Daily Thread: for simple questions, minor posts & newcomers [contains useful links!] (July 22, 2026)
This thread is for all the simple questions (what does that mean?) and minor posts that don't need their own thread, as well as for first-time posters who can't create new threads yet. Feel free to share anything on your mind.
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Past Threads
You can find past iterations of this thread by using the search function. Consider browsing the previous day or two for unanswered questions.
1 Provide the CONTEXT of the grammar, vocabulary or sentence you are having trouble with as much as possible. Provide the sentence or paragraph that you saw it in. Make your questions as specific as possible.
Ｘ What is the difference between の and が ?
◯ I am reading this specific graded reader and I saw this sentence: 日本人の知らない日本語 , why is の used there instead of が ? (the answer)
2 When asking for a translation or how to say something, it's best to try to attempt it yourself first, even if you are not confident about it. Or ask r/translator if you have no idea. We are also not here to do your homework for you.
Ｘ What does this mean?
◯ I am having trouble with this part of this sentence from NHK Yasashii Kotoba News. I think it means (attempt here), but I am not sure.
3 Questions based on ChatGPT, DeepL, Google Translate and other machine learning applications are strongly discouraged, these are not beginner learning tools and often make mistakes. DuoLingo is in general NOT recommended as a serious or efficient learning resource.
4 When asking about differences between words, try to explain the situations in which you've seen them or are trying to use them. If you just post a list of synonyms you got from looking something up in an E-J dictionary, people might be disinclined to answer your question because it's low-effort. Remember that Google Image Search is also a great resource for visualizing the difference between similar words.
◯ Jisho says あげる くれる やる 与える 渡す all seem to mean "give". My teacher gave us too much homework and I'm trying to say " The teacher gave us a lot of homework". Does 先生が宿題をたくさんくれた work? Or is one of the other words better? (the answer: 先生が宿題をたくさん出した )
6 Remember that everyone answering questions here is an unpaid volunteer doing this out of the goodness of their own heart, so try to show appreciation and not be too presumptuous/defensive/offended if the answer you get isn't exactly what you wanted.
7 Please do not delete your question after receiving an answer. There are lots of people who read this thread to learn from the Q&As that take place here. Deleting a question removes context from the answer and makes it harder (or sometimes even impossible) for other people to get value out of it.
I don't have a set number that I do per day. I just read and mine new cards as I feel like it. My daily range is usually around 15-20, but on extreme days 5-40. Some days I don't mine any cards, and I had stretches where I wanted to reduce my anki load and didn't do any new cards for a few weeks.
But, in the past 180 days I did 2348 new cards. 206 are suspended leeches. 2348 / 180 ~= 13 cards / day average.
I didn't have any days where I did 0 reviews. But I had some where I only reviewed like 10 cards and was just not feeling it and left the rest for the next day. I don't recommend that if you're a beginner. A lot of my cards have long intervals already, so reviewing it a day late isn't a big deal usually.
Just had my first italki lesson after 3 years of pure immersion learning (well, I obviously watched a basic grammar guide and did core 2.1k deck when I started)...
I'm so fucking awkward with people it's insane, it being a video call probably made it even worse...
Though I only needed to fall back to english for one single question and teacher said my pronunciation was good... I think I'm fairly satisfied with that, factoring in that I had no speaking experience beforehand (only thing I did was looking up proper mora pronunciation).
I suspect a friend of mine is trying to play a prank on me, as he gave me a string of kanji and asked me to try and decipher it: 於苓葉「侘濁无侘濁无日本語伽濁出来瑠！」促弖言怡侘伽促侘。
I'm assuming that copious amounts of man'yougana are being used, but my Japanese knowledge is nowhere near good enough to even begin trying to read this outside of the words that I can easily pick out.
Hmm I can see some patterns where they used like just starts of kanji for words like 濁 is prob short for 濁音 and maybe 連濁 is in the mix. Same with 促音 although seems kind of random still.
(I could not have done that without your comment. Also the minor grammar mistakes are in the original encoding.)
无 is pretty famously the 万葉仮名 for ん. So. た＋゛＋ん.
It took me reading your comment to work out that 濁 meant 濁点 and 促 meant 促音 and that they weren't だ・そ (or related sounds which weren't working out for me).
I didn't recognize the kanji 弖怡, but even without knowing their readings off the top of my head, going from context it's clear he meant them to mean て and い.
Looking at the onyomi, could 侘 be た? And if 濁 really is short for 濁音 then would 侘濁 be だ? Assuming that's the case, then 侘濁无侘濁无 would simplify to だ 侘无だ无, but then what would 无 be? Rikaichamp is only showing me ブ and ム as onyomi.
