Jarvik7, your explanation is good. The question is, how does one explain all the other strange behavior in the r-godan area? In the example above, 起きる does end in i when る is removed, but what about 食べる? It doesn't end in i when る is removed, therefor there should be a loss of mora, right? If we say "Well, it's different in the case of -eru ichidan", we can just as well find an -eru godan, such as 帰る.

I agree with your last paragraph regardless, grammar might be humanly imposed rules which came "after the fact", but there is still regularity and rules within a language. If there weren't, no grammar would ever be applicable.

Can't you just explain Okotte as being the way it is because it would conjugate like any other -ru godan sounding verb?

Tobberoth Wrote:Jarvik7, your explanation is good. The question is, how does one explain all the other strange behavior in the r-godan area? In the example above, 起きる does end in i when る is removed, but what about 食べる? It doesn't end in i when る is removed, therefor there should be a loss of mora, right? If we say "Well, it's different in the case of -eru ichidan", we can just as well find an -eru godan, such as 帰る.

The 音便 environment in this instance is りて (which becomes って). As such there would be no effect on 食べる (which has a continuative form of 食べ). If it was a godan, in which case the continuative would be 食べり, you would indeed get 食べって.

Te form exhibits so much "weirdness" because it is probably the most used grammatical construct in Japanese. Heavy use leads to heavy change. That is why most of the final mora + te constructs have 音便 on them. (死んで←死にて).

食べる is shimo-ichi-dan, so I don't see how it's an example of godan weirdness. I didn't mention it in my last post which might have caused some confusion, but 起きる also isn't godan, it's kami-ichi-dan.

Jarvik7 Wrote:

Tobberoth Wrote:Jarvik7, your explanation is good. The question is, how does one explain all the other strange behavior in the r-godan area? In the example above, 起きる does end in i when る is removed, but what about 食べる? It doesn't end in i when る is removed, therefor there should be a loss of mora, right? If we say "Well, it's different in the case of -eru ichidan", we can just as well find an -eru godan, such as 帰る.

The 音便 environment in this instance is りて (which becomes って). As such there would be no effect on 食べる (which has a continuative form of 食べ). If it was a godan, in which case the continuative would be 食べり, you would indeed get 食べって.

食べる is shimo-ichi-dan, so I don't see how it's an example of godan weirdness.

The point is, you're saying 起きる becomes 起きて because き already ends in i, so the り disappears into っ (おきりて => おきって).

If you're just expressing why る godan becomes って instead of りて, I guess it doesn't matter, but I'm guessing that what he asks is of a deeper nature. The question is why both 起こる and 起きる ends in る yet conjugates differently, without simply answering "because it's a godan and an ichidan", but actual historical reasons why godan and ichidan can both end in る.

Tobberoth Wrote:The point is, you're saying 起きる becomes 起きて because き already ends in i, so the り isn't needed (おこりて). In 起こる, り is needed since こ doesn't end in i. Correct? Well, in 帰る, the ending is e, not i. Therefor, it should be かえりて, no?

It is 帰りて, 音便ed to 帰って in modern Japanese...　変える on the other-hand is a shimo-ichi-dan verb, so it has continuative form かえ, which doesn't produce the 音便 environment when conjunctive て is added. 買える is the same, although it is a conjugated verb. 返る is the same as 帰る. In any case, this 音便 only takes place on godan verbs even if the environment occurs elsewhere (ex 借りる), probably because ichidan verbs are never modified to make their forms, so the verb wouldn't be understood if 音便ed.

Kami-ichi-dan verbs all end in -i for all of their forms (thats what the kami ichidan part means, it uses one vowel from the upper half of a i u e o). Godan verbs all have to be modified through mora replacement to end in -i for their continuative form. That is what I meant, but I admit that I could have been clearer as to the relevance. 食べる is a shimo-ichi-dan which means that all forms end in one vowel from the LOWER half of a i u e o, aka -e, thus like kami-ichi-dan you never have to replace a mora.

Godan and ichi-dan verbs can both end in る for the same reason that 車 and 暇 both end in ま (aka no reason). The verbs are divided into groups based on their conjugation patterns, not on their verb endings. English language Japanese texts encourage learning based on verb ending since it is easier for a beginner, and English language texts rarely encourage in depth understanding anyways.

