Japanese Language

silvermaple

01:13

Hey all!

jkerian

@silvermaple 'morning

silvermaple

How's it going?

jkerian

upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/…

Something I stumbled across when trying to write a "Linguistics Vocabulary FAQ" for this site

I realize this is a long shot, but are 助詞 and 助数詞 also called 非活用語 even though they're 付属語, or is that just the 自立語 (in the 'traditional' organization)？

silvermaple

whaaaa

That's so neat

@jkerian That is so far out of my league...

jkerian

Mine too... which makes this an interesting project

The problem is that this does appear to be quite contentious... and I really don't want to take sides in the fight, just get the various labels right (since people use terms from both sides)

silvermaple

01:20

I might be at a level where I should not be asking this, but what exactly is a Godan Verb?

jkerian

I'm also trying to sort out a disagreement between Kuno's "Structure of the Japanese Language" and "A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar"

@silvermaple -u verb?

taylor

what's the disagreement

silvermaple

Ohh

Oh, why don't they just call it that

jkerian

@silvermaple There's a few different things people call them

silvermaple

Oh, I did not know that

/strokes chin thoughtfully

jkerian

01:25

ichidan/ru-verb, godan/u-verb... there's another way of naming them... not remembering it right now

@taylor なら... there's a few interesting disagreements

silvermaple

Oh, see I saw ichidan, then I thought that there must be 2-4 as well

taylor

oohh hey this is a handy little chart here

jkerian

"S1 なら S2"... S1 is generally understood to be an assertion. Kuno claims that S1 is an assertion by the hearer, not the speaker

oh yeah... "Group I" and "Group II", that's the other (totally nonhelpful) way that some textbook seperate them

silvermaple

I learned u and ru, which is only confusing when a u verb ends in ru

jkerian

I think it's "Group I"/godan/u-verbs... "Group II"/ichidan/ru-verbs

taylor

01:30

hhmm yeah im looking at なら in Dict of Basic Jap page 281

i see what u mean

jkerian

Kuno had some counterexamples as to why it couldn't be an assertion by the speaker, but that book is downstairs right now

taylor

does it matter either way

silvermaple

Can you just say "X is Y (sometimes called Z)"

jkerian

@taylor Basically, if I were to paraphrase Kuno's perspective... the construction is something like "If, as you say, S1... I say S2"

That has a very different nuance from "If, as I suspect, S1... S2"

The problem I have with charts like (upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/…) is that alot of people try to actually learn the language from them.

taylor

hhmm well logic framework is that S2 is a conclusion being drawn from the premise S1 right

silvermaple

01:37

Ah! no! Those are awesome study guides, to help you out once you've learned it...

taylor

so the difference is whether or not the speaker is expressing the stance of his own believe about the truth of S1 versus temporary assuming S1 for the sake of drawing a conclusion?

well i dunno

yeah learning from table references and dictionary like stuff is pretty boring

ive always thought that in any case S1 in S1ならS2 is a hypothesis

and never bothered to think about whose hypotheses it may represent

silvermaple

Hey, not to interrupt with a non-sequitor, but...

jkerian

@silvermaple "the aardvark is the first animal on the list!"

taylor

no no its okay im just typing aloud here lolz

silvermaple

辞めなければ
is the negative ba form, so it would be "should not quit"?

@jkerian And yes it is

"Shouldn't have quit"?

jkerian

01:45

By itself, that's just "If X didn't/doesn't quit"... the "shouldn't" part comes from the (possibly elliptical) rest of it

silvermaple

Oh, ok

I think I just made connections...I wasn't thinking of it as that construction as the negative...what is that? conditional?

jkerian

negative conditional

silvermaple

negative conditional

jkerian

If you look at that chart we were looking at a moment ago, third column 未然形... 5th row or so :)

silvermaple

Oh there it is!

taylor

01:47

yeah that chart also has as a category "confusing verbs"

kind of a lame way to call it

silvermaple

This is one of the problems from learning things without a textbook

jkerian

@taylor isn't that pretty much just "common homophones"?

taylor

eerrrm isnt what just homophone now?

jkerian

@taylor I actually looked it up to make sure I was right... but "homo"=same, "phone"=sound :)

cypher

this might be a stupid question but...what does the "S" in "S1" and "S2" stand for? is it "statement"?

taylor

01:51

oh kk i see i didnt even look what that chart contained

jkerian

There's a handy chart at that link, I didn't actually know the difference between a homophone and a homonym until I looked at that

taylor

yeah it does seem like the other pointed out some verbs in stem homophony

@cypher it stands for sentence

as its used in that dictionary anyways

cypher

@taylor I see

jkerian

@cypher sentence seems likely... "phrase" seems like it would honestly fit better, but both Kuno and DoBJG use that way of writing it

taylor

yeah maybe they actually mean phrase

jkerian

01:56

DoBJG has list of abbreviations, "Phr" for phrase, "S" for sentence

taylor

well phrase in the linguistic sense i mean

jkerian

The more interesting choice is S1たらS2

Given that almost any way you slice it... たら is pretty heavily tied up in S1

It's probably just a commonly accepted linguistic shorthand though

silvermaple

02:32

Well all, it's been real, but I have work early tomorrow :( See you around :)

jkerian

later

and how do you know it's been real?

Andrew Grimm

When westerners are supplying their names in katakana, is it more common to do firstname surname or surname firstname? github.com/ruby-sapporo/sapporo.rubykaigi.org/blob/gh-pages/… did surname firstname, and I did firstname surname in github.com/ruby-sapporo/sapporo.rubykaigi.org/blob/gh-pages/…

It doesn't matter in this case, as the English versions are also given

On the same topic as japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/5362/… but not a duplicate

jkerian

I generally do "firstname surname"... I've noticed a tendency for the Japanese people in my company to take whatever I sign emails with and just tack -san onto it... would be a bit strange for that to come up as "surname givenname"-san

Andrew Grimm

Cool

Thanks

Flaw

Zhuangzi

Zhuangzi () was an influential Chinese philosopher who lived around the 4th century BCE during the Warring States Period, a period corresponding to the philosophical summit of Chinese thought — the Hundred Schools of Thought, and is credited with writing—in part or in whole—a work known by his name, the Zhuangzi. His name Zhuangzi (English "Master Zhuang", with Zi being an honorific) is sometimes spelled Zhuang Tze, Zhuang Zhou, Chuang Tsu, Chuang Tzu, Chouang-Dsi, Chuang Tse, or Chuangtze. Life The only account of the life of Zhuangzi is a brief sketch in chapter 63 of Sima Qian's Rec...

jkerian

07:34

I think this is a reasonable enough way of handling these... japanese.stackexchange.com/a/6602/29

Personally, I would rather not "close & move to meta"... and prefer to just "close", but perhaps it's silly to worry about 'cluttering' meta

@Tim: What would you say the strength of JfBP is?

Tim

08:06

@jkerian JfBP was my startng point many years ago: It taught me basics that I could use immediately on a day to day basis without cluttering my knowledge with words that I did not need (apparantly 1/3 of the vocab on most intro-courses) and, what was most impressive, it introduced other expressions in a concise enough format for me to learn and implement by rote that proved invaluable when it came to learning the underlying grammar and similar expressions later on.

(contd) To summarise: it was practical, it worked on several levels and I regretted that the higher texts were not available when I was ready for them.

@jkerian Actually I think I would rather just close and not clutter meta too. I wonder if there if there a repeatable answer to "I want to learn Jse, where do you suggest I start?" type of inquiries in there that would help such students.

Andrew Grimm