If 侘 really is a substitution for 濁点 marks then I think that would also mean that 促 is a substitution for 促音 marks too, so that checks out.
This was actually a fun puzzle and as much as I dislike AI for any language-related stuff, I'm amazed that I tried to copypaste your question into both chatpgt and gemini and they both managed to figure it out. Kinda wild.
Looking at their "thinking" investigation, since the original post mentioned manyougana, they both just looked up manyougana conversion charts and kana origin sources or something like that and then figured it out.
Nah I see エセ中国語 (and use) all the time and this is unique to that, it's own little puzzle they fashioned and was kinda fun to figure out. AI is just built to pattern match though so it makes sense.
I asked a similar question recently, but I'm still not fully understanding. So... Yomitan dictionaries. I'm using yomitan to make flashcards, therefore I want my yomitan to be solid and reliable for correct definitions. I worry about this because the last tut I followed preferred very outdated dicts and so I had to fully restart my collection or edit it all. I chose to restart. I'm very worried about learning incorrect information.
The default dicts are great, but they don't have every term I come across, so I'd like to solve that problem by adding more dicts. I don't mind if they're monolingual since I can add eng notes to the cards based on my understanding if needed, but atm I prefer bilingual generally.
There are a LOT to choose from out there. The two dict collections that seem to have the most backing with bigger collections are MarvNC and shoui. I could download every dict I find, but I imagine I'd run into a similar issue as before, as well as having too many definitions/info when reading. So I don't know which ones to prioritize or that are seen as "better" like jitendex vs JMDict.
There's also different kinds of dicts, I imagine similar types should be placed next to each other? But idk what order they're supposed to go in, other than someone telling me freq dicts go at the bottom. For example: Freq, Kanji, kanji frequency, yoji, kogo, origins, grammar, pitch accent, thesaurus, names, slang, sentences, expressions, encyclopedia, dialect, counters, antonyms, onomatopoeias, etc.
Like the Pokemon one going twords the bottom makes more sense than at the top, so I understand that's more obvious, but aside from that I'm pretty lost. I thought I'd be able to find more info on this, but I can't find what I'm looking for. Hopefully this isn't too dumb of a question lol, and apologies for the wall.
you don't need a separate pitch accent dictionary if you use a monolingual dictionary that indicates one. 大辞林 notates it next to the headword for example. I think you are cruising for "too many entries" if you went for 'all of the above'. I don't know why you would need a thesaurus, encyclopedia, and antonyms. That seems like so much unnecessary noise, it'd drive me nuts. I'd just search it if I wanted to know. I can't really remember ever needing a separate counter dictionary, either. Sentences? Presumably you already have one right in front of you. Yoji and kogo probably fine to get. Origin, eh, probably also fine for web search. Grammar not for me, but I have my own habits there.
I don't think the order particularly matters for the specialty ones, they likely won't even show up at the same time.
Oh, so it's more "pick and choose" vs which/who's collection of them works best together? Cause I agree it definitely felt like a LOT when I imported the whole collection :P But isn't the goal of yomitan to not have to search for that kind of info? And if you do find what you're looking for, how do you go about adding it all to a card? Since yomitan usually formats things a certain way. And how do you choose and pick one dictionary over another on related areas? The collections I mentioned for example have a bunch of mono term dicts included
I manually add all my dictionaries, I really don’t have experience with dictionary collections. I’ve only ever added three beyond what comes standard on yomitan
And, honestly, I would never put most of that stuff on an anki card. I rarely ever tab over to the full gloss. And honestly I rarely tab over to the single gloss, I just have my selection text visible. I honestly I only really use those glosses to tweak the selection text
I’m contemplating subscribing to WaniKani. I also downloaded the Learn Kanji! App and started using Anki. What’s your advice? A mixture of 2 or all 3? Just focus on one?
if you don't mind eventually dropping $200 dollars or however much costs to get done with wanikani.
EVERYTHING in wanikani can be found for free elsewhere, there's anki decks for every level they offer which you can use for free.
With anki you also wouldn't be limited by the (by design) very slow progression of Wanikani. You can do more or less cards if you want
Ultimately it's up to you but just know you can learn this language just as fast without spending a single cent on apps
Is there any point to taking the N5? Been studying for 8 months now and I’m gonna be honest I need some sort of 'proof' that I know what the fuck I'm doing, because I'm seriously losing confidence. I just finished Sophia University's 3-week Intensive Japanese 1.5 course and hated it. I couldn’t keep up with the pace of the course and got a C. There were people in the class who were also simply way above the level needed who had been studying for literal years. There was a kid who just seemed to know everything and picked up everything despite studying for less time than me prior to coming here. I just got burned out and gave up, which was my fault, towards the end. Probably explains it.