Originally there were more verb groups.

Verb Group: example of allowed verb endings
四段: く　ぐ　す　つ　ふ　ぶ　む　る
下一段: る
上一段: る
下二段: (nothing ex 得)　く　ぐ　す　ず　つ　づ　ぬ　ふ　ぶ　む　ゆ　る　う
上二段: く　ぐ　つ　づ　ふ　ぶ　む　ゆ　る
ラ変: り
ナ変: ぬ
カ変: (nothing) ex　来
サ変: (nothing) ex す

As you can see there was even more overlap, one doesn't even end in a -u sound, and some technically have no endings since the entire verb is one mora. There are also a lot of verb endings which no longer exist, like ゆ. I've only studied as far back as Heian language, but Nara period was even more complex. Everything was collapsed into Godan except for the two ichidan groups and the last two 変 groups, which became 来る and する during meiji & post-ww2 reformations. It gives the illusion of simplicity when there is infact a lot more under the surface.

Anyways, see wiki for more info on the specific environment in question.

The above post is a perfect reason to ignore grammar altogether. :: headache ::

sethg Wrote:The above post is a perfect reason to ignore grammar altogether. :: headache ::

Ask a question about grammar, get an answer about grammar. Feel free to stick your fingers in your ears and go LA LA LA LA, but I like to have a deep understanding. As a bonus I can read stuff like Genji Monogatari in the original.

Well, after discussing a lot here, my opinion became much more moderated.
The text books I dislike are the ones like genki and minna no nihongo.

I like Tae Kim's guide, but no one should ever try to memorize its contents. Refering to it for clarification is a very nice thing to do.

I still believe 100 hours is not only more effective than 100 hours of genki but it is also much easier to achieve and find motivation to do.
100 hours of listening is a goal very easy to achieven under a month, depending on your personality you can do it in 15 days - or even less. You can even do it at the same time you are doing RTK (but know it will slow your pace).

100 hours of genki requires much, much more effort. Assuming 1h/day, it'll take 3 months.

The listening I did while doing RTK prepared me very well to start doing sentences at full speed. In 3 months of 30 mins SRS + ~8hs of listening/day made my japanese good enough to read One Piece.

Jarvik7 Wrote:Ask a question about grammar, get an answer about grammar. Feel free to stick your fingers in your ears and go LA LA LA LA, but I like to have a deep understanding. As a bonus I can read stuff like Genji Monogatari in the original.

Oh no, I admire you for knowing so much, but I'm just saying... grammar is, in reality, so depthy and complicated... if just fluency in speaking and reading the modern language is your goal, why deal with the grammar? If you do want to read Genji, then yeah, you're probably gonna need some grammar to kind of "backtrack" through the language.

I think the problem is that grammar is unfashionable, so people tend to exaggerate how little time they've spent learning it. The perception is that the more time you spend learning grammar rules, the less intelligent you are. Just look at Khatz for example: his philosophy is "no grammar" but he recommends Tae Kim, Dirty Guide to Japanese and All About Particles. It's contradictory. Unless you're familiar with basic structural patterns you'll never be able to understand anything.

Jarvik7 Wrote:

nac_est Wrote:

Asriel Wrote:why it's　起こって instead of 起こて.

This makes for an interesting question: why is it 起こって instead of 起こて? Saying that it's because 起こる is a godan verb doesn't count, because that's something that's been made up at a later time to make it fit into the grammar.

Because the continuative form of 起こる (classically yodan, modern godan) is 起こり, with the conjunctive particle て attached to the end it becomes 起こりて. Due to predictable & regular sound changes (音便) it became 起こって in modern Japanese. There was no way it could have become 起こて.

起きる's continuative form is 起き (it already ends with an i vowel without a kana change) so it doesn't produce the environment in which 音便 occurs, and thus there is no loss of a mora (り) with a replacement by a geminate (っ). If it was the case that the continuative form was 起きり, then the te form would be 起きって. You would also get 起きります.

Just because you don't fully understand verb groups (and their conjugation) don't say that they "don't count". Grammar may be descriptive, but language naturally develops rules which humans then try to describe. You might as well complain that there is no reason for water to be みず and not GNQ2IH.

Wow, I was just gonna say "because it's 起こります" but a history lesson is even better!

