持ってくる？
   Are (you) bringing pencil to home?

For these examples, it may make more sense to think of them as a sequence of actions: hold and go, or hold and come. Here are a couple more examples.

1. お父さんは、早く帰ってきました。
   Father came back home early.
2. 駅の方へ走っていった。
   Went running toward the direction of station.

The motion verbs can also be used in time expressions to move forward or come up to the present.

1. 冬に入って、コートを着ている人が増えていきます。
   Entering winter, people wearing coat will increase (toward the future).
2. 一生懸命、頑張っていく！
   Will try my hardest (toward the future) with all my might!
3. 色々な人と付き合ってきたけど、いい人はまだ見つからない。
   Went out (up to the present) with various types of people but a good person hasn't been found yet.
4. 日本語をずっと前から勉強してきて、結局はやめた。
   Studied Japanese from way back before and eventually quit.