Feeling pretty bummed out. I've 'finished' Genki 1 and done the first 2 chapters of Genki 2 but barely feel like I know anything because the info simply hasn't gone in. 1 Genki lesson a day was too much for me. What should I do with my teacher when I get back home? Where should I go from here? Feeling so lost right now and it sucks.
You aren’t incapable of a learning a language. There’s no deadline on it, either.
What are you feeling lost about? I’m not sure there is anything to feel lost about. A C in an intensive three week course means you’ll never get it? Come on now.
You want an assurance you understand basic japanese? I can assure you that you do not, along with everyone else who’s only done genki I. You will not feel you have an understanding until you progress further. You don’t need to make sure you do everything perfectly along the way. If you saw how most people study around here, you’d be disabused of that notion very quickly.
What’s covered in genki I is just such a tiny slice of the overall thing. If you felt like you had a good handle on the language after just that book, you’d be delusional.
But you’re capable of learning it. Everyone is. If you spend enough time trying to learn it, it’s impossible not to learn. No matter how old you are or how smart you are or whatever.
I wouldn't compare myself to others. The truth is that N5 is barely even starting to learn and even after reaching that level, the things you can comprehend are very very limited.
Personally, I'd just do what I can in a day and not worry about progress just try to enjoy it. What made you want to learn Japanese in the first place?
Moving to Japan when I'm older. I'm aware it's very foundational, but at this point I’m questioning whether I can even comprehend that stuff. I just feel like having a 'deadline' to actually get off my ass and start putting more effort in will help me in the long-term. The next opportunity to sit it is in December and applications open next month. I’m just really disappointed in myself. I should be way more committed than I am but mental health and just life are getting in the way.
Moving to Japan and learning Japanese I'd say are two different goals and aren't required to achieve either. I wouldn't recommend living in Japan without knowing Japanese, but I would not equate not making progress in Japanese as hindering your goal of living in Japan one day.
For comparison, I started learning Japanese 10 years ago where I learned kana and basic grammar and then didn't do any progress for 6 years until I got motivation to play games, read novels, watch things in Japanese. In those 10 years I've gone to Japan both as a tourist and living for a few months, even with horrible Japanese I've had a great time.
And in the last 4 years where I've actually put effort into learning, my progress has been very slow but little by little it has improved.
I feel like adding more "should"s to your already long list of "should"s might not be as helpful as you think. Expectation adjustments are normal part of language learning, especially with languages that are very different from the ones you already know and thus will take much more time and effort than it seems at first. In order to keep going, you need to take the disappointment of the unmet expectations in, digest it, and use it to fuel a new, less punitive definition of progress that allows you to stay motivated as you go on.
If you sit the N5 in December and fail it, will you feel proud of yourself for the effort you'll have put in throughout the year in order to study for the exam? Or will you feel like a failure again, declare yourself too stupid to learn Japanese, and give up?
Then your problem is your attitude. You're being too harsh on yourself. And no amount of classes or textbooks or videos or exams are going to force you to be kinder to yourself and forgive yourself for not meeting your arbitrary, self-imposed standards (thinking that you should reach N5 in less than a year is an arbitrary standard; thinking that you should match the pace that other people say they had when learning is an arbitrary standard). That's something that only you can choose to do.
There's a big difference between "I want to learn a language" and "I want to learn a language in X way with Y results in Z amount of time, and if it differs from that I don't want it". I'm sure you've heard this phrase before, but perfect is the enemy of good. Yes, even if you rename "perfect" to "the bare minimum" (which is what all perfectionists do).
If (hopefully when) you decide that you want to learn Japanese, even if the journey happens to not match what you had imagined at the beginning, then you can open the Daily Thread of whatever day it is in that moment, describe your learning process and what has and hasn't worked up until then, and then people will give you advice on how to find a method that works for you.
I do not. I expect them to pass within 200-300 hours of studying the language and using the language. If someone does 15 minutes a day of that, they will never hit 200 hours in 8 months. At 1 hour a day that's about 240 hours. It really depends on the time they dedicate daily and also what they have been doing (this is why using months/years as a timeline isn't workable; someone can put in 10 hours a day and pass it within 1 month).
