Questions tagged [word-order]
語順. Japanese word order can be very flexible. According to some theories, there is usually an "unmarked" word order, and other orders are achieved by "scrambling" the constituents into different positions.
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General patterns in syntactic preferences
Today I wanted to explain basic particles to someone, so I started with an English sentence that I translated in Japanese while keeping the syntax the same. I ended up with:
昨日、(私は)東京に妹と電車で行きました。
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Can this sentence be rephrased like this?
I’ve come across this sentence
「それに考えてないよ高木さんのことなんて…」
Which translates to
“Moreover why would I be thinking about Takagi-san”
While the literal translation would probably be something like
“...
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Abbreviations for weekdays
I was studying Japanese weekdays and I found something interesting: you can use abbreviations such us ゲッすい (月水) to indicate both Monday and Wednesday or 木土 pron. どぼく to indicate Thursday and Saturday....
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I'm having trouble understanding the usage of 特に...もっとですね, and 15回以上は
From Sakura Tips podcast episode 615. パッキング, there is a transcript to the podcast. I'm having difficulty understanding due to my confusion regarding word/phrase ordering.
Original transcript:
...
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「一番背が高くなります。」 or 「背が一番高くなります。」?
To translate the sentence: "Who became the tallest?", which is more natural?
誰が一番背が高くなりましたか。or 誰が背が一番高くなりましたか。
On Busuu (language learning app), the correct option was the former (一番 ...
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Having trouble wrapping my head around こういうの in this sentence
クリスマス… 悪くはないわね、こういうの。提督、私は好きよ。少し…酔いそう。
I can understand pretty much everything but the use of こういうの in there, is there something I'm missing? Is the speaker just reinforcing the statement they've ...
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でも and other particles: conjunction, exclusion, and word order
I am not sure this has been asked here before. What I'm curious about is what particles get replaced by でも in its hedging usage ("or something") and what can occur alongside it and in what ...
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Can 幸い take a quotative phrase marked with と? [duplicate]
ここにいたとはあなたは幸いでした。
It was fortunate that you were here. (given translation)
This sentence looks like gibberish to me. If it is indeed good Japanese could you please explain what とは is doing, and the ...
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Word order for "Why do all German words sound the same?"
"Why do all German words sound the same?" What is the correct word order to say that?
なぜドイツ語の単語はすべて同じに聞こえるのか？ [Naze doitsugo no tango wa subete onaji ni kikoeru nodesu ka?]
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柴門を雇うなんてチーム, 柴門なんてを雇うチーム, 柴門を雇うチームなんて
津田監督に逆らって柴門を雇うなんてチームはどこにもいませんよ。
The placement of なんて feels most unlikely to me. I would expect
津田監督に逆らって柴門なんてを雇うチームはどこにもいませんよ。
or
津田監督に逆らって柴門を雇うチームなんてはどこにもいませんよ。
I have always been hesitant about ...
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What is the Order of Operations for translating sentences which have both passive form and relative clauses?
The bolded sentence in the following excerpt contains the passive form of a verb which is also being used in a relative clause. Should I translate the verb as a relative clause first, then transcribe ...
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Can I say パソコンを買いに秋葉原へ行った?
秋葉原へパソコンを買いに行った。
パソコンを買いに秋葉原へ行った。
I think both are OK.
Recently I saw someone write "You can't insert anything between 買いに and 行く". Is that true?
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Word Order: topic plug
恋愛と結婚は別のものと彼女は考えていた。
“she believed that love and marriage were different
things” (Read Real Japanese)
It took me a minute to understand what's going on (I'm a beginner). It's a delight to see ...
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Can the place that the direct object occupies change the meaning of the sentence?
I have these two sentences:
私は映画を仕事のあと見た。
仕事のあと映画を見た。
To me, they seem equivalent in meaning. However, for the Google Translator the first one means 'I watched the movie after work.' while the ...
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Do particles go after or between question words?
Recently, I have realized something interesting:
The following sentences are from Japanese lyrics of different songs, so they must be grammatically correct:
誰よりも輝く君を見て
誰にも話せない
誰の心にも、大切な場所がある
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Why これは in the end of the 唆{そそ}るぜこれは！ statement?
