Japanese is rife with compound verbs, which are generally composed by taking the verb stem (what I like to call the ‘pre-masu form’) of one verb and attaching it to a second verb. For example 食べ終わる (“tabeowaru”) which is comprised of the verb stem of 食べる (“taberu”, meaning “to eat”) and 終わる (“owaru”, meaning “to… Read More »
In this article I’d like to go over the Japanese expression “dake atte” (だけあって), particularly because the meaning is not quite what you expect given the words comprising it. But first let’s look at those words as a starting point. だけ (dake) is probably a word you’ve come across before, and many times it is… Read More »
I try to make sure I get a daily dose of Japanese, not as instructional material (a textbook, etc.) but as content made for native speakers. One good way to do this (which I’ve written about before here) is to set your PC or mobile device to Japanese language. I have my main personal phone… Read More »
I’ve made a list of 50 hints for learning Japanese based on my own experience, covering everything from kanji, listening, and grammar to study habits and other topics.
In this article I focus on the differences in using the “wa” versus the “ga” particle in the context of asking simple questions.
This time I’d like to discuss the word おぼしき (oboshiki), which despite having a bit of a complicated origin has a relatively simple meaning and usage.
I decided to translate a poem by the 4th-century Chinese poet Tao Yuanming (陶淵明), leveraging both the original text as well as Japanese translations and explanations.
I feel that grammar is the soul of a language, and in the case of Japanese, particles are one of the most important parts of grammar. In this post I’d like to go over the particle combination “made de” (までで), which may not be obvious the first time you spot it in the wild. I… Read More »
This time I’d like to go over the expression “年は年だから” (toshi wa toshi dakara), and some related topics. I chose this since this expression is a little tricky to understand, especially if you are thinking about it from an English point of view. First let’s look at a short, real-world dialogue using this: Person A:… Read More »
In this post I go over an interesting use for the word “あれ”, along with a few other common uses.