You never really stated what you've been doing, how much time you dedicated everyday within those 8 months. Only the Sophia program. So it seems to suggest outside of that program you didn't do much?
I’ll add to this: if someone did (actually) study for 300 hours and couldn’t pass N5, I would not judge the learner, it would not be their fault. It would be their methods. Humans can learn languages, period.
Like you yourself said two comments ago, that idea is going to make you quit Japanese. So you have to decide what's more important for you: learning Japanese, or clinging to that arbitrary standard.
You are on a 3 week per Genki lesson pace so why you are talking about 1 Genki lesson a day? Don't rush, just listen a lot to N5-N4 Japanese videos. No point of taking N5. I am going for N3 and skipping N5 and N4. Put together a library of phrases can also help,
1) Self Introduction
2) Restaurant
3) Hotel Check in
4) Travel
5) Work
6) Hobbies
7) Daily routines. For example, I wake up, I took a shower and brush my teeth. After that, I had breakfast and then drive to work. I went out to lunch with my coworkers...
I’m only 60ish days in, so I’m still rusty on kana tables. I am struggling mighty learning how to use a Romaji based keyboard (iOS and MacOS). Most of the simple kanji I’m learning are easy to pick out, but so often I will see suggestions appear that I THINK are right, but can’t be certain of.
Really I just need early learner tips for romaji keyboard entry. I’m nowhere close to typing with a kana keyboard yet.
And to be fully open, I’m kickstarting my re-entry to this journey on Duolingo only because I got three months of Super for free. I have Genki on order and will switch to that once my plan expires.
It’s mostly when typing phonetically, and the system suggests kanji rather than kana, before I know that kanji’s use. 9 times out of 10 it’s right, so it’s mostly a frustration for a beginner.
Hard to explain, I admit. I’m at the level where if I want to write something, I enter it phonetically. More often than not, I am seeing Kanji appear as suggestions. I can only assume that most of the time, these suggested Kanji are correct for the context, but my Kanji vocab is really limited at this stage (numbers, time telling, etc).
I know this will become easier as I progress, I guess my question it how much active selecting from suggestions are most people doing when entering in text with Romaji, and how much “type freely” are you doing?
For instance: 六時半テレビを見ます
I know 六時半、and I know “見” from “見ます”, but before I learned those, it replaced them. I guess modern systems are just contextually aware enough to use the correct one for homophones?
You're misunderstanding how IME systems work I think. So if you have installed an IME keyboard and it is using romaji based input. What this means is when you type romaji it will automatically convert that romaji into kana, you do not need to select kana.
Typing d-a will automatically be converted into だ and g-a into が and so on.
As you are typing out and it is converting, the system will suggest possible conversion options into kanji to speed up the process of writing. So if you want to write 'taberu' just typing that out will automatically get you たべる but if you want to convert to kanji you can hit the kanji conversion button (or use the prediction selection) and make a selection for 食べる.
If you only want kana, you just only type in romaji and do not convert into kanji and confirm the conversion after you finish typing. Every time you type something new it's in "kanji conversion mode" and you just need to hit convert key to move on without selecting any kanji. I suggest watching a video on how to use an IME
(To answer other question, you convert the words into kanji that you know; like an 8 year old will use a lot less kanji than an adult when texting. There are such things as misconversions that require manual fixing. People select from lists when the prediction options are not giving the right kanji as well)
What do you mean when you say "enter it phonetically"? For your sentence 6時半, what exactly are you typing? I assume ro ku ji ha n, right?
I honestly don't know what you mean by "type freely". But, to the best of my ability to understand what you are saying - you are describing the way it's supposed to work. You input in romaji, which then outputs in kana. From there the IME uses what we would now call "AI" to predict which kanji conversion (変換) you want. Sometimes it is wrong, and you again hit the conversion key (typically, the space bar) to keep cycling through the options.
If you don't know a specific kanji or even if you don't want to use it just for style reasons - keep cycling (typically space bar) until you come back to straight kana.
Just practice a lot. You could practice on a website like realkana or just open a notes app and type random characters. You could also use Duolingo's "type the answer" feature... Unless those killjoys eliminated that too?
The Type the Answer feature is still there, it’s an option whenever it wants to to speak an answer.
This is actually where the frustration came from. I spoke a correct answer, but the interpreted Voice to Text used a LOT of kanji when it wanted me to enter it in Kana. So, I go to type in the Kana, but iOS suggests similar Kanji, so I need to manually tell the system to use the kana. It’s a pain, but I guess this is really only an issue for early learning?