Well, so much for me getting a few laughs about misreading katakana. This apparently morphed into a grammar thread. :-)

jmkeralis Wrote:Like I said, I'm definitely not the norm - the more languages you learn, the easier they get, so I'm not as likely to get mixed up as someone who's on their second language.

This is something that a lot of people don't take into consideration. For me, Japanese is my first attempt at another language and it's rough sometimes. Someone who has experience with other languages (like Khatzumoto and many others) will likely find learning Japanese much easier than someone like me. It shouldn't be an excuse, but don't be depressed if you don't move as fast (I'm giving myself advice here).

Japanese was my third language (I'm an English native and I started learning French in kindergarten), but I can't say my knowledge of French helped me out much LEARNING Japanese. I think it did probably help my accent, since I already knew how to change accents depending on language.

Interestingly when I was a kid I didn't even think French was another language, I just thought it was the "counterpart" of English. I remember asking my parents what the French of German was called.

Japanese knowledge definitely helped my Chinese and Korean though.

jmkeralis Wrote:Well, so much for me getting a few laughs about misreading katakana. This apparently morphed into a grammar thread. :-)

Haha, much like languages, threads here just seem to... evolve. A bit faster, though

sethg Wrote:

jmkeralis Wrote:Well, so much for me getting a few laughs about misreading katakana. This apparently morphed into a grammar thread. :-)

Haha, much like languages, threads here just seem to... evolve. A bit faster, though

I'm just waiting for Classical Genki.

Jarvik7 Wrote:

nac_est Wrote:

Asriel Wrote:why it's　起こって instead of 起こて.

This makes for an interesting question: why is it 起こって instead of 起こて? Saying that it's because 起こる is a godan verb doesn't count, because that's something that's been made up at a later time to make it fit into the grammar.

Because the continuative form of 起こる (classically yodan, modern godan) is 起こり, with the conjunctive particle て attached to the end it becomes 起こりて. Due to predictable & regular sound changes (音便) it became 起こって in modern Japanese. There was no way it could have become 起こて.

起きる's continuative form is 起き (it already ends with an i vowel without a kana change) so it doesn't produce the environment in which 音便 occurs, and thus there is no loss of a mora (り) with a replacement by a geminate (っ). If it was the case that the continuative form was 起きり, then the te form would be 起きって. You would also get 起きります.

Just because you don't fully understand verb groups (and their conjugation) don't say that they "don't count". Grammar may be descriptive, but language naturally develops rules which humans then try to describe. You might as well complain that there is no reason for water to be みず and not GNQ2IH.

I see that my post may have passed for sarcasm/complaint or a hidden attack to grammar, but it really isn't so. I actually find (Japanese) grammar to be fun, and I learned a lot through it.
Thanks for the lengthy explanations, they are quite interesting. It's also true that I don't fully understand verb groups, as I've only studied them in a superficial way.

I hope however that you could see my point in that post. I was induced into writing it when I read Asriel 's use of the word why when talking about grammar. It is my opinion that grammar cannot tell us why things are the way they are. It only (attempts to) construct a logical framework to make the language more easily analysed.
So when I said "it doesn't count" I didn't mean to say that grammar is worthless, only that it isn't meant to explain things to learners.

As a (meagre) proof of the fact that grammar is not necessary at the early stages of learning, consider this: I, a learner with "scarce understanding of verb groups" who didn't even know what 音便 was before today, have been able to correctly use these verbs for some time now.

Finally, there is no reason for water to be みず and not something else. Languages are mysterious (to me, at least ).

For grammar there usually is a why. It's not always important to know it though.

You don't have to know how the engine in a car works in order to drive it. Some people get satisfaction out of it though (and are arguably better drivers if you take it to the autosports level).

While I think the kind of information I posted above is valuable to a serious student of Japanese, it would be nearly impossible to teach beginner Japanese based on that. To continue the analogy, the first day of drivers ed doesn't begin with a chemistry lesson on the properties of petroleum.

Tobberoth Wrote:I agree with your last paragraph regardless, grammar might be humanly imposed rules which came "after the fact", but there is still regularity and rules within a language. If there weren't, no grammar would ever be applicable.

