Japanese Adjectives – An Introduction

No matter what ever languages you use, you definitely need some word to praise, blame, envy, etc, Some of the examples are Cute, Stupid, Smart, etc. Hence, like every other language, Japanese also has its own set of adjectives with appropriate rules and exceptions. We will be discussing about it in our today’s lesson.

What is an Adjective?

You all must already be knowing but still for the ones that are yet to know, Wiki says

In grammar, an adjective is a word whose main syntactic role is to modify a noun or pronoun, giving more information about the noun or pronoun's referent.

In simple words, an adjective is a word which modifies the nouns and pronouns.

Eg:

English - “That is a book”
Hindi – Wo ek kithab hai (वो एक किताब है)
Tamil – Adhu oru puthagam (அது ஒரு புத்த‌க‌ம்)
Japanese – Sore wa hon desu (それ は ほん です )

This is a normal sentence. Here book (kithab/puthagam/hon) is a noun. Let us add “something” that can modify this noun.

Using adjective before the noun

English - That is a good book
Hindi – Wo ek achha kithab hai (वो एक अच्छा किताब है)
Tamil – Adhu oru nalla puthagam (அது ஒரு ந‌ல்ல‌ புத்த‌க‌ம்)
Japanese – Sore wa ii hon desu (それ は いい ほん です)

Using adjective after the noun

English - That book is good
Hindi – Wo kithab achha hai (वो किताब अच्छा है)
Tamil – Andha puthagam nandraga ulladhu (அந்த‌ புத்த‌க‌ம் ந‌ன்றாக‌ உள்ள்து)
Japanese – Sore wa hon ii desu (それ は ほん いい です)

Here “good” (achha/nalla/ii) changes the noun and it acts as an Adjective.

So, you must be clear by now that – "In Japanese, adjectives are placed either before a noun or at the end of a sentence which is the same case as in English”

Types of Adjectives

In Japanese, they have two different types of Adjectives. They call it as

• I – adjective (called as the 'true' adjectives) - Adjectives that end with an “I” sound

• Na – adjective (called as the 'quasi' adjectives) -Adjectives that end with an “NA” sound
  

There is a third form as well which is the "noun + 'no' particle" form. Technically speaking, these are nouns but they are often used as adjectives. Do not worry a lot about this, I will disuss it in detail in further lessons. For now, understand that there are two types of Adjectives in Japanese and they are the i and na adjectives.

Why two types of adjectives?

Well, the answer to your question is, “Why two types of Kana exist in Japanese?”.

Yes, it is for the same reason. I-adjective have Japanese Origin while the NA-adjectives are mostly Chinese origin words.

Now, guess what type of adjective the below belong to…

TAKAI - たかい (meaning Expensive) – I adjective
SHIZUKANA - しずかな (meaning Quiet) – NA adjective.

That was really simple, wasn’t it? :)

Well, there are some exceptions too where not all i-adjectives have to end with I sound and not all na-adjectives have to end with a NA sound. Don’t worry about the exceptions now, we have just started, Let us take it slowly :)

Usage of small tsu - sokuon - Chiisai tsu

We already have seen the usage of Hiragana letter along with small ya, yu and yo. In today’s lesson we will see how to make use of the small tsu (っ). This small tsu is called Sokuon (written in Kanji as 促音). Small Tsu literally translated to Japanese gives us Chiisai Tsu (Chiisai means Small)

There are some vocabularies even in English which might need an extra stress to the letter. For example, consider the word, “button”. As you see here the extra stress is over the letter ‘t’. Such words are there in Japanese language too. For example,

Chotto meaning “little”
Kekkon meaning “marriage”

So, how do we write these letters? This is when the small tsu (っ) comes into picture. You need to use a small tsu right before the word which needs stress.

Consider the word chotto. Breaking down this word a little bit further down gives us

Cho-(t)to ちょっと
Cho is nothing but chi + small yo ちょ
To is と
As the stress on t is before the word to, we need to add a small tsu before to like ちょっと

Similarly, the words matte まって, kitte きって, kekkon けっこん, etc
(matte means wait, Kitte is postage stamp and Kekkon is marriage)

There are certain rules in the usage of this sokuon (促音). Wiki says,

The sokuon cannot appear at the beginning of a word, before a vowel kana (a, i, u, e, or o), or before kana that begin with the consonants n, m, r, w, or y. In addition, it does not appear before voiced consonants (g, z, d, or b), or before h, except in loanwords.