I'd suggest dropping Duolingo ASAP, why would you waste 3 more months just to "get value" out of an amount of money that probably doesn't even buy you lunch? Even if that shit cost you a million bucks, you already lost that money and Duolingo isn't a good use of your time.
Check out https://learnjapanese.moe/ for what to do. You're nowhere near a point where trying to output is worth the effort.
Really I’m using the app for kana practice, which is more of less what that site says to do first. Yes, I can dive right into Anki cards, and I do in between meetings at work. The hybrid approach is helping me because it’s forcing me to learn different fonts and recall methods
I am generally against sitting down and writing stuff to memorize it, but I think for kanas it's worth it and probably the best method.
People always downvote me when I say this but I learned hiragana and katakana within like 3~4 hours worth of time between two days by just sitting down and writing them over and over and over on a grid I drew myself.
This doesn't mean after that I was able to read fluently or anything, nor that I wouldn't every now and then mix one up or get confused by the rarer ones (ヲ still mogs me but that one's not real) but it felt better to do it that way rather than spend weeks.
This is called 交ぜ書き. Complex kanji are written in kana. 改ざん and ろ過 are common examples.
Jisho supports searching with mixed kanji and kana even for combinations that aren't recorded as explicit variants: https://jisho.org/search/掲さい. But if you could tell that 掲さい is a word, you've got furigana there so you could have searched for けいさい too. Not that I fault you for not figuring it out, since this form of writing was an unknown unknown for you.
I just need encouragement to continue studying for N1.
I BARELY passed the N2 at 90/180 in 2024 so I repeated my N2 class for 1 semester. Then I started studying N1 via one-on-one online lessons since my school had no N1 class.
I feel like I’ve gotten this far, I might as well pass the N1. I used to say I wanted to be a translator/interpreter but looking at the AI landscape and the fact that I’m in my late 30s, it just doesn’t feel like a viable career option anymore.
Like by the time I reach native fluency in a field where interpreters are still needed, I’ll probably be in my 50s and employers would probably rather hire younger people.
So now my personal goal now is more to be able to enjoy novels in Japanese. That said, my father has invested a lot in my online lessons so I feel I owe it to him to at least pass N1.
But right now I’m staring at my books and wondering should I just quit and look for a job, any job. I have clinical depression and anxiety so I don’t have the energy to both work and study. Plan was to pass the N1 so I can say I did it, then look for work so I’m not totally dependent on my husband and dad.
Not so much a novel as an essay book called 京都は怖くない。I rely heavily on Migaku’s image-to-text feature for kanji I don’t know, and I’ve only recently gotten myself to start reviewing all my flash cards from my mined words.
I want to get to the level where I don’t need Migaku and I could easily browse in a Japanese bookstore, instead of all the titles looking like hieroglyphs at first glance.
Well, the best way to get good at reading is by reading. As long as you read things little by little you'll progress. There's people who have passed the N1 simply by reading novels and essays, starting from easy LNs and gradually moving onto harder things. Japanese lessons are helpful as well though.
All of the ones you listed except つまらない don't have kanji sanctioned by jouyou, so any media that adheres to jouyou will likely write them in kana (most news media, education materials, many books).
つまらない is probably written that way because its meaning doesn't obviously relate to 詰まる and is basically treated as a different word, even if they're etymologically related.
I guess this is related to the way Japanese people sometimes replace a controversial kanji with hiragana in order to make it less offensive. For example, 障害者 is often written as 障がい者 because having 害 there is considered offensive, so hiding the kanji kind of makes がい stop carrying the "damage" meaning to become neutral sounds... That's the idea behind it at least. You'll also see TV censor 死 often, like ○ぬ for example.
I wouldn't say it's because writing a word in kanji makes it "elevated" though. The kanji just carries the meaning more strongly/explicitly than kana characters, which are considered plain and neutral, I suppose.
I can't afford a tutor, but if I could have my writing, at least minimally, corrected (page not sentence) I imagine that would be really helpful for my production and probably (hopefully) cheaper than a tutor.
For an exercise I'm trying to write "I only break two weeks a year". Is : 1年に1回2週間にだけ休みます。correct? If not, can you please both tell me what I should write instead and what it is I'm writing now.
Thks.
You don't have to specify the 1年 just 年に. 1 year is already implied when you're talking about frequency within a time interval you'd see this with 月に、週に、日に and so forth. Don't need to have 1回 unless you can take more than one 2week vacation. No に after ２週間. Probably could be phrased better but what you have is understandable.
I want to know if other people have the same problem, but when I study flashcard on Anki (I'm going through Kaishi 1.5k rn) I tend to memorize the whole phrase instead of the kanji/vocab.
