I think more likely it's related to the に of purpose, as in 日本語を勉強するには、どうしたらいいでしょう。 For historical reasons, verbs can sometimes be used in a nominal position, without the nominal の. In the modern language this tends to be restricted to certain fixed phrases, expressions, and a few grammatical constructs (and often you can put の in without a problem).

I've recently stumbled across this phrase in the OreImo light novel (vol 3 p. 137, though context shouldn't be necessary): "夕日を振り仰いでため息を一つ。​"

Why is "夕日" marked with を and not with に？ Are actions like "turning towards" something, actions that you "do" to the thing you're looking at as the direct object?

を does not have to mark specifically something that is being done to something else. Note that 振り仰ぐ does not just mean "turn towards", it means "look up at". So this is no different from 夕日を見る.

I see that EDICT claims 振り仰ぐ is intransitive; I wonder if that's an error...

Well, that depends on what your definition of "intransitive" is with regards to the Japanese language; I don't know what EDICT's definition is but it might be an error.

を has uses outside of being the direct object marker, for example:

「家を出る」

出る intransitive here but is used with the を particle, to signify motion, or traversal. Not sure if this is the case here though, but that's what it looks like to me.

I have a stupid question: In the sentence below what is the conjugation? What does it mean? I found the conjugation in a dictionary, "果たさなければ", and it's stated as a "Provisional" conjugation...what? I have a hunch it's related to なくちゃ.

日本はアジアの一員として役割を果たさなければならない。
"As a member of Asia, Japan has to carry out her duties." (This is my guess)
よろしく御願いします！！！

gyuujuice Wrote:I have a stupid question: In the sentence below what is the conjugation? What does it mean? I found the conjugation in a dictionary, "果たさなければ", and it's stated as a "Provisional" conjugation...what? I have a hunch it's related to なくちゃ.

日本はアジアの一員として役割を果たさなければならない。
"As a member of Asia, Japan has to carry out her duties." (This is my guess)
よろしく御願いします！！！

The root verb is 果たす - to accomplish. It is first conjugated to 果たさない, the negative form, then to 果たさなければ which is the ば conditional form (remove い, add ければ, same as い adjectives).

Thank you so much FooSoft!
So ーばならない = なくちゃいけない, right? I have only known the casual forms of that grammatical phrase. I need to visit Wikipedia more often. Thanks a bunch!

gyuujuice Wrote:Thank you so much FooSoft!
So ーばならない = なくちゃいけない, right? I have only known the casual forms of that grammatical phrase. I need to visit Wikipedia more often. Thanks a bunch!

Ooops, I actually made a mistake in my post above, なくちゃ is short for なくて, and なきゃ is short for なければ. Both of those shortened forms allow you to drop whatever comes afterwards (like in your example the いけない) part.

Check out http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/must

yudantaiteki Wrote:を does not have to mark specifically something that is being done to something else. Note that 振り仰ぐ does not just mean "turn towards", it means "look up at". So this is no different from 夕日を見る.

Thanks, that makes sense. But yeah, it did confuse me that it was given as an intransitive verb.

Is 今+限定 being used here in the same way as 今+限り would be, basically meaing "the last time"?

「今限定で穏やかな頬は、氷でできた彫像のように、透き通って溶けてしまいそう。」
"This is the last time; this calm face - like a statue made of ice, it seems like it's going to become clear and melt away".

is there any difference between
ta tokoro and ta bakari?
they both mean .. have just...

lanval Wrote:is there any difference between
ta tokoro and ta bakari?
they both mean .. have just...

Pretty similar, but so different that if you hadn't pointed it out, it wouldn't have occurred to me that they are similar.

ところ feels to me like something may still be going on, like we were just talking about X, for example. ばかり feels like something just happened, but ended a little while ago, like we just talked about X before you arrived.

lanval Wrote:is there any difference between
ta tokoro and ta bakari?
they both mean .. have just...

The DBJG entry for ところ talks about this, if you have that. "[Vinf.past + tokoro da] indicates that somone/something is in the state of having just done something, while [Vinf.past + bakari da] implies that someone/something did something and not much time has passed since then." So in 「私は山本先生には一週間前にあったばかりだ」 ところだ won't work because a week is too long.

thanks, got it now ^^

この国では「戦士」「魔導師」「僧侶」などさまざまな職業の人材育成こそ重要と位置づけ国を挙げて支援をしている
The machine translation from Google translate: In this country, "Warrior" "The Guru" Magic "priests" are positioned to support the national human resource development is especially important in a variety of professions including

挙げて支援をしている = raising and supporting
人材育成こそ重要と位置づけ国を挙げて支援をしている = raising and supporting people of talent training, important and the placed country (?)