5 Myths about learning Japanese

I was chatting with my school day mates this weekend about our good ol’ days. Talking about what each one of us are up to in our own lives, I said that I am learning Japanese. Couple of my mates were like, “Err! What for?”. I did not answer them but questioned, “Why do you guys think I should not?” The majority of all the reasons they said was “Japanese is one of the toughest language. It contains way too symbols to remember… not like our 26 alphabets English”. Few others said, “Well speaking Japanese is cool but I don’t have time to spare”. We then moved over to other personal topics and parted after an hour.


It was fun but then it kept me thinking why do people think Japanese is the toughest language? To be frank, my mother tongue Tamil is really tough. If it were not my mother tongue I never would have been fluent in it. So are the other languages. How many people think French is the toughest of all for the numerous exceptions it has. I personally know people who consider German to be even tougher.

In my last class, my にほんごのせんせい (nihongo no sensei - Japanese teacher) was talking about the importance of being self motivated in learning Japanese. The conversation was like below:

Teacher: We will be having a mock test by Mid June so start preparing for the exam.
Student A: But sir, I am a college student and I got my semester exams coming up :)
Student B: For me too.
(There was a chorus, “yeah for us too”)
Student C: At times, I am working even on weekends. It’s really hard to find some time Sir.
Teacher: (with a smile on his face) Ah! Everyone seems pretty busy. Why did you all join the class then?
Student A: Sir, you should be appreciating us. In spite of this busy schedule we bothered to join this class and study.
Teacher: Let me correct you… “In spite of this busy schedule we bothered to join this class” and that is all you have done. (He then smiled and continued the class)

I was thinking about his words over and over. He was so true in saying that. Many of my class mates were so interested when they joined the class. I am not even sure if “interest” is the correct word or should it be “show-off”. Well, whatever it is. Remember guys – “Interest alone will not get us anywhere.”

I am interested in Speaking Japanese. I joined a class. I even attend all the classes without fail. Will I pass? NO if I don’t pay attention to the class. NO if I don’t practice what is taught in the class. NO if I don’t put effort to understand & exercise it on a regular basis. It is not only for Japanese. It holds good for anything and everything. Interest is just a motivating factor. It is a MUST to start off any task but it is NOT the only thing needed to achieve that task.

The series Japanese is possible have also discussed about the same thing. The below extract says the top five myths about learning Japanese.

Japanese is way too hard

After much study and talking to several people, I must say that Japanese is not "hard" or "complex", but "different". It's true that it is very different from English or Spanish. However, the grammar, spelling, etc. is very straightforward. Making sentences in the language, conversing, etc. can occur very early on. The pronunciation is very close to Spanish, although the accent is different.

I am too busy to learn Japanese

This is a common reason why many people aren't bilingual in Japanese right now. If you don't have a goal in mind, or guidance, you won't notice how much time is spent doing nothing.
If you take a look at your average day from an objective standpoint, you'll find many wasted hours and minutes. Look how much time is spent waiting. Waiting in line, waiting for someone to show up, waiting for the commercials to end, waiting for the movie to start, etc. That wasted time can be used constructively to inch you toward your goal of learning Japanese!

Learning Japanese means learning to write all those difficult symbols

Those "difficult symbols" are the Kanji, borrowed from the Chinese. There are about 2000 Kanji in daily use in Japan. While it is true that the Kanji are probably the most difficult part of Japanese, you can ignore them for quite a while and still enjoy the rest of the language. I will teach many of the beginning lessons in roman characters, so you will have nothing new to learn as far as reading the lessons. I will slowly make the transition to phonetic characters and perhaps in the distant future, I will teach you some Kanji.
To be able to write any word in Japanese, all you need to know are the 2 phonetic systems, "Hiragana" and "Katakana". They only have 46 letters each, and can be learned very easily in a matter of weeks. Plus, once you know how something is pronounced in one word, you know it for any word. It's completely phonetic. Don't you wish English was that way!

Japanese can be learned just by watching Anime

This is so WRONG! Check out what Tofugu have got to say about this. Be sure to watch out his video. It’s fun!

Japanese should be learned only in a formal class room environment

That is pretty easily shot down. I learned Japanese for three years before ever setting foot in a classroom (to learn Japanese, that is). When I finally had the opportunity to take classes, I placed into a Second-Year course in a very good Japanese language program. I've met people who took French and Spanish for three or four years in high school and couldn't place into their respective Second-Year courses. In other words, you don't need a classroom to learn Japanese, you just need to utilize your resources.

