nest0r Wrote:I was really confused by the red herring thing, but I think I got what pm215 meant.

I just meant that if you want to retain the source meaning but use に, then the source in question would have a different feel from using から. I didn't think of it in terms of retaining the exact same sentence structure and just replacing から with に.

I meant "that DBoJ quote is about a particular set of situations where に and から are basically interchangeable but with different nuance, and it doesn't apply here because に and から aren't interchangeable (and in particular implying that に and から are possibly interchangeable for causatives leads the OP further down his misconception that the から is related to the use of a causative here)." Which was perhaps a lot of information to pack into a short phrase :-)

@Thora

Yeah I think that sounds better. The comma makes more sense if I read 気取った文学仲間 as ‘pretentious/affected literary circle(s)’ that are trying to thwart each other ‘互いの足を引っ張り合う’ as an end in itself. This talks about it somewhat in the context of politics: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/kyoiku/learning...T00718.htm

@pm215

I probably shouldn't have riffed on it, but I was suddenly fascinated by the idea of starting with asking about に as a source, looking at the differences in terms of constructions, and then trying to come up with a reason for the different connotation, i.e. the aspect where you can talk about a human source but they're rendered inert in some fashion. As a n00b I like trying to find patterns based on arbitrary bits of information.

Seems like agency and distance are interacting here in interesting ways.

OK, this may be a little long but I'm trying to translate an original japanese bluegrass song. I don't have any lyrics so I'm doing this off of what I can hear on the band's myspace site (check it out here if you'd like:http://www.myspace.com/stovejp). If I've screwed up any of the lyrics feel free to correct me.

This is what I've got so far.
Any and all help would be great:

俺はくわがた虫だ（I think this means something like "I'm a japanese stag beetle" )
びるのかべりついてる　
でもまだ　(but not yet?)
でもまだ
あしはもみちゃりね

aargh57 Wrote:OK, this may be a little long but I'm trying to translate an original japanese bluegrass song.

(Direct link to the song in question. Catchy tune :-))

Quote:俺はくわがた虫だ（I think this means something like "I'm a japanese stag beetle" )

Just "stag beetle" will probably do for lyrics translation :-)

Quote:びるのかべりついてる

Close. ビルの壁に付いてる.

Quote:でもまだ　(but not yet?)
でもまだ

Yep, (because this connects to the negative in the last line of the verse...)

Quote:あしはもみちゃりね

...which is rather trickier. 足はもげちゃいねえ (from もげる + てはいない) is my guess, but it is a bit of a guess.

Verse two is a bit easier:

Quote:俺はくわがた虫だ
地下鉄駅で生まれた
でもまだ
でもまだ
羽はつやつやだ

足がもげちゃい and variations seems to be common (脚がもげちゃいました, etc.).

So really it's もげってしまいました, もげる + てしまう, polite past form, which implies regret/undesirability of the action?

(I guess in this context they were sticking to the wall and they haven't fallen off yet?)

JMW on p. 201 and p. 233 talks about てしまう/ちゃう and てしまいました:

http://books.google.com/books?id=xaXukH7...au&f=false

http://books.google.com/books?id=xaXukH7...ta&f=false

Comments here on ちゃいました: http://www.renshuu.org/index.php?id=21&p...individual (3rd and 4th comments).

nest0r Wrote:足がもげちゃい and variations seems to be common (脚がもげちゃいました, etc.).

So really it's もげってしまいました, もげる + てしまう, polite past form, which implies regret/undesirability of the action?

I don't think ~てしまいました fits with でもまだ, though, plus it doesn't sound like anything that would be a casual form of that. I'm actually more confident of the てはいない -> ちゃいねえ bit than the verb itself...

It fits with でもまだ I think if you read it as もげってしまいません, no? As in, they're still hanging on or something like that? So you don't think てしまいません can be made into ちゃいない? I'll take your word for it. I thought they were using a kind of slangy variation of ちゃいます which is already strange (as noted in that comment in above link) in being a colloquial contraction combined with the polite form. I thought perhaps people just took it an extra step and turned it into a stem with plain negative or something. And then that got made into ね～ instead of ない? ;p

I found this: ‘ふれては△ない(△ means a short pause here) is indeed used for a contraction of ふれてはいない, but it should be ふれちゃいない when used in informal conversation: い after ちゃ is indispensable in this contraction.’ - http://www.guidetojapanese.org/forum/vie...?pid=50658

I'm pretty sure that's early in JMW, too. Hmm.

