Japanese - Ask questions thread

Basically if you have a question about the language, ask it and fellow 4channers might see it and answer it for you.

To start it off. When an animate object (iru) dies, is it considered inanimate(aru)?

what the fuck do you want to say in english?  give an example sent. or something.

Is it true that Japanese has over twenty words for pederasty?

>>1
No. It is still iru. The iru/aru thing is not as cut and dry as you may think. For example, you can use iru when saying there's a taxi over there, because you associate strongly the concept of taxi and taxidriver.

>>1
You probably wouldn't use that verb at all any more considering he's dead.  If you want to talk about his body or his spirit, you would use "aru".

when do you use ano/kono/sono over are/kore/sore? or are they the same?

ano kono sono is followed by the noun your are referring to, like kono neko, sono neko. are kore sore are used when you are not naming the noun. E.g. Sore wa ii ne >> That is nice. Sono kutsu wa ii ne >> Those shoes are nice.

>>6
In English, the functions of both those words have been fused into "this, that, etc..." except that one set is used as a pronoun and the other as determinant.

:Kore: wa akaku ni natte iru. = :This: is becoming red.
:Sono hon: wa omoshiroi desu. = :That book: is interesting.

If your question is about which of the ko-so-a-(do) series to use instead of the difference between kore/kono, I'll let anonymous answer for you.

How do you say 'How do you say _____ in Japanese'?

>>9
___ wa nihongo de nan to iimasu ka?

>>8
I'll bite on this.
ko- is always "this," something close to both the speaker and the addressee.
so- is "that thing close to you but far from me"
a- is "that thing far from both of us"
do- is used for questions "what thing" type stuff

Also, when you're talking about a memory or something like "that house I went to yesterday," so- is used when it is something you are familiar with but the addressee is not, and a- is used when you are both familiar. For example, if I went to Sapporo and stayed at the Weeaboo hotel, I'd say "sono Weeaboo Hotel," but if we'd gone together, I'd say "ano Weeaboo Hotel."

>>8
Kore: wa akaku natte iru = :This: is becoming red.
Fixed.

==8
Damn it, forgot about particles not being needed for adverbs.

Can anyone explain 行ってくる to me?
Example: トイレに行ってくる。

>>14
look at this

>Motion Verbs (行く、来る、etc.)
It is reasonable to assume the actions 「行っている」 and 「来ている」 would mean, "going" and "coming" respectively. But unfortunately, this is not the case. The 「～ている」 form of motion verbs is more like a sequence of actions we saw in the last section. You completed the motion, and now you exist in that state. (Remember, 「いる」 is the verb of existence of animate objects.) It might help to think of it as two separate and successive actions: 「行って」、and then 「いる」.

from http://www.guidetojapanese.org/enduring.html

>>15
You didn't answer >>14 at all. You talked about ている when the other person wanted to know about てくる. Well, specifically he wanted to know about 行ってくる. Rather, in that case, it is 行って来る because the idea is "going and then coming back."

行って来る is functionally equivalent to the English phrase "I'm heading to XXXX. I'll be right back/be back later."

For example, when you leave the house in the morning to go to work/school, you'll say out loud 行ってきます. You're saying, in essence, "I'm leaving, but I'll be back later."

It's just a fixed expression, though. No one thinks of it as "i'm going and coming back." Instead, it is just thought of as the equivalent of "see you later". I mean, no one actually thinks about the actual meaning of each word in "see you later" when they say it, do they? No! They just say it as an idiom. 行って来る is an idiom as well.

>>16

I WAS thinking of it as going and coming back, which was confusing the hell out of me.  Thanks.

>>16
You missed out explaining why this is so. Because the Japanese have a stronger sense of belonging to a group, "returning" to the group is an important action. Hence 行って来る means "I'm going, but don't worry, I'll be back."

Please answer me this:
What's the difference between "う-", "う~", and "うぅ"?
I'm desperate.

desperate for love

>>20
I've actually got 3 steady lovers - an adult, a teen and a loli. I'm sick of love. They ain't getting any loving out of me as long as I have japanese.