Taking a class works for many people. I know it has helped me. I certainly recommend taking a class if you have the opportunity in addition to following this column. You DON'T have to take a class to keep up with this column, though.
What is a classroom? A place of opportunity where you can learn. There are people who go to class and don't learn, and some that seize the opportunity. There are also people that master whole fields of knowledge without going to a classroom. A classroom is just one of the many ways to learn.

To conclude, not only for learning Japanese but anything for that matter:

• Don’t bother if you are not interested. Failure is guaranteed if you got no interest.
• Interest alone will NOT get you what you want. It takes dedication, hard work and efforts to be put as well to succeed.

Now go and start practicing your にほんご (nihongo) :)

がんばってください

Japanese Onomatopoeia

Onoma… what? Is that a Japanese word?

Well, NO! Onomatopoeia is an English word meaning a rhetorical device i.e., the use of a language that creates a literary effect (but often without regard for literal significance). Simply put, it is using words that imitate the sound they denote.

In English, we have words like

Splash – The sound like water splashing
Woof – The sound made by a dog
Meow – The sound made by a cat
Buzz – Sound of rapid vibration
Ding – A ringing sound

We have such Onomatopoeia in my native language Tamil as well. As per the Tamil Language grammar they are termed as “Irattai Kilavi” and “Adukku Thodar”. Not trying to explain too much of Tamil grammar but I will at least have to quote some example:

Sala sala – the
Kaa-kaa – sound made by crow (kaakaa is also a noun in Tamil :))
Lol-lol – the sound made by dog
Meeaaw meeaaw – sound made by cat
Bak-bak – sound made by a hen
Kokkarako – sound made by a rooster
Sottu-sotta – more like the English “drip”

I can keep on adding to this list :) Not only English & Tamil but almost all the well established languages have Onomatopoeia. For the sake of quoting a few:

The sound of a kiss in

English - mwah
Malayalam or tamil – umma
Russian - chmok
Japanese - chuu
Filipino - tsup

The Frog croaking in

Ancient Greek - brekekekex koax koax
English - ribbet ribbet
German - quak quak
Russian - qvah qvah
Spanish - croac croac"
Swedish - ko ack ack ack
Filipino - kokak kokak
Hungarian - brekk brekk

There a lot like this which you can see varying across different languages. Japanese is also one amongst. Just to share a few interesting ones, check out:

A list of often used Japanese Onomatopoeia
Japanese Onomatopoeia Game (Requires Macromedia Shockwave Player)

I am in the process of collecting almost all the Japanese Onomatopoeia off of the WWW. I will share it with you all once it’s done :)

What is Furigana?

It's not uncommon to see a kanji with its reading spelled out in very small kana, written just above it. Kana used in this way, to show you how to pronounce a kanji, are known as "furigana".

Reference: kanjisite.com
Image Courtesy: wikimedia

What is Okurigana?

Okurigana are nothing new. It is the same old hiragana characters accompanying Kanji. It shows the grammatical functions of the word.
For example, if a verb such as tsukau is written in kanji as 使う. Do you see the final hiragana letter u? It is Okurigana!

Okurigana can also be used for various purposes such as showing verb and adjective conjugations. They also help the reader to distinguish between various kun'yomi for the same kanji. Okurigana are normally written in hiragana.
What okurigana to use with what kanji is fixed by certain rules of disambiguation.
Read Wiki's Okurigana for more!

Reference: www.sljfaq.org
Image courtesy: wikimedia

What is Rōmaji

Yes, Rōmaji it is… with a prolonged o sound. Many people spell it romaNji incorrectly. Rōmaji is the correct word meaning Romanization of Japanese. Apart from the three different system of writing Japanese, Romaji is also used to write Japanese. In fact, Rōmaji is the standard way of transliterating Japanese into the Latin alphabet. Wikipedia claims that all Japanese who have attended elementary school since World War II have been taught to read and write romanized Japanese.