So it's て-form　は (if) いません/いない? So it's like the いけない/ならない‘must now’ thing (JMW p. 193)?

“c. Following the te form, wa sometimes means “if.” Used with a negative verb or a word of negative idea like dame desu.
(1) Tokei ga nakute wa jikan ga wakarimasen.If there is no watch, I cannot tell time.
(2) Tatte wa ikemasen. You must not stand.
(3) Tatte wa dame desu. You should not stand up.”

nestor Wrote:It fits with でもまだ I think if you read it as もげってしまいません, no?

I don't think you can use the 'regret/oh crap' ~てしまう in the negative, can you? That, combined with the way your first reply gives four examples of non-negative forms and no negative forms, led me rather to think that you were suggesting a non-negative form...

I guess we could use a third opinion :-)

pm215 Wrote:

nestor Wrote:It fits with でもまだ I think if you read it as もげってしまいません, no?

I don't think you can use the 'regret/oh crap' ~てしまう in the negative, can you? That, combined with the way your first reply gives four examples of non-negative forms and no negative forms, led me rather to think that you were suggesting a non-negative form...

I guess we could use a third opinion :-)

lol. I didn't even think of that. The negative that is. But yeah, don't let me make you think we need a third opinion. I tend to ramble even when I'm 99% sure I'm wrong, just to suss out where I went wrong (plus it's fun). This often entails red herrings, however. ^_^

So could it be possibly, ‘but I still won't let myself fall’ or something like that? If it's あしはもげってはいません. {feet} {tear loose} {must not}? Or possibly the ては negative doesn't mean ‘must not’ unless it's いけない/ならない so nevermind? Wait, I don't even think もげって is a word. I need to stop now.

Right, もげて, I knew that...

I'll voice my opinion towards もげてはいない, as in 'hasn't fallen off (yet)'

In terms of もげて＋しまわない　（もげちゃいない）...
I can see how this could work (as in like 「もう行く？」　「ううん、まだ行かない」 as opposed to 「ううん、まだ行ってない」, it's a different meaning)

But since もげる seems to be something that "happens" instead of something that you "do" (i'm not opening the transitive/action verb/blah blah debate that was going on), I think the -ていない, indicating the 'state' of not having fallen off.

I agree with pm215 in that I think it's もげちゃいねぇ.

俺はくわがた虫だ
ビルの壁に付いてる　
でもまだ
でもまだ
足はもげちゃいねぇ

I'm a stag beetle
I'm on the wall of a building
But,
But,
My legs haven't fallen off yet

俺はくわがた虫だ
地下鉄駅で生まれた
でもまだ
でもまだ
羽はつやつやだ

I'm a stag beetle
I was born in an underground station
But,
But,
My wings are still shiny

The thing about てはいない is that I'm wondering what function the は has? Is it just there to allow してはいない to become ちゃいない? ;p Because it seems different from て-form + いない to mean ‘yet’, so I can't translate it that way.

What about てしまいない? I can find results for that on Google but no idea whether it's related to しまう?

It's not different in meaning, just in nuance. It's just an insertion of は for contrast.

走ってる？
走ってはいないけど、歩いてるよね。

He's running?
He's not running, but he is walking.

Nest0r Wrote:What about てしまいない?

You can use てしまう　in the negative when, for example, you want to talk about avoiding something regrettable or a period before some unwanted circumstances. ～てしまわないように　　　～てしまわないうちに　
(Note that it's しまわない　not しまいない）

Most of the てしまいない hits are false positives (i.e. てしまい、ない or the like). I think the others are probably just typos.

As far as I know, you cannot generally use てしまわない to mean the opposite of てしまう. I believe that てしまわない always has to occur in some sort of hypothetical or conditional construction like うちに, と, ため, ように, etc.

@fakewookie - For some reason I was thinking that might be different for when it's inserted in that construction, but I can see what you mean. But then doesn't it lose that when it's contracted?