Isn't it kind of a ridiculous oversimplification to say that grammar is human imposed rules which came "after the fact"? Grammar rules come both before and after the fact because language changes. For example, certain languages have had professional grammarians for hundreds of years, and many of them have certainly helped to mold new language, essentially because the rules they wrote were then considered standard and taught to students. In this case, the grammar rule existed before the new language, which is then molded to fit the grammar pattern.

Even without professional grammarians, isn't this how language works? Like when you make up words by adding suffixes and prefixes, or by making a word that isn't a noun into one. You know these grammar patterns in a intuitive way even without an academic background, and this influences the way you--and everyone else--makes new language.

I'm not sure if I'm interpreting what you two were saying properly.

Tzadeck Wrote:

Tobberoth Wrote:I agree with your last paragraph regardless, grammar might be humanly imposed rules which came "after the fact", but there is still regularity and rules within a language. If there weren't, no grammar would ever be applicable.

Isn't it kind of a ridiculous oversimplification to say that grammar is human imposed rules which came "after the fact"? Grammar rules come both before and after the fact because language changes. For example, certain languages have had professional grammarians for hundreds of years, and many of them have certainly helped to mold new language, essentially because the rules they wrote were then considered standard and taught to students. In this case, the grammar rule existed before the new language, which is then molded to fit the grammar pattern.

Even without professional grammarians, isn't this how language works? Like when you make up words by adding suffixes and prefixes, or by making a word that isn't a noun into one. You know these grammar patterns in a intuitive way even without an academic background, and this influences the way you--and everyone else--makes new language.

I'm not sure if I'm interpreting what you two were saying properly.

That's the regularity and rules I'm talking about. It simply sounds wrong if you use the wrong suffix, but not because you've learned that it's this and this kind of verb and it needs this and this kind of suffix. That's grammar. That's academic rules applied to the language to make it easier to learn and discuss.

Think about exceptions. Say, する and くる. Both are called exceptions when you learn them by your teacher, most grammatical works will call them exceptions. But it's not actually exceptions, historically. It's verb forms which has disappeared in modern Japanese.

Grammar is when you analyze a language and find general rules in how it works. It can be done in any language, no matter how it works, because it's general and it's after the fact. It doesn't matter why a word looks a certain way, all that matters is that you can somehow categorize and predict how it works. An example, わ and が are used in a certain way in Japanese. That's regularity and rules in the language, the particles are simply used like that. The GRAMMAR however is a matter of discussion. Is わ a topic marker and が a subject marker? Maybe. We westerners like to think of it as such, even though it means there's tons of exceptions.

harhol Wrote:

bombpersons Wrote:I have my ps3 (running linux) running a python script that chooses videos from my terabyte hardrive and shows them like a tv channel. So all I have to do is turn the tv on and I get Japanese input all the time =D

As awesome as this first sentence sounds, surely this would lead to an insanely high electricity bill?

Quite possibly...I haven't found out yet...

Actually a little concerned now...

bombpersons Wrote:

harhol Wrote:

bombpersons Wrote:I have my ps3 (running linux) running a python script that chooses videos from my terabyte hardrive and shows them like a tv channel. So all I have to do is turn the tv on and I get Japanese input all the time =D

As awesome as this first sentence sounds, surely this would lead to an insanely high electricity bill?

Quite possibly...I haven't found out yet...

Actually a little concerned now...

This is definitely the funniest thing to come out of this thread, and the last thing I would ever expect too.

nac_est Wrote:...I was induced into writing it when I read Asriel 's use of the word why when talking about grammar. It is my opinion that grammar cannot tell us why things are the way they are...

Well I just reread my post in the context of all these crazy grammar explanations, and I've gotta say, I actually sound like I know what I'm talking about, don't I?

Truth is, I only know a very little bit about all this grammar stuff. I know how to use it, because that's how I was taught. All I meant is that a textbook will teach you when you use a って　and just a て, whereas you probably won't pick it up as fast from just listening.

There, I just had to dispel any ideas that I'm actually smarter than I am

welldone101 Wrote:This is definitely the funniest thing to come out of this thread, and the last thing I would ever expect too.

"Alternatively, you could put the hot PS3 inside the cold refrigerator and watch as your energy costs spiral out of control, laughing as the ozone layer burns away over your head and the melting ice caps bring the beach to your doorstep. You choose."

Giggle.