In my experience most JSL teachers ARE people who just majored in anything (or education, or English so that they could communicate with basic level students) and are able to teach simply by their nature of being Japanese.

JSL teachers are not 国語 teachers, so they wouldn't be teaching Japanese people. It is apparently VERY hard to become a 国語 teacher.

albion Wrote:

nac_est Wrote:- Not specifically centered on keigo but with a whopping 58 five-stars out of 70 votes: 言葉と声の磨き方. It's about communication skills in Japanese (speaking). It has a CD with voice examples as far as I can tell. Wouldn't it be great for a learner, too?

I actually own that one. There isn't anything in it about how to use keigo, or any aspect of language really. I think the 言葉 here is mainly how you say the words. It's mostly concerned with fixing voice problems (too quiet, too weak, annoying, etc.). The CD is pretty much just voice exercises as well (so it has the guy going 「アッ　アッ　アッ　アッ、ターターターター」). That said, it is a voice training book for Japanese people, so I think it can probably teach a few things about actually speaking Japanese better.

I'm extremely interested in this book then.
within the course of a year I have made tremendous progress for reading, writing , expressing myself but I still have the very awkard feeling that my pronunciation and my flow are basically the same they used to be a year ago.... that is to say : totally unnatural . I'm still totally at loss to how you are expected to make a difference between the gazillion of japanese homonyms , when you're supposed to stress a syllabe , etc.... especially since it seems that according to the sentence the same word can be uttered in different ways....
So just exactly what do you think of this book regarding to this point ?and could you clear something : It's a japanese book for japanese ? I can understand the japenese themselves need help when it comes to keigo but how come pronunciation require manual ?

tokyostyle, "Using the same word 12 times doesn't count as "using a lot of keigo". <-- Please read my posts again.

Anyway, since my posts have generated some discussion and we've had people requesting to see the original email I will attempt to go into it in more detail, rehashing what my teacher, a qualified JSL instructor who has been teaching full time for the last 6 years, told me.

Obviously for privacy reasons I can't copy the full email, but here are some snippets (names have been deleted/changed):

The email starts with my boss saying to the boss of another company that there is a person from a third company that wants to participate in our event, and that this person often supports us in our events.

XXさんはXYZの報告会でのプレゼンなど常に対応なされておられます。 i.e. XX-san always supports our events, such as doing the presentation at our XYZ information session.
Now, according to my teacher, the person who wrote the above sentence is trying to be extra polite by not only using なさる, the respectful form of する, but is also putting that into the passive form to make it even more polite. Also, they have put おる into the passive form too, for the same reason that なさる was made "passive".

The problems, according to my teacher, are:

1) You can't make なさる more polite by making it passive. In the hierarchy of politeness it goes する -> される ->　なさる
2) He has attempted to make おります more polite by making it passive. The problem here, though, is おります is used to humble oneself, not to give respect to another person.

The entire sentence should have read:

XXさんはXYZの報告会でのプレゼンなど常に対応なさっています。
or XXさんはXYZの報告会でのプレゼンなど常に対応なさっていらっしゃいます。 (although this is excessively polite to the point of it being patronising)

Next, sentence:

Background: a list of different participants has been compiled categorising them into different types of participants.
なお、ABC会社につきましては、XXeventにのみ参加いただくようにリストを仕分けしてありますが、
Translation: Furthermore, in regards to ABC company, the list has been categorised so that we have them participate only at XXevent.

The problem here is that if you're going to say XXいただく then the XX needs to be preceded with ご or お. That is unless you say XXしていただく, in which case you would not use ご or お. So what this sentence needs to say is one of the following:

XXeventにのみご参加いただくようにリストを仕分けしてありますが
or XXeventにのみ参加していただくようにリストを仕分けしてありますが

Anyway, in regards to all these errors, my teacher did say that they are very common mistakes, so much so that they may end up becoming grammatically acceptable one day.

Hope this helps.

ghinzdra Wrote:I'm extremely interested in this book then.
within the course of a year I have made tremendous progress for reading, writing , expressing myself but I still have the very awkard feeling that my pronunciation and my flow are basically the same they used to be a year ago.... that is to say : totally unnatural . I'm still totally at loss to how you are expected to make a difference between the gazillion of japanese homonyms , when you're supposed to stress a syllabe , etc.... especially since it seems that according to the sentence the same word can be uttered in different ways....
So just exactly what do you think of this book regarding to this point ?and could you clear something : It's a japanese book for japanese ? I can understand the japenese themselves need help when it comes to keigo but how come pronunciation require manual ?

It's not so much pronunciation (what 'a/k/r/etc.' sound like), rather speaking more clearly so people can understand you better. Improving your breathing, speaking louder/more cheerfully. For pronunciation, one of the training methods in the book is about 'n':

音の焦点を締る「ン」トレーニング１

「ンナ」「ンニ」「ンヌ」「ンネ」「ンノ」

一つ一つ確認できたら今度は「ンナニヌネノ」と連続させてやってみましょう。「ンナンニンヌンネンノ」とはせずに、最初の「ナ」の前だけに、「ン」をはさんで、今度は一語ずつ舌ではじくようにして音をはっきり出してみましょう。

「ンナニヌネノ」　「ンニヌネノナ」　「ンヌネノナニ」　「ンネノナニヌ」　「ンノナニヌネ」　「ンナネニヌネノナノ」

But that's about it for pronunciation.

I think maybe a different book would be better for that.
http://is.gd/jaz0

That deals with accents and pitch, and also includes a CD. This website shows you what the book covers:

http://home.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/hiroshim/pg.html

bucko Wrote:2) He has attempted to make おります more polite by making it passive. The problem here, though, is おります is used to humble oneself, not to give respect to another person.

This is totally not actually a mistake since it is common and actually おる is just the same as いる anyway (if おる is just 謙譲語 explain why おり is used as a connective without this implication). In places where おる is the standard form this is even more true. Also, I suspect that people with more of a 国語 background would just be more in line with whatever 文科省 says.

mystes Wrote:

bucko Wrote:2) He has attempted to make おります more polite by making it passive. The problem here, though, is おります is used to humble oneself, not to give respect to another person.

This is totally not actually a mistake since it is common and actually おる is just the same as いる anyway (if おる is just 謙譲語 explain why おり is used as a connective without this implication). In places where おる is the standard form this is even more true. Also, I suspect that people with more of a 国語 background would just be more in line with whatever 文科省 says.

What do you mean "connective"?
It never serves a conjunctive purpose, but if you mean continuative, 連用形＋て＋居る is humble when used to refer to your own actions, and derisory when used to describe someone else's. Thus you wouldn't make it passive to make it respectful, since you'd either be raising yourself up, or raising someone else up at the same time that you abused them. 連用形＋て＋居る is only neutral in western (only? I'm not familiar with eastern/northern dialects) dialects such as 山口弁 where it's used instead of いる in all uses. You could still use おられます when it is indeed passive/negative-nuance though, just not passive for the sake of respect.

-edit-
After a bit of research it indeed seems to only be used for politeness in western dialects. Western dialects are largely an "older form" of Japanese that preserve many elements of classical or pre-ww2 language usage. After the post-ww2 standardizations it seems that the "old-timey" usage of おる=いる was expunged from 標準語, so おられる is no longer correct according to prescriptive grammarians.

At the very least it is controversial language usage and should probably be avoided. Most of the top hits on google for おられる／おられます are posts saying it's incorrect, or people asking if it's incorrect.

mystes Wrote:This is totally not actually a mistake since it is common and actually おる is just the same as いる anyway (if おる is just 謙譲語 explain why おり is used as a connective without this implication). In places where おる is the standard form this is even more true. Also, I suspect that people with more of a 国語 background would just be more in line with whatever 文科省 says.

The "おり" which is used as a "conjunctive" (or as Jarvik7 correctly puts it, a "continuative") is completely different to the おる used to humble onself. Where did you get the idea that they are the same from?

Anyway, Jarvik7 sums it up nicely.

Jarvik7 Wrote:What do you mean "connective"?
It never serves a conjunctive purpose, but if you mean continuative, 連用形＋て＋居る is humble when used to refer to your own actions, and derisory when used to describe someone else's.

As you are no doubt aware, in more formal writing the 連用形 is often used on its own in the sense that 〜て is used in less formal writing. In some cases「〜ており」is used to mean 「ていて」 but as far as I am aware this has no sense of being humble or derisive. If おられる is a mistake, surely this おり should be considered a mistake as well.

bucko Wrote:The "おり" which is used as a "conjunctive" (or as Jarvik7 correctly puts it, a "continuative") is completely different to the おる used to humble onself. Where did you get the idea that they are the same from?

If is this correct then I take back what I have been saying, but do you have a source for this (a dictionary entry for the different おり would be fine)?

bucko Wrote:Keigo's not really just a matter of looking at a basic sentence and making it fluffy because of all the targets and objects of politeness involved, so I doubt the basic English sentence method you suggest would work.

What might work is your suggestion of a situation, but you would need to state who you are elevating (the person you're talking to? a third person? both?) and whether you also want to humble yourself.

Situation: you are talking to your boss and ask if he knows Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate your boss only (you and Tanaka sensei remain neutral).
Keigo:　田中先生をご存知ですか？

Situation: you are talking to your boss and tell him that you know Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate Tanaka sensei only (you and your boss remain neutral).
Keigo:　田中先生を存じ上げています。

Situation: you are talking to your boss and you tell him that you know Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate both your boss and Tanaka sensei (you remain neutral).
Keigo:　田中先生を存じ上げております。

Situation: you are talking to your boss and you tell him that you know Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate your boss and humble yourself (Tanaka sensei remains neutral).
Keigo: 田中先生を存じています。

This post just confirmed that I have no idea how to use keigo... I didn't know any of those nuances, yet know all the words that make them up. Not that I thought I had keigo down or anything beyond a basic understanding of it's existence, but enlightening nevertheless. Good post.

mystes Wrote:

Jarvik7 Wrote:What do you mean "connective"?
It never serves a conjunctive purpose, but if you mean continuative, 連用形＋て＋居る is humble when used to refer to your own actions, and derisory when used to describe someone else's.

As you are no doubt aware, in more formal writing the 連用形 is often used on its own in the sense that 〜て is used in less formal writing. In some cases「〜ており」is used to mean 「ていて」 but as far as I am aware this has no sense of being humble or derisive. If おられる is a mistake, surely this おり should be considered a mistake as well.

bucko Wrote:The "おり" which is used as a "conjunctive" (or as Jarvik7 correctly puts it, a "continuative") is completely different to the おる used to humble onself. Where did you get the idea that they are the same from?

If is this correct then I take back what I have been saying, but do you have a source for this (a dictionary entry for the different おり would be fine)?

I will quote from A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar in regards to おり.

1. ており is the written version of ていて. Although おり is the masu-form of the humble auxiliary verb おる, when ており is used in the writing of documents, articles, papers etc., it does not express the writer's politeness.
2. ており is more formal than ていて or てい.

In other words, there are two おるs. The first is in the form of ており which is used to join sentences in written documents similar to how ていて works. The second is in the form of おります which a speaker uses to humble onself or one's group.

One more thing, I did hear that おります is sometimes used as いらっしゃる in certain Kansai dialects, but I shouldn't confuse things anymore.

bucko Wrote:One more thing, I did hear that おります is sometimes used as いらっしゃる in certain Kansai dialects, but I shouldn't confuse things anymore.

Indeed. The first part of my post was about usage of ~ておる. In 標準語 speech, it has humble&derisive functions (same as the locative おる), while in various dialects it is neutral (the same dialects use it instead of いる&ある as well for locative functions - again neutral).

I'm not very experienced with formal written style (である式), but probably, if mystes is indeed correct that おり is used as a neutral locative, that is something unique to written formal style. In any case an email to a client is not formal writing, it is polite speech style writing.

Excerpt from 広辞苑6:
locative usage:
意味的に下の立場の人が上に向かっては使いにくく、上から下へが多いため、それをする人を低める語と解釈されることがある。

continuative usage:
(動詞·助動詞の連用形、または、それに助詞「て」の付いたものに付いて。自分について卑下、他人について軽侮·罵詈の意味を含むことがある)

As you can see they both indicate that it has a lowering function (ignoring dialectical usage).

Here http://oshiete1.goo.ne.jp/qa2061738.html a native speaker says that he sometimes hears おられる but feels uncomfortable with it because おる, where おられる is derived from, is used to humble oneself, not to give respect to another person. He also comments that often elderly and educated people use it, and wonders whether it is coming into common use.

One person answers:
おっしゃるとおり、「おられる」は間違った表現といえると思います。
「おる」は「いる」の謙譲語。その未然形に尊敬の助動詞「れる」を接続してしまっているのです。

Translation:
"I think, as you say, おられる is an incorrect expression. おる is the humble form of いる. They're mistakenly using the respectful auxilary very れる in the imperfective form."

If you read through that entire page you'll see that there is a lot of confusion even among the native speakers.

Jawful Wrote:

bucko Wrote:Keigo's not really just a matter of looking at a basic sentence and making it fluffy because of all the targets and objects of politeness involved, so I doubt the basic English sentence method you suggest would work.

What might work is your suggestion of a situation, but you would need to state who you are elevating (the person you're talking to? a third person? both?) and whether you also want to humble yourself.

Situation: you are talking to your boss and ask if he knows Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate your boss only (you and Tanaka sensei remain neutral).
Keigo:　田中先生をご存知ですか？

Situation: you are talking to your boss and tell him that you know Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate Tanaka sensei only (you and your boss remain neutral).
Keigo:　田中先生を存じ上げています。

Situation: you are talking to your boss and you tell him that you know Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate both your boss and Tanaka sensei (you remain neutral).
Keigo:　田中先生を存じ上げております。

Situation: you are talking to your boss and you tell him that you know Tanaka sensei. You want to elevate your boss and humble yourself (Tanaka sensei remains neutral).
Keigo: 田中先生を存じています。

This post just confirmed that I have no idea how to use keigo... I didn't know any of those nuances, yet know all the words that make them up. Not that I thought I had keigo down or anything beyond a basic understanding of it's existence, but enlightening nevertheless. Good post.

Before cementing what I wrote in here please confirm it with a Japanese teacher. I quoted that directly from my notebook and I could have got part of it wrong. For one, I can't understand why my teacher said that 田中先生を存じ上げております meant that the boss and Tanaka are elevated but the speaker remains neutral. I would have thought that with ております in there the speaker would have been humbled.

Another thing which I don't know is the 'why'. Why would you sometimes want to elevate one person and not the other, or humble yourself and leave others neutral. Grr keigo.

bucko Wrote:Another thing which I don't know is the 'why'. Why would you sometimes want to elevate one person and not the other, or humble yourself and leave others neutral. Grr keigo.

You would elevate one person and not the other if you are talking to a client (elevate them) about a third party (leave them neutral). You would humble yourself and leave others neutral if they are above but close to you in status, especially if you are talking about people much higher in the same conversation (ex talking to your senpai in a conversation where you talk about your boss) or higher status people are present/listening.

..I think. Like I said I don't study keigo usage.