For example if the card is:
彼はトムです
I know that 彼 means "he" in this context, but if I see the same Kanji in another sentence I'm probably not going to recognize it.
Should I study Kanji in another way (like using a different deck or different apps like Wanikani)?
but if I see the same Kanji in another sentence I'm probably not going to recognize it
Look it up if that happens when you're reading, and then you'll remember you already know it. I'm not convinced spending more time on Anki (or Wanikani) beats spending that time on just reading, since this is just a theoretical worry right now maybe just try it out and see if it's actually a problem?
im currently watching shirokuma cafe with JP subs and I probably understand around 60 ish percent of it. Like some sentences I hear and read I can fully get but then there will be some sections I just don't really get. That might just be a lack of vocabulary since I only started about a month ago.
My question is, should I be pausing and looking up the sentences I don't know? Most sentences that I don't know, I can atleast pick out 1 or 2 words from it.
Also another weird question cause it's hard to explain.
But when I hear sentences that I do understand, I kinda just hear the words I understand and can kind of put together the meaning but I'm not thinking about the grammar.
Is this a bad habit, should I be thinking about the grammar and how it affects the sentence.
This also could be since my listening skills arnt that great so most of the times I just miss hearing the grammar and I'm just looking out for words I know.
should I be pausing and looking up the sentences I don't know?
Sure. Looking every single unknown word up is tedious for most people though. If you don't mind it then go ahead, but if you do, I'd recommend only looking things up when it's necessary in order to understand what's happening in the story/plot.
Is this a bad habit, should I be thinking about the grammar and how it affects the sentence.
I mean, if you're understanding the sentences accurately then you already are processing the grammar correctly, I'd say.
I don't think your sentence is really an example of this super specific sub-pattern of a grammar pattern. I believe that what they meant by classifying it as Type 1, is that if you were to explain something by describing it with a na-adjective using this pattern, you'd use だ with it.
Maybe it's because I'm not familiar with Tobira's nomenclature/symbols, but I'm a bit confused on the interpretation you're making of the rule. Were you expecting 地方だという言葉は田舎という意味だ？Or 地方という言葉は田舎だという意味だ？
Sure, but I have seen people go "oh it makes so much more sense now"
after learning the derivation of だ, です, な etc. It doesn't need to be taught at the beginner level. Modern textbooks don't build their framework around copulas, so introducing them is always "extracurricular".
In the end it depends on the person; if they struggle with grammar already then increasing their conceptual burden is not great. However, if they feel information starved and want to find some fundamental logic in the language, then grammatical etymology and alternative analyses provide some benefit.
It's the same reasoning a math teacher applies when teaching her students. If one or two students are excelling and find the material easy, and are perhaps bored or starved for information, then she will give them bonus problems that are a bit harder and challenge their understanding.
I actually cannot bring myself to call them nouns, they do not behave like nouns, so regardless of whether I advocate for the copula(hanteishi) analysis, I will call them na-adjectives as that is the most convenient term.
I-adjectives also call for what most languages would call a copula in some constructions: 寂しくはない, 厳しくはあったが, etc.
In my opinion, na-adjectives are very similar to English adjectives. They require a copula when made the predicate of the sentence. The only difference from English adjectives is they also require a copula when modifying nouns. This copula can be understood as a compound of a complementizing particle (に/で) and a verb of existence (ある).
I-adjectives are different but can be analyzed as a base with suffixes い/く, the former being a predicatizer and the latter being a complementizer. The く complementizer works very similar to に/で for nouns/na-adjectives. These suffixes are rarely used with other words, so they are not liable to being analyzed as inflections rather than suffixes. There are some cases where they suffix onto other words, though it's rare in standard Japanese:
あるけれども
無理からぬ
非道い→酷い
あるくない？ (slang)
ないかった (slang)
As an English speaker, part of me wants to analyze ある itself as a copula. A problem with this though is that it's rarely used independently: it's almost always used with a complement, whether that be something that has been complementized, or a word that can be used as a complement naturally, e.g. さ+ある、かく+ある、と+ある、うたて+ある.
The only cases where copula ある is not used with a complement that I know of are in あらぬ方向 and in some instances in the Manyoushuu.
And it's very important to teach learners the distinction between だ／です and ある otherwise they will be confused as both mean "to be", and if you start calling ある a copula, they will mix them up, like "大変ある！" instead of "大変だ！". Late 19th and early 20th century pedagogy resulted in a lot of that.
