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Let's Learn Japanese! Part 2

Blogs > drag_
Post a Reply
drag_
Profile Blog Joined April 2010
England425 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-10-02 17:25:55
October 02 2010 17:24 GMT
#1
PART 1: http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?id=142137

Ok, sorry it's been awhile since I wrote the last part, but I've been pretty busy. Anyways, part 1 was more of an introduction than anything grammatical or what not. Anyways this part will be about verbs!

In japanese, broadly speaking, there are only two tenses: past and not past( ie present or future). Verbs also have two MAIN forms: Short form (informal and used for some constructions) and long form (more formal). There are also two types of verbs: る (ru) verbs, (食べる, tabeRU) and う (u) verbs, (行く, ikU). In this part I will only go over the formal form in the present and past.

Furthermore, pronouns do accompany verbs. In english, or most other languages, verbs decline, I eat, you eat, he/she/it eats, we eat etc. The verb is almost always accompanied with a pronoun to indicate the subject. In japanese verbs do not decline like this, and there is no plural or singular or gender for verbs to agree with, and pronouns are often dropped at the beginning of sentences. I will try and explain this better below.

In るverbs, the part before the る is called the verb base, eg 食べる (taberu) 食べ (tabe) is the verb base.
To make the long form with a ru verb we simple take off the るand add ます(masu)
eg: 食べるーーー>食べます
  見るーーー>みます
or tabeRU ----> tabeMASU I eat
miRU ----> miMASU I see
As I said earlier, verbs do not conjugate. You do not have to adjust verbs for agreement with plural subjects or gender. Furthermore pronouns do not accompany verbs, and are usually not included at all in sentences. So the verb forms presented above could also be translated as I/you/he/we/they eat depending on the context of the sentence. I hope this makes sense. If it doesn't feel free to flame me and I'll try to explain better.
This is fairly simple and if you follow this you should be ok.
To turn a る verb negative, add ません (masen) onto the verb base instead of ます. eg

In う verbs you drop the final u and turn it into an i + ます/ません.
For example, 聞くーーー>聞きます
       話すーーー>はなします
or kikU ---> kikimasu
hanasu---> hanashimasu

When you look up a verb, you will also find it in its る/う form, so you can always turn it into its long form as long as you follow these rules.

PAST TENSE
Forming the past tense is very simple. You take the verb base, and instead of adding ます you add ました (mashita). This is the same for る and う verbs.
eg: 食べるーーー>食べました
見るーーー>みました
  聞くーーー>聞きました
  話すーーー>話しました
or taberu ---> tabemashita I ate
miru ---> mimashita
kiku ---> kikimashita
hanasu---> hanashimashita
I hope this makes sense.
Now, for the irregular: (there is no pattern, you just have to learn 'em)
するーーー>します
  ーーー>しました
くるーーー>きます
  ーーー>きました
or:
suru---> shimasu (I do)
---> shimashita (I did)
kuru---> kimasu (I come)
---> kimashita (I came) (lol)

Ok. I hope this was helpful for anyone who's working on the basics, is interested in starting or just wanted a brush up. If you have any questions/want me to continue please let me know!
PS: For anyone interested in learning how to write the basic alphabet (there are 3!!) start here: http://japanese.about.com/library/blhira.htm
It's a pretty good tutorial and will give you the basics to it.

*
OhThatDang
Profile Joined August 2004
United States4685 Posts
October 02 2010 18:01 GMT
#2
damn even though its only a little =p using kanji for a part 2 of learning japanese is pretty advanced already

other than that interesting refresher =p
troi oi thang map nai!!!
Never.Die
Profile Joined March 2010
Japan189 Posts
October 02 2010 18:35 GMT
#3
Awesome, 5 star blog. I hope you continue this.
Cambium
Profile Blog Joined June 2004
United States16368 Posts
October 02 2010 19:29 GMT
#4
Grammar is nice, but it's pretty useless without vocab. If anyone's serious about learning Japanese, definitely study as much vocab as you can while learning the grammar.
When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.
Archas
Profile Blog Joined July 2010
United States6531 Posts
October 02 2010 19:32 GMT
#5
I'm studying Japanese in my spare time, so these blogs are pretty helpful. Thanks!
The room is ripe with the stench of bitches!
Piy
Profile Blog Joined January 2008
Scotland3152 Posts
October 02 2010 20:15 GMT
#6
I've learned a bit of Japanese, and my flatmate is pretty hard set on getting his already decent Japanese to an advanced level this year, and from my experience, it's not significantly harder than any other language. Grammar, Kanji and alphabet is a real pain, just like Korean and Mandarin, because it takes so long to decipher things at first, but this whole "level 3" "level 2" "intermediate level 2" way of talking about languages is just such a defeatist way of looking at it.

Like people in some thread a little while ago saying that learning Korean was basically a waste of time because of it being level 3...

Best of luck to you, language learning is so much fun
My. Copy. Is. Here.
Thratur
Profile Blog Joined June 2008
Canada917 Posts
October 02 2010 20:28 GMT
#7
I've learned a looooot of vocab and Kanji but I forgot to learn grammar, so this was kind of useful. Thank you!
Kanin
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
75 Posts
October 02 2010 22:33 GMT
#8
Nice blog

I love languages, but I can't get my head around languages without alphabets. The symbols just don't "stick" which is why I never attempt to learn seriously.
*squeak* ^-^
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