唆{そそ}るぜこれは - is translated as "This is exhilarating" in anime. Though, various translations give "It's tempting" and google gives "I'll instigate this".
Why is "これは&...
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What is the right order of this sentence? (JLPT N2 practice question)
From Shin Kanzen Master JLPT N2:
新しい店をオープンする ＿ ＿ ＿* ＿ かたまってきた。
１ の ２ ようやく ３ にあたって ４ 方針が
The right answer at the starred position is 4.
One arrangement I thought might make this answer work is:
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Placement of 〜て of manner in longer sentence (citing NHK Easy)
Reading an NHK Easy news article today, I came across the following sentence (emphasis mine):
新しいコロナウイルスがうつらないように、映像を使って人が集まらないようにする新しい技術を、いろいろな会社が考えています。
Which I have interpreted to mean
Various ...
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Word Order で And に before topic
I am Slightly confused about the word order for に And で
Are both of these examples correct and the only difference the emphasis?
私は夏に公園で先生に会います: I am meeting my teacher at the park in the summer
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Would a square logo/sign be read like a name seal or like a western sign, if the characters lined up?
Say I had a sign that read 中華料理, but I wanted to fit it into a square for a shop sign, or maybe a t-shirt.
Would it be better to use left-to-right, top-to-bottom:
中華
料理
or top-to-bottom, right-to-...
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The order of verbs and their complement/adjunct
次の日そのスカートを学校にはいていったら、友達によく似合うと言われた。（〇）
次の日そのスカートをはいて学校にいったら、友達によく似合うと言われた。（〇）
何枚ものお札を窓口につかんでいく（✕）
何枚ものお札をつかんで窓口にいく（〇）
I saw the first sentence in a book (留学生のためのここが大切文章表現のルール) and asked a Japanese ...
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Why does 結構 precede the noun instead of the verb in this sentence?
"Glasses suit her well."
What I'm reading is 彼女は結構めがねが似合うね. This looks to me like 結構 is modifying めがね.
Wouldn't it make more sense this way? 彼女はめがねが結構似合うね.
Thanks.
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きのう、私は VS. 私はきのう
I was wondering if both ways are grammatically correct, when starting a sentence.
I think starting like : "きのう、私は..." would put more emphasise on the fact that what ever follows happened yesterday, ...
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Can the modifier form ( な/い) of an adjective follow the subject marker when there is no noun to modify?
In this phrase '天気が好きなんです' 好きな follows the subject marker. Is this because the phrase ends with んです?
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When and how to use 家は, 家から, ここは, and ここから
What is the difference of the following:
a) 家はここから近いです
b) ここは家から近いです
c) ここから家は近いです
d) 家からここは近いです
Edit:
This is what I think of the Japanese above: a) my house is near here, b) this place is near my ...
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Beginner Grammar Question [duplicate]
First time poster on here, currently learning from the Japanese from Zero books.
In Chapter 13 of the book there is the sentence ‘what time are you going to the airport?’, now it’s written two ...
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Relative Clauses and Adjective Placement
How would you add adjectives inside a relative clause to the thing being modified? Is the placement set?
For example, in this sentence, can "new" come directly before computer (1) or should it be ...
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Can you say“ 何が貴方のお名前はですか”？Or does 何 have to come before です？
I’ve read that what’s your name is “貴方のお名前は何ですか“ but can you also put 何 to the beginning or is that incorrect? So can it be: 何が貴方のおなまえはですか。
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What is the difference between 「女性一人」 and 「一人の女性」?
So far, I've learnt that a quantity (number + counter) can be attached to a noun to quantify it by using の:
一人の女性。One woman.
However, I came across a sentence in my textbook where the noun an the ...
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文の組み立て JLPT N1 Question about word order
I am currently practicing for the N1 JLPT, where the questions require us to assemble the sentences in the correct order. Although the book provides the correct answer, it doesn't provide the correct ...
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Is it possible to preserve the literary style of this English passage in Japanese by rearranging the prepositional phrases?
Given the following English:
"A woman's torso, its skin a deathly purple, sat atop an immense arachnid thorax."
It's possible to rearrange the prepositional phrases and still have a grammatically ...