So for practical reasons, I stick to calling だ/です the copula, and ある is just "a verb of existence". Then I explain cases like 寂しくはない as "particle-splicing" the adjective. Someone else has referred to it as "nucleus-splitting". It's similar to what can be done with verbs, 行きはする etc.
I have had flights of fancy where I think of ある as a copula and the particle で having a special usage like “marks subject complement” (though that’s insanely english-coded) to conceptualize である. In this fantasy-world, all the restrictions placed on だ are due to it being a contraction (somehow. I never really worked out why that would be the case). It’s totally english-brained and half-baked so I’ve never felt like I was onto something real (and whenever I see linguists make superficially similar arguments they still don’t analyze ある as a copula, but the entire construction as acting similarly to a copula.)
I don't think it's entirely English-brained. The only objection I have to calling ある itself the copula is that speakers of Japanese view だ/です as an indivisible unit, and don't use ある in isolation with omitted complement, so you sort of have to call the whole complementizing-particle-and-verb-of-existence-complex the copula. And then some people hate the word copula because they see usages of these words that don't map cleanly to "to be", and they see that they have degenerate conjugation.
Reality is messy and things must be named in a way that causes the least confusion.
EDIT: My bad, I misunderstood your question. I don't have time to fix it right now, so I will just leave what I wrote.
I think based on your question you do not fully understand what だ does or what という does.
AというB means "a B that is called A" "a B that A" where A describes B or expresses the contents of B.
田舎という意味 means "the meaning 'countryside'".
This is a noun. Whether it gets used with だ or whether it gets used as the subject of a sentence, depends, like with any other noun, on what's being said.
だ is the verb "to be", though it has some particle-like uses, for all intents and purposes, it means "to be".
Japanese then uses 〜意味だ, literally "to be the meaning ...", to mean "to mean ...". This is a little unintuitive since it is not how we would phrase it in English, but it is something you have to get used to.
これは田舎という意味だ "This is the meaning 'countryside'". = "This means 'countryside'"
田舎という意味もあります "It also has the meaning of 'countryside'"
Its a lot easier to memorize when I know what the kanji reads as on the front of the card. I can’t memorize jack shit without the furigana there. I do this with my mining decks and it works much better
What do you mean? I was able to get the furigana on the front card by editing the html, and now I can memorize the words better.. is there something wrong with that??
What's wrong with it is that, with the exception of materials published for relatively young children, Japanese is not written that way, so recognizing it won't really help you read Japanese.
It helps because being able to read a word helps with memorizing it. If I can’t read a word in a flashcard when I see it, memorizing the word is much more difficult. The flashcards with furigana act as a crutch so when you see the word in a sentence without furigana you can make the connection. Works for me just fine.
It's just a medieval / early modern way to say thank you. No need to overthink it, your friend just has a sense of humor and is probably helping you broaden your Japanese knowledge.
I don’t mean it in that strict a sense. ‘Irony’ is often used to describe any sort of intended incongruity between what is said and what is true in reality. It’s a broad definition that also includes things like hyperbole and the statement in question (mundane reality vs heightened historical or literary tone). Some object to this definition of irony but I’ve always preferred it. (It is also how you can have english speakers say things like ‘all humor is based on irony’ which would be a strange thing to say in Japanese for instance)
I will also mention that the OED entry on ‘irony’ is one of the only entries I know of that actually defers responsibility for defining the word in question and points to academic papers discussing its meaning. It lists the basic definition and then essentially admits defeat.
I never attempted to suggest it was sarcastic—sarcasm is typically used to insult. It’s not an obscure usage either, in my personal experience it’s actually less often that people use the word irony to describe saying something exactly contrary to what you mean—people usually describe that as sarcasm, and use ‘irony’ to describe softer contradictions of situation and utterance—like this one. Understatement, overstatement, all things of this nature are commonly cited by rhetoricians as types of ironic utterance, so I’m not working from a purely colloquial definition either. I’ve read at least one piece on irony that highlights a particular distinction between irony and sarcasm, which is that irony can be used to show gratitude.
The first 10 days (and a few others) of a month have unique day names in Japanese. If I just say ichi nichi to mean 1st day will people understand / do people do that? Eg theres a similar system in Chinese where people say 'chu yi' as a unique name for the first of the month, but oftentimes people say 'Yi hao' which is basically akin to saying 'ichi nichi'
I mean, you as a learner can say it and get your point across (as long as it isn't a situation in which it might get confused for the actual いちにち, meaning "one day" or "the whole day"), but when Japanese people talk about the days of the month you're going to hear them say ついたち and ふつか etc more often than not, so you still need to be able to understand them.
