Hot answers tagged speaking
22
Atashi is for females. Chicchai can be seen as more emphatic "tiny". They are both quite common.
Remember that in most textbooks for any language the most ideal form of the language (often judged so by prescriptive grammarians) is taught. As you familiarize yourself with real world usage (through travel, friends, and media) you will discover all sorts of ...
14
It is worth pointing out that in Japanese, different dialects use different accent patterns for the same word.
The Japanese language taught as a foreign language is most likely to be 標準語 (ひょうじゅんご), which is based on the Tokyo dialect. Therefore, probably the “correct” accent pattern to use should be that of the Tokyo dialect (as in your examples of はし). ...
13
もしもし is used to call for someone’s attention. Although it is often used on the phone, the use is not limited to phone calls. もしもし is a repetition of もし, which is also used to call for an attention. もし is a variation of 申し (もうし), which was used in the same way in old time. 申し definitely predates telephones, and I guess that both もし and もしもし for asking for ...
13
YOU and Mark have already mentioned that 全然 can be used with a small set of positive descriptions, and that this is usage is not considered correct (which might be true, but it's absurdly common, so that doesn't really matter).
But my impression is that the positive version of 全然 is not really limited to a small set of words, but rather to particular ...
9
I agree with Chocolate: it is not expected, regardless of whether the traveler is a native speaker of Japanese or not. And as a result of doing something unexpected, some people may interpret it as making fun of the local accent, because it seems to be the most plausible explanation why anyone from another area would imitate (probably very poorly) the local ...
9
It is actually very much the same as homonyms in English. Consider the difference between
refuse |riˈfyoōz| and refuse |ˈrefˌyoōs; -ˌyoōz|. It sounds weird if you mix up the pronunciation:
I |ˈrefˌyoōs| to accept this.
It's bad English and identifies you as a non-native speaker.
If the context doesn't give enough hints as to which refuse you meant, it ...
9
Two pointers :
Yoko Hasegawa, Against marking accent locations in japanese textbooks, Japanese-Language Education Around the Globe.
柴田{しばた} 武{たけし}・柴田{しばた} 里程{りてい}, アクセントは同音語{どうおんご}をどの程度{ていど}弁別{べんべつ}しうるか ---日本語{にほんご}・英語{えいご}・中国語{ちゅうごくご}の場合{ばあい} (Is Word-Accent Significant in Differentiating Homonyms in Japanese, English and Chinese?)
Abstract : To ...
9
Like YOU mentioned, Zenzen being used with positive words is slang and not correct Japanese. That being said, Japanese people use it all the time, especially young people.
typically i hear 全然 with OK、大丈夫、平気, 楽しい、and きれい with others possibly I haven't heard. That is to say that the words that are used with 全然 in a positive sense are probably limited to just ...
8
As you say, ねー is a (very) informal, rather masculine, way of replacing ない at the end of words.
Works for both verbs:
行かない → 行かねー
and い-adjectives (which are kind-of-verbs anyway, but let's not get into that debate here):
危ない【あぶない】→ アブねー
in fact it also works with other "-a" kanas. E.g:
ヤバい → ヤベー
Adding のだ/んだ as you do in your example is only ...
8
In this example, やっぱり functions as something like "as I thought" and shows that the speaker had a preexisting suspicion that a certain matter was indeed true. なるほど shows that a greater understanding of the surrounding context has been gained from the confirmation of the fact referred to by そう. So yes, it does make sense.
EDIT (for the updated question)
I ...
7
It's still understandable without correct accents, most of the time, but if you were able to use the correct intonation, then you would gain better fluency in Japanese obviously. I sometimes check at this site to check the the correct accents.
For example for that chopsticks「箸」, and bridge「橋」
7
As you probably already read in the question on dialects, Yakuzas are often pictured speaking Hiroshima-ben on TV. According to Japanese friends, this has probably as much to do with the fact that Hiroshima-ben naturally sounds quite hard to the ear (whereas soft-spoken Kyoto-ben is the typical dialect choice for cute, feminine characters) as any real-world ...
6
I have heard it used in formal (e.g. business) contexts. I have never heard it used in casual conversations among friends or family.
This is what you might expect, because Sino-Japanese words like みょうにち do tend to have a more formal feel than native Japanese words like あした or あす, when they exist alongside each other with similar meanings.
6
The NHK pronunciation dictionary prescribes that:
付く, 着く, （羽根を）撞く, （職に）就く, （嘘を）吐く, （位に）即く, （明かりが）点く, and （餅を）搗く all have the accent on the first or second mora (with first preferred: HL)
突く has no accent (so in isolation it is LH, but note that this is not the same as accent-on-the-second-mora LH when other words follow)
Hope this helps!
6
I feel that speaking a foreign language in an accent other than the 'standard' one is kind of like playing the violin: it sounds really awful from a beginner, but from someone skilled it can sound very nice.
