一緒に日本語をみがきましょう！

以下の作文はついさっき僕が書いた作文です。文法は正しいかどうか教えてくれませんか。

ある時代のアフリカ

19世紀後半はヨーロッパの大きな国々がアフリカに行き、その大陸を分割され、植民地の時代の初め。その前、ポルトガルやオランダはアフリカの各地を探検していて新しい植民地を設けた。特に南アフリカや西アフリカ。当時アフリカ人は原始的な民族であったのに、ヨーロッパ人が深く内地に進んでいることはできなかった。それは熱帯病、取り難い地形などのせい。

Your Japanese is pretty good. I'm sure most of native Japanese speakers would get the gist of your post. That said, each sentence contains some minor errors which I think would be better corrected. Can you write the story of the European invasion in English? It would really help us improve the wording and fix grammatical errors that may change the meanings/nuances if reworded.

No final verb in the first sentence.

here's what i understood

一緒に日本語をみがきましょう！
one dunno ko day dunno dunno dunno ga ki ma sya oo

>>4
congratulations faggot.
l2everything.

To me it actually feels more like a stylistic problem. I think if you wrote in a more advanced and more "Japanese" way the errors would take care of themselves. You don't necessarily need to work directly on improving your grammar in the first place to do that, just read more of the appropriate kind of Japanese and it'll come naturally.

That's my not very helpful opinion anyway.

>>4
That isn't ko, that's ni.

>>4
It's 'Issho ni nihongo o migaki mashou.'

OP here

>>2
Thank you! I've never taken any Japanese classes so hearing that made me glad. Here's the (painfully literal) English translation of what I intended to convey (the things in the square brackets are not in the original text, just trying to make it more smooth and logical for the reader):

The Africa of a certain age

In the latter part of the 19th century the large countries of Europe went to Africa, divided that continent, [which ushered in] the beginning of the colonial era. Before that, Portugal and the Netherlands explored various parts of Africa, establishing new colonies[,] especially in Southern and Western Africa. Even though, at that time, the Africans were a primitive people [i.e. not technologically advanced enough to be able to resist a European invasion], the Europeans could not advance deep into the inland [of Africa]. That was because of tropical diseases, the difficult terrain, et cetera.

>>6
Oh, your comment was very helpful. I've been doing something like that, like going to Amazon.co.jp and reading some stuff using the "なか見!検索" feature, although reading Japanese when there are so many characters you don't know (and when do know them, the combinations are not familiar) is frustrating.

As for the style, I was trying to mimic the Japanese literary style I've seen on e.g. Amazon and Wikipedia (dropping the copula is a part of it). I don't know if it's a good style to use, though.

>>9
Here's my suggestion:

19世紀後半にヨーロッパの大きな国々がアフリカに行き、その大陸を分割し、植民地の時代が始まった。その前から、ポルトガルやオランダはアフリカの各地を探検していて新しい植民地を設けていた。特に南アフリカや西アフリカに。当時アフリカ人は原始的な民族であったのに、ヨーロッパ人が深く内地に進むことはできなかった。それは熱帯病、難しい地形などが理由だった。

I tried to make as few corrections as possible to keep your writing style while it sounds natural. I agree with >>6 and think you already have an excellent command of Japanese.

If you'd like to make it sound more academic/formal, I'd write:

19世紀後半、西欧列強諸国による侵略を契機として、アフリカ大陸を分断することとなる植民地時代が幕を開けた。これ以前に西欧が植民地を築いていなかったわけではない。ポルトガルやオランダは、特にアフリカ南部および西部を中心として、アフリカの植民地化に既に乗り出していた。しかしながら、当時の原住民は西欧に対抗しうる文明を持っていなかったにもかかわらず、熱帯特有の病気や険しい地形に阻まれて、西欧は奥深くまで侵入できずにいた。

And here's a very rough translation:

Africa's colonial period began in the late 19th century when European powers commenced invading Africa, resulting in the division of the continent. This does not mean that there had been no colonies in Africa. In fact, Portugal and the Netherlands had already explored the continent and established colonies, especially in Southern and Western Africa. However, tropical diseases and the difficult terrain had prevented further invasion of the continent, where natives did not built as sophisticated a civilization as European countries established.

>>10
Thank you!! (礼) Your Japanese is incredible. I have a long way until I can even dream of writing advanced text like that.

I'll work on the style aspect more, since I want to learn to write good and moreover readable Japanese myself. The sentence structures bother me a lot, mainly because they're so radically different from the usual patterns seen in western languages, thus making the sentences difficult to understand. I always catch myself looking at the parts of sentences instead of the whole thing, and so I'm not seeing the big picture. It sometimes feels like you have to make an extra effort to even remember what the main point in the sentence is, and then to figure out what the sentence means as a whole (if that makes any sense). I guess that'll work itself out as I get more and more exposed to the language, though (to state the obvious).

sage

cant read yet...

can someone post that in romaji please?

im still learning reading... and i havent even gotten to the second grade kanji(self studying here)

>>13
Are you sure this is a good thread for you to be reading in the first place, then?
The discussion is about very advanced grammar, it's a given you should at least be able to read the sentences before taking part in the conversation.