I don't really get it. Any help appreciated.

This sentence is confusing me a bit:

田中さんの家にはキャデラックとベンツがあって大きな犬が２匹います。

How come it's not "大きい犬が２匹います". Thanks if someone can explain why an い-adjective is acting like a な-adjective.

vinniram Wrote:This sentence is confusing me a bit:

田中さんの家にはキャデラックとベンツがあって大きな犬が２匹います。

How come it's not "大きい犬が２匹います". Thanks if someone can explain why an い-adjective is acting like a な-adjective.

大きい is an adjective meaning "big". It's not a particle. Don't you love how Japanese doesn't have spaces?

jcdietz03 Wrote:この国では「戦士」「魔導師」「僧侶」などさまざまな職業の人材育成こそ重要と位置づけ国を挙げて支援をしている
The machine translation from Google translate: In this country, "Warrior" "The Guru" Magic "priests" are positioned to support the national human resource development is especially important in a variety of professions including

挙げて支援をしている = raising and supporting
人材育成こそ重要と位置づけ国を挙げて支援をしている = raising and supporting people of talent training, important and the placed country (?)

I don't really get it. Any help appreciated.

Here is my attempt:

In this country, it is the development of skilled individuals with professions like "Warrior", "Wizard" and "Priest" that elevates and supports the important and established nation.

Edit: I think the confusing part here is that there looks like an elipsis of が after 人材育成こそ

@vinniram -- Some adjectives like to do that. 大きい and 大きな, 小さい and 小さな...

Quote:④、形容詞「大きい家」と連体詞「大きな家」には基本的には意味の違いはありません。
ただ最近の趨勢としては感情を込めた会話の中で「大きな」がより使われているようです。
慣用句にも「大きなお世話」や「大きな顔をする」などが見られます。
これを「大きいお世話」とか「大きい顔をする」と使うことはできません。
「大きい顔」とすると本当に顔が大きいことになってしまいます。

このように「大きい」はただ客観的な大きさに力点があり、
「大きな」の方が主観的な思い、感情に力点があるようにも感じます。
しかし、このニュアンスは個人差、地域差があるかもしれません。

Source of Quote

Basically, there's no difference in meaning. Basically, in conversations which are more "emotion filled," so to speak, you would use 大きな.

The phrases 大きなお世話 and 大きな顔をする are interesting because they work fine, but can't be made into 大きいお世話 or 大きい顔をする, because that would mean that his face is literally getting bigger.

You could think of it in that 大きい is more of an objective way to say "big" whereas 大きな is more subjective. But of course, it also comes down to personal/regional differences and such.

Note, I didn't translate the article, I just read it and posted it in my own words, so while I think it's pretty straightforward, other people might have a different take on it.

ah okay, thanks Asriel. Another funny little thing to note down on the card

FooSoft Wrote:In this country, it is the development of skilled individuals with professions like "Warrior", "Wizard" and "Priest" that raises and supports the nation.

My problem with sentences like this is that hardly anyone actually produces sentences like this when they're speaking casually, so as I wade through this long sentence with lots of kanji, by the time I get near the end, I've already forgotten what the beginning was all about.

But your explanation sounds good to me. Basically, it's giving some BS background rationale to make the character classes seem more realistic. I don't think I've ever seen the word "魔導師" before (looks a lot like "magician" 魔術師, which you see in most any fantasy manga), but at this stage, I could probably say that about most compound kanji words.

Basically, the Google Translate result looks pretty much just wrong to me. Subjects, objects, and and everything else is all jumbled. The professions aren't supporting development. The development of those professions are prioritized. The country is being placed anywhere. These professions hold a "place" of importance. Everything is reversed. Ugh.

Mushi Wrote:Basically, the Google Translate result looks pretty much just wrong to me. Subjects, objects, and and everything else is all jumbled. The professions aren't supporting development. The development of those professions are prioritized. The country is being placed anywhere. These professions hold a "place" of importance. Everything is reversed. Ugh.

Yes, machine translation is often poor, and Google Translate does not handle Japanese very well. I suspect that one problem is the way Japanese tends to drop clauses, which (especially with the algorithm google is using) is liable to confuse a computer. Basically, if you're at a level where you're trying to read this kind of sentence you're going to do a better job yourself than Google Translate :-)

@vinniram

I homestayed in Japan for a while and noticed they were using な after い adjectives, so I asked them what it meant and what Asriel said was pretty much right.

It's just to add a little emphasis or declaration.