I myself lived for two years in the Kanto area and learned to speak 'standard' Japanese. After that I spent a year in Kyoto and though I learned to ...
6
もしもし is from 申し（もうし） being double and shortened, and at Edo-era people use only もうし without repetition.
申す(もうす) is same meaning with 言う(いう)/話す(はなす), but we use as polite-from nowaday.
ref: http://gogen-allguide.com/mo/moshimoshi.html
6
First of all, knowing pitch is not as simple as knowing the pitch on each word. There are many morphological endings that make pitch change on verbs and adjectives. For instance, taBEru becomes TAbete because -te will make the pitch shift to the 3rd mora from the end when the verb has pitch. Pitch also changes when 2 words or more form a new compound word ...
5
Omission of syntax to allow the user to infer meaning (for politeness or whatever reason) is one of the many characteristics of Japanese. What remains unsaid is often stronger than what is actually said. The Japanese abhor "spelling things out" for you, because it is not "harmonious" and puts them in a position of having to be direct. If you've read こころ by ...
5
Generally you just read out the individual kana, and for little-tsu you can say 小さい「つ」. If you want to specify it's katakana, you can say かたかなで、、、.
If there is some confusion you can say the "group" of kana it's in, then say の then whatever one it is specifically. So for か you would say か、き、く、け、こ、の「か」. With any luck that is how you learned them, so it ...
5
For your particular sentence, using 五日 adverbially without に under the meaning 'fifth day of the month' is ungrammatical, so it is unambiguously 何時か. They are expressing intent to go to America eventually in the future. As Tsuyoshi Ito correctly points out below, there is still slight chance that it may be 五日 meaning 'for five days,' but this possibility is ...
5
あたし (atashi) is the female version of 私 for referring to yourself. わたし (watashi) is the neutral form for that, so you can use it always. あたし is only used by females, while 僕 (ぼく, boku) for example a possibility for males is (although 僕 by itself is rather informal).
There are many words that are dependent on who it says, or who it is addressed. あたし is just ...
5
From my personal experience, I find that people say the hour based on the 12 hour clock without the 午後 or 午前, and if the listener is not sure they will ask 夜？朝？ If they want to be specific they will say 朝７時 or 夜7時.
I also find that the 24 hour clock is only used in writing and not in speaking. So, they do write it down one way and say it another. Even ...
4
In Nagoya, ありがとう is pronounced as LHLLL (see below), where L and H mean low and high pitches, respectively. I think that this is the same in Tokyo, too.
Correction: According to the publisher webpage on the book アクセントの法則 by Haruo Kubozono, the accent pattern of the word ありがとう is as follows:
Tokyo: LHLLL
Nagoya: LLHLL
Osaka: LLLHL
Kagoshima: ...
4
Although the 12-hour clock system (12時間制) is much more common in general, the 24-hour system (24時間制) is used in some contexts. Probably the most notable is train timetables.
25:00 is 午前1時 of the next day. But in some cases, the speaker wants to treat it as part of the day before. I do not think that there is a standard way to describe it, but I have seen ...
4
You will be perfectly understood even if your pitch isn't "good". In cases where there is an ambiguity, people will either infer the intended word or just ask for clarification.
If you want to learn a pitch, you can buy pitch dictionaries like this one.
3
To answer your updated question, yes, there are situations where you could use one but not the other.
As Derek said, やっぱり is used when a fact was suspected and then confirmed. If you had no such previous suspicion, you would not use やっぱり.
Also, if the fact is negative (someone is failing out of school, has an STD, etc.), it can be rude to use やっぱり and ...
3
In my opinion,
鈴木: これをもっと安くしませんかねえ。
田中: それはちょっと。。
。。。 would be
それはちょっと(安く)出来ないですねぇ。
Above could be intentionally omitting the rest to get more politeness by not directly saying the rejections.
Regarding ambiguities of the word "ちょっと", please take a look at this Research Paper from Hokkaido Bunkyo University.
...
3
Only girls would use this kind of language, especially high school girls. If adults use it, it wouldn't sound right. You definatley couldn't use it within a business!
I think they use this kind of language to be kinda cute.
If you're learning the language, you should of course learn the proper words and maybe just look at these kind of feminisms to be ...
3
In Okinawa, I got into a cab and asked in Japanese to go my destination. In Tokyo, the taxi driver might comment favourably that I can speak Japanese. In Okinawa, the taxi driver was impressed that I could speak standard Japanese (標準語). I realized then that I spoke Japanese with a Tokyo accent.
If you going to a different area for a short time I see no ...
2
I think the answer depends on how much you know about the dialect, which in this case doesn't seem to be that much. The term dialect refers to a much more complicated system than just the zuuzuu phenomenon, so even if you changed your pronunciation, unless everything else is dialectally accurate, then you are uttering an incorrect sentence. And that's IF you ...
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