Timeline for Is じゃないです equally correct as じゃありません?
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| Jun 17, 2020 at 8:18 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
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| Aug 30, 2011 at 17:13 | comment | added | ento | @sawa: Thanks for your write up. Now that I think of it, I can understand that shorter is better than a long, drawn-out sentence. I think it could be further deduced that better (shorter) writing style is preferred in formal occasions, and the formal way of expression is first taught to beginners. | |
| Aug 11, 2011 at 0:31 | comment | added | Matt | @sawa This has been fun, thanks. I see your point on /ku mo aru/, will think about that one. Re /desu/, let me note just so that we are on the same page, it is obviously originally a verb (and still a verb in the standard), but the argument is is that for some speakers it is evolving into a non-conjugating "clitic"/"particle". For these speakers, /desita/ is no longer used in the relevant contexts, and /datta + desu/ or /datta + ssu/ is used instead. (I think some argue that this is an evolution of of んです.) I'm not sure if I'm 100% in agreement with this analysis but it is intriguing. | |
| Aug 11, 2011 at 0:09 | comment | added | user458 |
@Matt Regarding your last point, I think ないです can be considered more systematic because you can get rid of the negative n, which is only (irregularly) used with mas. That may be the reason younger people do not tend to use it. Anyway, thanks for your comment.
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| Aug 11, 2011 at 0:07 | comment | added | user458 |
@Matt Thanks for the comments. I would like to add some arguments. 1. As for why i ending is underlyingly ku aru, the latter form actually appears when the sequence is interrupted with elements like mo: naku mo aru or samuku mo aru. If you assume i as an element, you would have to say i or ku aru is chosen depending on whether the sequence will be interrupted, which is strange. 2. desu is obviously a verb because you can see the the verb conjugation. Particularly, the past tense is desita. I don't know about っす; it is interesting.
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| Aug 10, 2011 at 23:29 | comment | added | Matt | @sawa To summarize: Under your model, it is true that ないです is inferior to ありません, and these are ultimately the grounds that people criticize it on (though they may express it in a roundabout way, e.g. "ない is already an ending, it doesn't need です as well!" etc.) But, younger speakers of Japanese may already have a model that analyzes verb endings and です differently, and so applying your principles to their model may give the opposite result: that ないです is simpler and superior to ありません.... Of course, as long as 標準語 sticks to the old model, じゃないです will be "ungrammatical" in that sense. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 23:25 | comment | added | Matt | @sawa 3. Basically I am using clitic in the sense that Wikipedia defines it: "a morpheme that is grammatically independent, but phonologically dependent on another word or phrase" (this is broader than your definition). Perhaps the word "clitic" is inappropriate, but my point is, some linguists argue that in some speaker's MJ, です (→っす) can be viewed as something like a non-declining "politeness particle" that attaches to plain forms. Thus you get 行かないっす instead of 行きません, じゃないです instead of じゃありません, etc. (This usage might have spread from acceptance of 高いです instead of 高くあります, 高うございます etc.) | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 23:18 | comment | added | Matt | @sawa 2. Yes, the -i ending is exceptional, and that is the point: it is exceptionally short. By converting it to -ku aru, are you not implicitly instituting a rule that all declarative sentences must end in an -u verb? Why can't they also end in an -i adjective? (or an -i adjective-like construction functioning as a verb ending, if you like). Again, the model that views -i as -ku aru is not necessarily an illogical one, but it obviously handicaps -i if we are then going to count morphemes. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 23:16 | comment | added | Matt | @sawa Thanks for detailed reply. I should stress before I get into this that my argument is not that your model is wrong so much as it is not the only possible model. 1. So your argument is, when faced with the aru/nai vs saku/sakanai irregularity, we must attach a null morpheme to /nai/ conveying the meaning "conjugation of the verb aru"? OK, I can accept this as a model, although I don't agree that it is the only possible model, or that it must then follow that this null morpheme should be counted if we are measuring length. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 22:49 | comment | added | user458 | @Matt 3. In linguistics a clitic means an element that has a pronominal nature attached to a verbal element. I think you are using it in a different sense. I don't know what you mean with it. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 22:48 | comment | added | user458 |
@Matt 1. If you don't assume underlying ara, then you have to assume that nai has multiple meanings such as negation of existence, negation of possession, negation of perfect, negation of progressive. With the assumption, this reduces to the ambiguilty of aru. 2. I think you are mixing historical change with synchronic derivation. -ku form is the basic form in present adjectives, observed in other forms, (for example, the past katta comes from ku ar-ta. It is i ending that is exceptional.
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| Aug 10, 2011 at 22:31 | comment | added | Matt | I think there are unexamined assumptions in your counting strategy here. Why include "ara" if it is so obligatorily deleted that no-one has used it for generations? How come -i (from -si) is replaced with "-ku aru", which is obviously a less basic (and newer!) form? If you treat "desu" as a clitic (which is what some people argue it is evolving into in spoken J., cf forms like "だったっす"), you could easily recount: na-shi desu (3) vs ar-i-(i)mas-e-nu (5). Morpheme count might actually be the reason that じゃないです is preferred by speakers with this model of the language. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 17:41 | history | edited | user458 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Aug 10, 2011 at 16:19 | comment | added | ento | Could you elaborate on the relationship between a phrase's length and its correctness, advancedness and formality? Are shorter phrases generally more correct, advanced and/or formal? I simply want to hear more because I couldn't quite follow the logic there.. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 15:09 | comment | added | user458 | @Samurai_Soul They don't know it, or it doesn't come to their mind when speaking. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 14:39 | comment | added | Samurai Soul | @sawa: I don't understand "uneducated people cannot use じゃありません"? Cannot use it on what grounds? That they haven't learned it? I suppose it's not as commonly heard as じゃないです, so it's possible they've never learned it. But I have a hard time buying that. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 13:14 | comment | added | user458 |
@phirru It is an uneducated form in the sense that it is the only choice for uneducated people. Uneducated people cannot use じゃありません. On the other hand, educated people have access to either form. And teachers and university students can use じゃないです knowing that there is the form じゃありません but do not want to bother being totally correct.
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| Aug 10, 2011 at 13:06 | history | edited | user458 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Aug 10, 2011 at 13:04 | comment | added | phirru | Does it really give off the "uneducated" vibe that much? I've heard this from all types of people, including Japanese teachers and very serious university students. | |
| Aug 10, 2011 at 12:59 | history | answered | user458 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |