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What is the difference between the "わ" sentence ender used by women in general and the one that is used by both Males and females in the Kansai area?

I've asked my Japanese co-workers about it specifically and they said that there is a difference to them, but unfortunately, like most native speakers of a language, couldn't concretely explain what that difference is.

One comment was that women can say "~わね" where this cannot be said by men in the Kansai area.

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  • The difference is who they use, but that sounds self-evident…. Maybe the question can be phrased more precisely.
    – Tsuyoshi Ito
    Commented Jun 1, 2011 at 5:24
  • restated it such so note that men and women can use it in Kansai.
    – Mark Hosang
    Commented Jun 1, 2011 at 5:27
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    I assume you mean like the usage in this video? dailymotion.com/video/…
    – phirru
    Commented Jun 1, 2011 at 5:59
  • @phirru yup, that is the exact usage i am referring to.
    – Mark Hosang
    Commented Jun 1, 2011 at 10:57

1 Answer 1

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One is feminine and the other is just very emphatic. Both are particles so both can be used in the same context. The wa used by males is likely to be used with less formal language, but only because of the common language of its users, not any grammatical constraint.

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  • so to correlate this to another particle, would you say it was taking the place of "yo"?
    – Mark Hosang
    Commented Jun 1, 2011 at 5:30
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    There's overlap, I suppose. Think of yo as being used when directly transferring information to another (or I suppose you could be talking to yourself). The male wa is exclamatory. "疲れてるわ！" "ええわ！" (slamming door on salesman's face).
    – Nate Glenn
    Commented Jun 1, 2011 at 6:04
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    Not to mention you can also combine よ with わ and make it わよ! Add ね to the mix, oh the horror! そうですわよね！ I hate it when they say that! そうですわよねやでだべ！
    – syockit
    Commented Jun 3, 2011 at 20:01

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