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placement of さえ
I came across this statement involving さえ.
私はAKB48が全然分からない。一番有名な人さえ名前がわからない。
My question is: Is there a general rule as to where you can place さえ?
What about: 一番有名な人の名前さえ分からない。What is the meaning ...
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Is the following Japanese sentence negative or positive in English?
Context: Character A has just told the character who is the narrator that he has the talent to be an assassin. Being a normal person, and thus taken off guard, the narrator responds with the following:...
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Clarification on comparative constructions is needed
Here's a sentence:
シベリアより東の地域はシベリアの中部ほど寒くないです。
I understand what it says but I don't understand why 「より」 is used right after 「シベリア」, and why the word order is not like this:
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Does 特別に戦 mean 'special battle' or 'specially battle'?
特別に戦が神 (とくべつに いくさが かみ)
I think placing に after とくべつ makes it into an adverb, right?
However, I'm having a lot of trouble working out whether it means 'especially' or 'specially' or just 'special'. (...
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Word order in a comparative sentence
The original sentence was interrogative and used「AはBよりC」construction in it
九州では東京よりさくらが早くさきますか。
I could have written something, using simpler constructions but I decided to use the construction ...
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What's the difference between「どこかで犯人を見ましたか」and「犯人をどこかで見ましたか」?
I saw in a book the following sentence used in an example:
犯人をどこかで見ましたか
Shouldn't it be「どこかで犯人を見ましたか」?
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Can an adjective come after a verb?
I was trying to say "I write slow".
I figured it would be:
おそい（が）かく。
But a native speaker didn't understand me and said it was:
かくのがおそい。
Now I understand how の after a verb makes it a noun, ...
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Can you slightly switch up the word order of this sentence? [duplicate]
This is what I've been taught:
これ は わたし の 本 です。
= This is my book.
And I was just wondering whether you can change the word order to say:
この 本 は わたし の です。
...
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desu vs. arimasu (or imasu) when declaring existence
The difference between arimasu and imasu is clear, but how do I decide when to use desu and when to use arimasu (or imasu) when stating that something exists?
Consider this example sentence:
There ...
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Different nuances of interrogative phrases
何{なに}がXですか。
Xは何{なん}ですか。
What are the different nuances associated with these two phrases?
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日本へ手紙を送る vs 手紙を日本へ送る
I'm trying to learn the ropes of Japanese language with some online guides, and sometimes I try to anticipate the sentences using what I learn, just to find out that the guide uses a different form. ...
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"I wish I could say…"
Just wondering how you would say "I wish I could say "I miss you""?
I was thinking it would be something along the lines of 「恋しい」語るできたらいいのに although I'm not sure. Thanks!
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The place of noun and information using の?
I have seen articles like 秘密のとんかつレシピ. This would mean that the prior word is defining the latter, it's the secret Tonkatsu Recipe. Is this true? Thanks in advance!
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Can Japanese Sentence Structure be OVS?
So I was reading from this particular site on Japanese sentence structure and what dawn to me was, this particular structure seems to be OVS.
(object/noun, verb, subject)
There's not a whole lot of ...
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What is the order of the full list of kana?
My question would be, if I were to pick up a Japanese dictionary, or had a project in which I needed to put several Japanese words (including hiragana, katakana, and kanji, with gojūon, dakuon, yōon, ...
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Can "ので" be used to give the reason after the consequence is mentioned?
I've been told that it's correct with this example:
遅れちゃった、寝過ごしたので。
But I don't understand why it's used like this because ので is the conjunctive form of のです so it's used to connect the sentence with ...
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Is 今日本に何時ですか correct?
What I'm trying to say is "what time is it in Japan right now?". My main problem is if I placed 今 correctly and if I should use に or は?
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~を僕はします Question about word order
In school I was taught to write sentences, with 'I/me' or any other pronoun first-person or not, always being at the beginning of a sentence like so:
僕はリンゴがダサいと思います。
Yet I frequently see sentences ...
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Topic at the end of an utterance
So, I'm well aware that Japanese follows an SOV sentence structure. However, I see -very often- the topic appearing at the end of an utterance, rather than at the beginning. For example:
きれいですね、...
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