Various system of Rōmaji

The Latin alphabet was first used in Japan in the 16th century by Portuguese missionaries, who devised a Romanization system based on Portuguese spelling. Later the Dutch introduced a Romanization system based on Dutch. By the 20th century, there were a number of different Romanization systems in use.. The three main ones are:

Hepburn Romanization
Kunrei-shiki Rōmaji and
Nihon-shiki Rōmaji

Variants of the Hepburn system are the most widely used. For example, let’s consider the name じゅんいちろう. This is written in Hiragana. To write this in equivalent English Kana characters - ju-n-i-chi-ro-u. If it was to be written in romanized version it would be - Jun'ichirō (as per Revised Hepburn Application of Rōmaji)

Why to use Rōmaji?

Romanization of Japanese helped big time to input Japanese into word processors and computers and other electronic devices that do not support the display or input of Japanese characters. When it comes to education field, Rōmaji was a lot helpful for foreigners to start reading Japanese faster. It is also helpful in academic papers in English (or other Western languages) written on Japanese linguistics, literature, history, and culture.

Finally, Rōmaji is not English

As everyone else, I was also under the misconception that Rōmaji is English but I was proved to be wrong when I read a document on ‘Rōmaji is not English’. Here is the extract of that document:

The great benefit of romaji is also the source of many problems: it looks like English. When Taro in fourth grade writes his name in romaji lettering, is he writing in English? Many teachers think so, and even instruct him to ‘Eigo de kakinasai’ (write it in English) when what they mean is ‘write it in romaji’. Written romaji may appear similar to English but in fact, several Kunrei-shiki romaji encodings do not follow standard English phonetic patterns.

When students confuse the phonic patterns of romaji as English phonic coding, they are mixing a syllabic language (Japanese) with its inseparable consonant-vowel pairs (ma-mi-mu-me-mo), with the sound patterns of English, which features distinctive vowels and consonants and abundant consonant clusters.

Download the complete document for further reading.

Japanese Script

Every language needs a script for it's written form. Japanese is not an exception! To write in Japanese, two different scripts can be used namely Kana and Kanji. This Kana is further sub divided into Hiragana and Katakana. Kanji is the script that was inherited from Chinese centuries ago.

Hiragana & Katakana - Why two?

It's enough to learn just 26 letters to master English Script (also called as the English Alphabets). When it comes to Japanese, there are about 46 letters both in Hiragana and Katakana. Combination of two kanas can produce a new sound which we will see in our lessons. You should know that the letters both in Hiragana and Katakana share the same pronunciations.

If they have the same pronunciations then why two different scrips? Well it's not only you but any person starting to learn Japanese will wonder why should Japanese have two different kanas. Well, the reason is clear and simple. To justify, let me tell you some example -

How do you write the word 'Determination' in English?
Determination - yes, you will write it as it is because the word Determination is an English word.
Now, let's consider a non-English word. Say, नमश्कार. This is a Hindi language word which translates to Welcome in English). So, now how do you write this word in English? You will transliterate, yeah? Hence it will be Namashkaar!

This same rule applies to Japanese as well with a little twist. Unlike English which uses same script for both English and foreign words, Japanese use Hiragana to write Japanese words and Katakana to write foreign words.

Example:
The word Nihon (meaning Japan) is a Japanese word so it should be written in Hiragana where as this site name, MaJa is a non-japanese word and hence it should be written in Katakana.

Note: As we move down the lessons, you will also find that Japanese words that can be written using Hiragana can also be written using Kanji's.

Kanji? Say what?

Kanji are the symbolic representations of a word i.e., pictogram! As said earlier, these script are inherited from Chinese over centuries. Kanjis have different readings (pronounciations) and meanings depending on how they're combined with other kanji. As everyone else say, it is not really that hard to learn Kanji as long as you practise. However it is really challenging to remember their stroke order. Don't get confused with the word stroke order. It just means the sequencial order in which a Kanji should be written.

Japanese FAQ claims that there are about 50,000 Kanji but you need not learn them all! Think that you are fluent enough in English. Does that mean you know all the letter in English? Not really! The same logic holds good here. To understand, write and speak Japanese fluently, it is more than enough if you know about 1,000 Kanji. It is said that the Japanese Ministry of Education declared 1,945 characters as "Jooyoo Kanji", which are the most frequently used characters.

When it comes to the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, they require you to know some amount of Kanji's depending on your JLPT level as shown below:

Level 4 - Around 100 Kanji
Level 3 - Around 300 Kanji
Level 2 - Around 1,000 Kanji
Level 1 - Around 2,000 Kanji

However, if you are beginner you should first be starting it with Hiragana, Katakana and then Kanji parallely learning vocabularies. That is how I started mine :)