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I'm new here but had some trouble finding this so I am going to ask.

Is it OK to have more than one は or が particles in the same sentence, I've realized that in cases that there is a comma it is OK because the sentence is fragmented but I have no clue in cases where there no comma.for instance the sentence "I don't like people who like fish". I have come with three ways to write it and Google translator have the same translation for the 3 of them bUT I feel that only one is right:

1.私は魚が好きな人が好きじゃない

2.私は魚好きな人が好きじゃない

3.私は魚好きな人すきじゃない

For some reason I fell the third one is the correct, so I ask you, which one is the correct and why?

Thanks in advance.

2 Answers 2

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It's OK to have two or more が/は in one sentence, and this typically happens when a relative clause is involved, like in this case. (I think you know the basics of relative clauses, but here's a good starter: Relative Clauses and Sentence Order)

  1. 私は魚が好きな人が好きじゃない。
  2. 私は魚好きな人が好きじゃない。
  3. 私は魚好きな人好きじゃない。

These all make sense, and carry the same meaning.

But Sentence 3 sounds blunt and a bit unnatural to me. While simple particles like が/は tend to be omitted in simple sentences in casual conversations, a longer noun clause like 魚好きな人 ("people who like fish") tends to be explicitly marked with some particle. Otherwise, the sentence would be hard to parse.

  • 本読んだ。 (okay in casual conversations)
  • [?] 友達に借りた厚くて難しい本読んだ。 (makes sense, but を is usually expected after 本)

And also note that 好【ず】き after a noun is almost considered as a suffix ("-phil", "lover"), so Sentence 2 looks okay simply because 魚【さかな】好【ず】き sounds like one na-adjective. Note that 好き is read as ずき due to rendaku.

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  • Thanks a lot, I'll give the links a read and study more! ありがとうございます! Jul 15, 2016 at 19:09
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The correct translation is 1.

私は魚が好きな人が好きじゃない。

私は(noun)が好きじゃない and the (noun) is 人 which has been modified by 魚が好きな.

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  • Am I correct to assume that every noun in a sentence need either a topic or subject particle? Jul 13, 2016 at 21:54
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    @FelipeOliveira Absolutely not. Nouns can be objects marked with を, or they can be linked to another noun via の, and so on. There are a lot of other roles nouns can play. (And you can mark other things with は, not just nouns.)
    – user1478
    Jul 13, 2016 at 22:18

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