に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event?

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Printable Version

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に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Virtua_Leaf - 2009-09-26

友達の家にいる
友達の家でパーティーがある

That's simple. But I just found this sentence over at Yahoo Dictionary:

「旧友を駅に迎える」

Presumably に expresses location here but surely 迎える doesn't express existence, right? How come で isn't being used here?

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - alexsuraci - 2009-09-26

I learned it as 「で」 being general-purpose verb context (i.e. by means of) and 「に」 being location (i.e. in/at/etc.), as well as an indirect object particle, which has tripped me up before. I never learned 「に」 as having some sort of existence-verb restriction.

So, I think the first would say "(I am|etc) at friend's house", the second would say "Party is at (exists by means of) friend's house", and the third would say "Meet old friend at station".

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Pauline - 2009-09-26

迎える(to go out to meet) is an motion verb like 行く and 帰える and uses other particles than existance verbs.

According to the Dirty Guide to Japanese:

Quote:In general, word order in Japanese sentences using an action verb is:
[SUBJECT] + TIME + PLACE/IMPLEMENT + INDIRECT OBJECT + OBJECT + ACTION VERB

For an existence verb it is:
[SUBJECT] + TIME + LOCATION + EXISTENCE VERB

And for a motion verb it is:
[SUBJECT] + TIME + ORIGIN + ROUTE + DESTINATION + MOTION VERB

...

In summary:
SUBJECT + は/が/nothing delete subject if possible, show changes with は
TIME + に/nothing use nothing if it's a deictic time word
PLACE/IMPLEMENT + で is the place where you do or where you are?
LOCATION + に is the place where you are or where you do?
ORIGIN + から
ROUTE + を is this a place on the way to where you're going?
DESTINATION + に/へ use に over へ but be aware that both are okay
(DIRECT) OBJECT+を
INDIRECT OBJECT + に use this if you're out of choices :-)

As you can see, a motion verb like 迎える cannot use で since you are moving between two different places and is not staying at the same place.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Virtua_Leaf - 2009-10-01

Thanks a lot for the replies guys!

Thanks for the explanation, Pauline. It made for an interesting read. But is 迎える DEFINITELY a motion verb? The definition where I got that sentence from was:

１人の来るのを待ち受ける。「旧友を駅に―・える」「拍手で―・える」

- http://dic.yahoo.co.jp/dsearch?enc=UTF-8&p=%E8%BF%8E%E3%81%88%E3%82%8B&dtype=0&dname=0na&stype=0&pagenum=1&index=20844717852700

ie., from what I can tell, waiting, not moving.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - bombpersons - 2009-10-01

I think, thinking about grammar like that just makes it more confusing. Just learn the sentence and it will make sense one day =)

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Pauline - 2009-10-01

Quote:But is 迎える DEFINITELY a motion verb? The definition where I got that sentence from was:

１人の来るのを待ち受ける。「旧友を駅に―・える」「拍手で―・える」

ie., from what I can tell, waiting, not moving.

After thinking a bit about it, I would guess 迎える is an action verb. That was actually my first guess, but when I looked up its translation one of them was "to go out and meet".

Also, neither 迎える nor 待つ fits fully any of the types, which is probably why it is called "dirty". The guide is more of an cheat sheet for beginners to explain what all those pesky particles are used for.

At least we can agree it is not an existence verb.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - jacf29 - 2009-10-01

bombpersons Wrote:I think, thinking about grammar like that just makes it more confusing. Just learn the sentence and it will make sense one day =)

I second this. Focusing on the grammar is futile. Once you go through enough sentences in your SRS you will have a feel for the difference, which is worlds better than being able to explain the grammar behind them. Because when you are zooming through a book, you won't be thinking about the grammar.

How many sentences have you done btw?

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - zazen666 - 2009-10-01

I always though of "に"　as meaning "--->" and that seems to more or less work for me .....

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - kazelee - 2009-10-01

zazen666 Wrote:I always though of "に"　as meaning "--->" and that seems to more or less work for me .....

To me that screams more へ.....

When I think of で I tend to think of the two things interacting with each other.

に still boggles the bajeezus out of me.（失敗）

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - liosama - 2009-10-01

Thinking about grammar in this sense is more helpful if anything because it is here where you begin to see the shift in your understanding and categorizing of 'verbs' from other sorts of 'verbs' and how they ought to be used with particles to construct grammatical sentences.

Look at all other 'meet' like verbs, which use に instead of で,
会う
集まる im sure takes on に among a few others
and im sure there are other similar words that use に.

This isn't a matter of grammar particles strictly per se , it's more of a matter of understanding the word and its uses. So I would advise against 'ignoring grammar', learn it alongside your sentences.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Thora - 2009-10-02

@jacf29: Developing a sense of what sounds correct through exposure doesn't mean sentence analysis is "futile". Both is better than either. Also, we can learn Japanese w/o SRSing sentences (though perhaps you meant exposure more generally.)

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - jacf29 - 2009-10-02

wrong choice of words. yes you can learn japanese without SRSing sentences.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Virtua_Leaf - 2009-10-02

I personally find dissecting structures and grammars vital. I took the 'don't waste time on textbooks, you have to "feel" it by yourself' route and, while I learnt a load of words and readings, it never felt like English to me (using that in the sense of my fluent language, not similarities to English). Now it slowly is.