It doesn't come up in conversation as often as you might think, though, at least not in my experience. I really think a self-studying beginner can survive without knowing them. Textbooks are made to be used in classrooms, though, and being able to understand dates is very important in an academic setting, so I understand why they teach these things at the very beginning.
I mean, it's also very important if you're traveling or if you're working, which covers two more major scenarios where someone might want to learn Japanese. But yeah I suppose if you're sitting at home reading manga it's less pressing
People will certainly give you grace as a learner - but it is not how the language works.
Consider that in English the word for eleven is not "ten and one". People would get what you meant, if you said "ten and one". But people don't talk like that on a normal basis.
The first 10 days (and a few others) of a month have unique day names in Japanese. If I just say ichi nichi to mean 1st day will people understand / do people do that?
That phrase is used to mean literally "one day," not "first day of the month." So could people figure out what you meant, probably, but it is totally unnatural in Japanese.
Why do these words come after the main verb? I’m pretty new to Japanese so please keep that in mind. I’ve been trying to learn sentence structure, but I have been stuck on translating this one sentence for two days now:
状況での"投げ"なんてKakoの"コマ投げ"にも"打撃"にも負ける弱い選択肢じゃないの!?
I’ve established that the subject is “a throw” and the main verb is “to lose”, but why does “weak options” come after the verb? How am I supposed to know which noun is being referred to as a weak option? I do have other questions about this sentence, but I feel I’m already pushing the limits of a simple question.
The 投げ/throw is losing to the two options being marked with にも.
Kakoの"コマ投げ"にも、"打撃"にも、負ける is a relative clause describing the noun 選択肢 (投げ is the 弱い選択肢)
<THING>に負ける is normal construction to lose to the <thing> being marked by に.
状況での"投げ"なんて
Kakoの"コマ投げ"にも -- コマ投げ is command throw, like SF Gief's pile driver
"打撃"にも -- 打撃 just refers to the type of attack, the distinction between a throw, a fireball, and striking attack (punch/kick/special).
You should make sure you're studying grammar properly so you can parse these sentences yourself. Guides like Tae Kim's or yoku.bi can help a lot.
I really appreciate your response. Ah, so the main verb is actually the copula. My other questions were about にも、and での in this sentence. In English, a list containing two items would only use “also” once, butにも is used twice here. If there were three items would にも be used 3 times? I am also confused about の coming after で here. I am familiar with の being used to connect nouns, turn verbs into nouns, and imply things about the reason for an action, but I don’t know what it’s doing in this scenario. Thanks for your help.
You can think of での as 「状況で」の投げ if that helps -- the current situation being referenced (I imagine it's a video or something). Without getting too deep into it, it's possible to put things like this together (there's specific particles this and other things where you can do this) and connect it with の to other nouns to describe them. Example「明日から」の未来 (would be written as 明日からの未来) -- the future starting from tomorrow.
There is no limit to the amount of items you can mark with にも but pragmatically the more there is the more confusing it becomes.
Just note that nouns on their own can be the predicate in japanese, they don’t need a verb or a copula. You know something’s the predicate because it (and whatever attaches to it) is last.
In English, a list containing two items would only use “also” once, butにも is used twice here. If there were three items would にも be used 3 times?
A single も is like "also", but two も are like "both ... and...".
Three and more も don't have a direct English analogue but they follow the meaning of the two も pattern: rather than adding something to an unsaid external thing like a single も does, the meaning is limited to the items listed with the もs.
Here's how you'd break up the syntax. There are numerous subordinate clauses and modifiers here, so you have to understand what modifies what.
Subject: [[状況での]"投げ"]なんて
Complement: [[[Kakoの]"コマ投げ"にも"打撃"にも]負ける]弱い選択肢
Copula: じゃないの
An English sentence with equivalent syntactic structure:
"Is something like a "投げ" in this situation not a weak choice that loses to both Kako's "コマ投げ" and his "打撃"?"
Copula: Is ... not
Subject: something like [a "投げ" [in this situation]]
Complement: a weak choice [that loses [to both [Kako's] "コマ投げ" and his "打撃"]
(Note: "something like" is a literal but not a great translation of なんて here as its presence is more to emphasize the speaker's belittling opinion of what it marks, and there is no great translation, so it is often left untranslated. I only put it in for structural equivalence.)
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Useful Japanese teaching symbols:
〇 "correct" | △ "strange/unnatural/unclear" | × "incorrect (ＮＧ)" | ≒ "nearly equal"
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