Languages have different vocabulary and grammar for different areas (or “domains” as I call them), for example newspapers, popular novels, and Internet forums. This can be frustrating because being knowledgable in one domain doesn’t mean you’ll have an easy time in another. But the plus side is that once you learn some common phrases and… Read More »
I compared the English translation abilities of 5 different machine translation services (including those of Google and Microsoft) using a short excerpt of classic Japanese literature from Akutagawa Ryunosuke.
I’m always on the lookout for different ways to help people throughout the world improve their Japanese. For example, a few months ago I started experimenting with free online classes, and I also have a series of articles about practicing writing in Japanese (Japanese Writing Lab). After having an exchange with one of my readers… Read More »
The Japanese も (mo) particle has a handful of uses, but one of the most common––and easiest to understand––is when it is used to indicate that something else also applies to a certain statement. For example: バナナも好きだよ (banana mo suki da yo) (I) also like bananas. Here we can see the word “also” cleanly captures the… Read More »
It’s not uncommon for one word in a language to have multiple meanings, but for non-native learners it can be challenge to figure out all the meanings from context. Japanese is no exception, although intonation (depending on region) and kanji selection can help to differentiate meanings in some cases. In this post I want to… Read More »
One of the joys of reading Japanese literature is that the more you do it, the more you pick up certain words and phrases that are specific to literature and not commonly used in spoken language. This knowledge helps you not just understand the meaning of such words but also their nuances. In this post… Read More »
One thing that sets apart Japanese from other languages, such as English, is the wide variety of ways there are to express politeness, whether it is special verb forms, words, or other grammatical constructions. One of the most basic of these is the verbs “ageru” / “kureru” / “morau”, which I have written a bit… Read More »
As you probably know, particles are little words that help give grammatical context to other words in Japanese and are critically important for proper grammar (and in some ways are similar to articles and prepositions in English). Particles can be used on their own, as well as in limited combinations with other particles, and in… Read More »
When learning a foreign language (or anything for that matter), the more you can interact with the material, the more likely you are to maintain focus and retain what was learned. For example, in order to improve conversation ability, the best way is clearly to have frequent real conversations with native or fluent speakers. But… Read More »
In this blog I’ve written quite a few articles on Japanese grammar, particularly about particles, one of the tricker areas to master. In this article I’d like to talk about にも (ni mo), a commonly used particle combination. Fortunately, a majority of the time にも can be understood by simply combining the meaning of these… Read More »