One downside of self-study is that there's noone there to tell you your doing something right or not. Viewpoints should seem like an obvious aspect of a language and for some people it probably is. But is it you? Me? The person I emphasize with? The cat on the wall? I need something to explain things like that to me for the sake of clarification sometimes.

Tae Kim was great for getting me a foot into the language but his teaching style doesn't really suit my type of person. に = "towards" just doesn't work for me, I need to be told it means "by," "from," and all the ones in between. I thought Japanese was some mysterious, abstract language only suited for those with double-jointed brains. Then I opened up a damn grammar book and was told about how it works in a practical manner.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - yudantaiteki - 2009-10-04

Virtua_Leaf Wrote:I personally find dissecting structures and grammars vital.

I agree. I took the "don't focus too much on grammar" approach at first, and while I was able to make a lot of progress and learn to read real Japanese, I found that when I eventually went back and did a more thorough study of the grammar, it improved my reading speed and comprehension a lot. A number of assumptions that I had about Japanese grammar turned out to be wrong, and things that I thought I knew I actually didn't. The problem with inferring grammar from reading a lot of sentences is that it's easy to infer things incorrectly.

You'll never learn Japanese just by reading a grammar book, and you should definitely be reading Japanese a lot more than reading grammar, but judicious use of grammatical explanations can really go a long way towards helping you make sense of what you're seeing and get a handle on fine points in the language.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Virtua_Leaf - 2009-10-05

yudantaiteki Wrote:
Virtua_Leaf Wrote:I personally find dissecting structures and grammars vital.
I agree. I took the "don't focus too much on grammar" approach at first, and while I was able to make a lot of progress and learn to read real Japanese, I found that when I eventually went back and did a more thorough study of the grammar, it improved my reading speed and comprehension a lot. A number of assumptions that I had about Japanese grammar turned out to be wrong, and things that I thought I knew I actually didn't. The problem with inferring grammar from reading a lot of sentences is that it's easy to infer things incorrectly.

You'll never learn Japanese just by reading a grammar book, and you should definitely be reading Japanese a lot more than reading grammar, but judicious use of grammatical explanations can really go a long way towards helping you make sense of what you're seeing and get a handle on fine points in the language.

Completely agree.

I have another question here.

新聞によるとフロリダに雪が降ったそうだ。

Why is に used here and not で? I would have thought 雪が降った would have been seen as an event. Is it stressing that the snow existed in Florida? OR... hang on a minute, now I've written this, is it the に that signifies something ON something? Literally "the snow fell ON Florida"?

Googling "(で/に)雪が降った", most of the results use に but there are a few using で:

マダガスカルで雪が降った

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - alexsuraci - 2009-10-05

As mentioned above, 「に」 can act as a locational context particle (in addition to an indirect object particle); in that example, it's saying the snow fell in/at Florida. "On" might work too, but that has too much of a direct feel imo.

When I get confused about a particle I often head over to this gigantic Wikipedia article, covering all/most of them succinctly with many examples. Maybe it'll help you out too.

In summary, 「で」 typically indicates the means of which an action was performed, and 「に」 indicates the location that it happened, or an indirect object, or a direction/destination.

Edit: In the same link, here's an interesting bit of info regarding 「で」.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Smackle - 2009-10-05

I think it's supposed to have a direct feel. に used in this case means the snow fell on Florida. で would have more of a in/at feel.

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - alexsuraci - 2009-10-05

Smackle Wrote:I think it's supposed to have a direct feel. に used in this case means the snow fell on Florida. で would have more of a in/at feel.

Do you have a reference for that? Every resource I've scoured over time has said the opposite. (Not being snooty, genuinely curious.)

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Smackle - 2009-10-05

Well, I don't know about sources, so I'll use that Wikipedia article's examples and say what I think about them.

学校にいる。
This is the example of に working as a location of an action. But this is a static action. Actions usually are only placed with に for their whereabouts if they're verbs for existence. (Not counting direction function in this case.)

I see where we see a difference in that Wikipedia lists it as an indirect object. Well, I would agree it is an indirect object, but it is more direct than で where it is not an object of the action at all. If our wordings confused each other, then I'm sorry.

But in any case, I believe it's serving the indirect object function stated in the article rather than the location. Whereas で would be carrying out the location function.

(Indirect object, location, direction, and intent functions all have the same feel with に for me though.)

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - yudantaiteki - 2009-10-05

alexsuraci Wrote:
Smackle Wrote:I think it's supposed to have a direct feel. に used in this case means the snow fell on Florida. で would have more of a in/at feel.
Do you have a reference for that? Every resource I've scoured over time has said the opposite. (Not being snooty, genuinely curious.)

One way to see the difference between に as the target of the action and で as the location of an action is with 書く.

名前はこの紙に書いてください。 (Please write your name on this paper.)
論文は図書館で書いた。 (I wrote my paper in the library.)

I wasn't aware of に used with 雨が降る, but it makes a lot of sense with the "target of action" meaning of に (which I got from Japanese: The Spoken Language).

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - alexsuraci - 2009-10-05

Ah, so I kind of had it backwards. Thanks for the explanations. The 「に」particle has certainly proven itself elusive. Wink

に Vs. で - how do you know when a verb expresses existence or event? - Virtua_Leaf - 2009-10-08

The "target of action," huh. Kind of as I thought. I get it now.

Thanks a lot everyone for the explanations.

I guess the に in this case, then, could be substituted for the で, just with different meanings and, in turn, nuances?