>>19
no difference, you make these sounds when taking a dump.

>>6
>>7
>>8
>>11
these are all correct, but there is one time where "so" and "a" can be used in a different way.  when speaking of something that cannot be seen at the current time, and is only known of by the person speaking of said something then so is used. if it is something that both people are aware of then a is used
for example:
two people are sitting at a italian restaurant
person 1 is speaking of a mexican restaurant
person 2 does not know of the mexican restaurant
therefore person one would use そのレストラン(sono resutoran)

if both person 1 and person 2 knew of the restaurant then あのレストラン(ano resutoran) would be used

it is actually more complicated than taught at first.  i guess it is just something that you pick up in everyday speach.  i have only seen it in one textbook before

oh and the same goes for are/sore and asoko/soko although soko seems to not be used that much in everyday speach

>>22
There has to be SOME difference, because I've seen all these styles mixed together. For instance, I'm thinking "~" adds a tremolo to the drag-out.

>>24
just think about it.  it is exactly the way it looks
うー is an elogated ugh  sound
う〜 is a wavering ugh sound
うぅ is an ugh sound that goes to nothing, kind of like a sigh sound in english

う〜ぅ

Why do some people shout "THAT-THAT-THAT!" (sore-sore-sore!) sometimes? I've heard it lacks translation, but TRY to explain it.
Is it the same as "asore", and what does "asore" mean?
(Searched the net for days and came up empty.)

>>23

sweet never knew that, and it makes many things much more clear now.

>>27
I'll try and explain this one
Sometimes it can be kind of used like a grunt, kind of imagine you throw a football, and you yell, "There!" as you release it from your hands. I guess another way to think of it is maybe.. "Take that!" but that might not be all that accurate and might not work in all cases. I think the 'a' in asore is just a grunt going in front of it, with no real meaning, "Ah! Take that!"

>>28
Would you say that shouting "Sore sore sore!" at a disco would be like shouting "Yeah yeah yeah!"?

Why on earth would you shout "Yeah yeah yeah!"?

>>30
Disco brings about all sorts of faggotry.

>>30
In the furthest reaches of the net, I've found a blog where someone said that it was fun going to a disco/concert/rave, and shouting "sore-sore-sore". I figured they were shouting "Yeah yeah yeah!".

What's the difference between Nihon and Nippon? I don't think you can say nippongo but I think I've heard nipponjin, of course it all works for nihon.

If I were to guess, I'd say nippon is more of a older fashion way that is a bit more proud, where as nihon is more.. passive I guess.

Anyone care to elaborate?

I have encountered a song titled 「どんなときも」I was wondering what exactly that means. I've tried to conclude that the title's meaning has something to do with "What kind of time (also)"- but not only does that seem stupid, I can't imagine a context in which you would use a phrase like this either. Also, considering that the entire song title is specifically written out in hiragana, perhaps the "とき" isn't supposed to mean "time" at all... some clarification would be appreciated!

>>34
It means 'at any time whatever'. As a rule, interrogative pronoun* + も means any* or every*. For example, どこでも is 'anywhere', いつも is 'always', etc.

What does 乙です mean? As in この仕事、乙です. The dictionary has like a million definitions for the word.

>>36
乙 (read as おつ) means thanks
so この仕事、乙です means Thanks for your effort on this

Oh and a few more things I'd like to point out, I think 乙 is derived from お疲れ様　(otsukaresama) which is like "many thanks" However the kanji isn't the same, it might possibly have just been a nice and short way to say that, so then they hit space bar and got something different and just settled with that heh.

An example where this has happened, is for the anime show Bleach. It's buri-chi, but since they love shortening things, they called it buri instead, then I guess someone hit space and turned it into a kanji 鰤 (buri, which is a type of fish) and I guess they thought it funny so it's like a meme to call bleach that.

Eh, that makes perfect sense, thank you!

I see 乙 on imgboards, does it mean 'seconded'?