A DICTIONARY OF JAPANESE PARTICLES Sue A. Kawashima KODANSHA INTERNATIONAL Tokyo * New York LondonTo my studentsPREFACE Although there are many difficult grammatical points that a student must master in learning the Japanese language, particles belong in a class by themselves. Appearing in nearly every sentence, they are absolutely crucial to a proper understanding of the intended meaning. A student may possess a large vocabulary and a good grasp of verb conjugation, but without a firm command of particles, he or she cannot hope to construct consistently cor- rect sentences. In choice and placement, particles can completely transform the meaning of two sentences that are otherwise exactly the same. Throughout my teaching career I have felt that particles were the key to learning Japanese. Though not a linguist, I have many years of teaching expe- rience, and in this book I hope to have made good use of that experience by helping students come to a better understanding of particle usage. If the stu- dent benefits in any substantial way, I will feel my efforts have been rewarded. I wish to thank my students at Hunter College, who, by posing many thought-provoking questions, have contributed to the making of this book. I would also like to express my sincere gratitude té Tetsuo Kuramochi of Kodansha International, who helped to bring about this incarnation of the original edition, Particles Plus. Lastly, I am indebted for much of the translation herein to my daughter, a professor of Japanese literature, who has edited all of my work. Sue A. Kawashima Spring, 1999Previously published by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Japan as Particles Plus. Distributed in the United States by Kodansha America, Inc., 575 Lexington ‘Avenue, New York N.Y, 10022, and in the United Kingdom and continental Europe by Kodansha Europe Ltd,, 95 Aldwych, London WC2B 4JF. Published by Kodansha International Ltd., 17-14 Otowa I-chome, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 112-8652, and Kodansha America, Inc. Copyright © 1999 by Sue A. Kawashima All rights reserved. Printed in Japan First edition, 1999 99000102 10987654321 ISBN 4-7700-2352-9CONTENTS PREFACE INTRODUCTION +++ssssssesssssseesssecessseessnecesnvecssneessneeessneensneessaeee i ‘ombination Particles) BA [ crsseseseseseeceeeneeees 1 BAKARI [£40 5 DAKE #It-- 10 DAKE-NI #IFIC(C.P.) 13 DANO #@-- 14 DATTE #3T 15 DE tT: 7 DEMO 7% 26 DOKORO #ZS -- 29 DOKOROKA ¢23A 29 Domo ¢%& 30 EA 30 GA *# 34 GA-NA(GA-NAA) 3-25. (45-7885) (C.P.) 42 GATERA #°TS 42 43 45 45 46 KA] DUV(C.P.) 51 KA-NA(KA-NAA) 8-25 (49-2845) (C.P.) 52 KARA 25 53 KARA-SHITE '5-LT(CP.) 65 KASHIRA US 66 KE [So cccseseesececseesceeseceeenseeneenensenennsneeneaeenensensecssesessesesaenes 69KEREDOMO(KEREDO,KEDO,KEDOMO) nese, FE. (te) KIRL #9: Koso Zé KOTO ceé- KURAI(GURAI) << 5L\(<5L1) KUSE-NI k(CP.) TOATTE &-LIDT(CP.) TO-WA-ZU &-L\40-3'(CP.) TOKA ¢y* TOKORO ¢z3 TOKORODE ¢Z243T 210 210 211 211 212 213 215 215TOKORO-E ¢Z3-\(CP.) - TOKOROGA ¢cJt'- TOKORO-O ¢<3-%- TO-MO ¢-%(C.P.) TO-MO-ARE ¢-6-&*(CP.) - TO-SHI-TE ¢-UL-T(C.P.) TO-SHITEMO ¢-UT-8(CP.) TO-SHITE-WA ¢-UT-lé(C.P.) TO-WA ¢-I¢(CP.) TOWAMIE &-[d-l\X(CP.) TO-YUU &-lI5(CP.) TO-YUU-KOTO-WA €-l1\5-Ze-lt(CP.) TO-YUU-NO-WA(MO) — &-115-O-I.() (CP.) TO-YUU-TO &-l\5-&(CP.) TIE 3T: WA [s- WA > YA »- YAL PLY YA-INA-YA 4P-LZE-P(CP.) YARA ?5- Yo ke YorRI &) - Ze tf zo @ ZuUTSU FD MASTERING PARTICLES : EXERCISES - ANSWER KEYS +--+ PATTERNS --- GLOSSARY (English-Japanese) GLOSSARY (Japanese-English)INTRODUCTION DEFINITION OF PARTICLES 1) A particle (89#4 joshi) in the Japanese language follows a word to: A) show its relationship to other words in a sentence, and/or B) give that word a particular meaning or nuance. 2) Unlike verbs, adjectives and adverbs, particles are not inflected, and therefore stay in the same form regardless of where they appear in a sentence. 3) Generally, particles are considered to be equivalent to prepositions, conjunctions and interjections of the English language; of these three, the majority of particles belong to the first category. 4) A particle should always be placed after the word it modifies, which means that in translating them into English, the word order should be changed. Example: English phrase: “top of the desk” Japanese phrase: tsukue no ue = “(the) desk of top” WHEN TO USE PARTICLES Consider the following sentence: “My mother and my father had dinner at a restaurant in Tokyo with a friend.”This example contains three prepositions (at, in, with) and one conjunc- tion (and). However, the same sentence translated into Japanese is: “Watashi o haha to chichi wa tomodachi to issho ni tookyoo no resutoran de yuushoku o tabe-mashita.” There are eight particles in the above example. Note, then, two points: 1) You cannot simply replace English prepositions, conjunctions and inter- jections with particles; there are particles that cannot be translated into English but still have vital functions in a Japanese sentence. 2) Nouns are usually followed by particles. When you are just starting to learn Japanese, get into the habit of looking for the appropriate particle every time you see a noun. Of course, there are exceptions to this rule: A) Particles are normally not placed directly before a copula (desu, da, deshita, datta, etc.). Example: “This is an apple.” = kore wa ringo desu. Note the absence of any particles before “desu,” even though ringo (“apple”) is a noun. B) Words that express quantity, extent, or numbers are not usually followed by particles, even though they are considered nouns. Example: “Please give me three of those.” = sore o mit-tsu kudasai. Note that mit-tsu (“three”) is not followed by a particle, though it is considered a noun. Particles also follow verbs, adjectives, and adverbs, though less fre- quently than nouns. Learning when to use particles after verbs, adjectives, iiand adverbs is really a matter of memorization. FUNCTIONS OF PARTICLES As stated above, particles are vital in Japanese. Consider the case of pronouns in English: “I,” “my,” and “me” are separate words that indepen- dently signify their functions in a sentence. However, in Japanese, there is one word watashi that serves as the basic “stem” for the singular first- person pronoun, and the subjective, possessive, and objective cases are constructed in the following ways, through the use of particles: “[” = watashi [wal/watashi [ga brL[B]/be LU [a ‘my” = watashi {no| brL[o “me” = watashi | ni|/watashi |o (wo)| #L [I= |/bAL]& It's clear, then, that only through the use of particles can the precise function of the stem “watashi” be identified. Let’s look at another set of examples. The meaning of the English sentence “I eat fish” is straightforward: the subject is “I,” the verb “eat” is a transitive verb that requires an object, which is “fish” in this case. However, if we translate it into Japanese without particles, it would look like this: watashi sakana _ taberu. As it stands, this group of words has no apparent meaning. If we were to insert some possible particles after the two nouns, we can create sentences with vastly different meanings (particles are enclosed in squares):