@Thora - Yeah I was wondering about vてしまいない, though. ;p

Also, is it that such an instance of てしまわないように/うちに is negative because it's ‘completely’ in conjunction with ‘in order to’/‘before’ type constructions which are often used with negative verbs? Not because of the vてしまった having the potential connotation of having completed a regrettable/impulsive action?

Also interesting to note as an aside that since vてしまう is stative, apparently, it can be used with non-controllable verbs.

Edit: @yudantaiteki - Ahha! Okay.

So, then... what's your take on those lyrics? ^_^

nest0r Wrote:@Thora

Yeah I think that sounds better. The comma makes more sense if I read 気取った文学仲間 as ‘pretentious/affected literary circle(s)’ that are trying to thwart each other ‘互いの足を引っ張り合う’ as an end in itself. This talks about it somewhat in the context of politics: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/kyoiku/learning...T00718.htm

Thanks guys, makes perfect sense now.

It's kind of annoying how dictionary lookup doesn't work for 何かというと but does for 何かと言うと. Guess I'll just have to search everything by kana now for the sake of really finding everything. You'd think that this variant would have its own entry in the dictionary...

That contraction is driving me nuts. And the lyrics don't make sense to me. I hate Japanese bluegrass.

Edit: I guess I'm going to stick with viewing the は as having a vaguely emphatic feeling. Stative but with an emphasis on the type of state rather than simply, uh, stating it. Though I've always treated contrastive は with disregard, so perhaps I should look into that also. Would it be safe to say, I wonder, that emphatic and contrastive overlap, but it might be better to leave it as lightly emphatic when it's not being contrasted with a particular sentence element, and is contracted to boot?

nest0r Wrote:That contraction is driving me nuts. And the lyrics don't make sense to me. I hate Japanese bluegrass.

Edit: I guess I'm going to stick with viewing the は as having a vaguely emphatic feeling. Stative but with an emphasis on the type of state rather than simply, uh, stating it. Though I've always treated contrastive は with disregard, so perhaps I should look into that also. Would it be safe to say, I wonder, that emphatic and contrastive overlap, but it might be better to leave it as lightly emphatic when it's not being contrasted with a particular sentence element, and is contracted to boot?

What about は with negative adjectives? I see that even more often, and it means the same thing and is probably how I got used to the idea.

Like someone asks you if your job is going well and you say わるくはないけど. We do the same thing in English, "Well, I wouldn't say that it's bad exactly, but..." Or, more literally "As for awful, it's not (but it's obviously not so great, otherwise I would have just said うまくいってる)."

I seem to remember some good examples of both types of this in the "Read Real Japanese Fiction" series. If I have time at work tomorrow to find them I'll post them. Yay free time as an English teacher.

nest0r Wrote:That contraction is driving me nuts. And the lyrics don't make sense to me. I hate Japanese bluegrass.

Edit: I guess I'm going to stick with viewing the は as having a vaguely emphatic feeling. Stative but with an emphasis on the type of state rather than simply, uh, stating it. Though I've always treated contrastive は with disregard, so perhaps I should look into that also. Would it be safe to say, I wonder, that emphatic and contrastive overlap, but it might be better to leave it as lightly emphatic when it's not being contrasted with a particular sentence element, and is contracted to boot?

I don't think the contraction makes any difference. But yeah, if it's not explicitly being contrasted with another thing, I guess は just acts to emphasise the thing it's attached to, kind of like an implicit contrast.

難しくない。
It's not difficult.

難しくはない。
It's not difficult... [but it is time consuming]

edit: beaten by Tzadeck...

Today I randomly found a sentence that uses てしまわない that doesn't exactly use hypothetical grammar, but is none the less a hypothetical situation.

A character put hydrogen peroxide in his hair and bleached it by mistake. Because it wasn't diluted, his wife explains that his hair will probably fall out soon. He takes his anger out on her and she screams back at him 「あなたの頭のてっぺんがそっくり溶けてしまわなかったのが、ふしぎなくらいよ！」

Well, all negatives can be "hypothetical" in a certain way; that looks like just a standard negative しまわない, so I guess it can work.

I'm wondering about the last sentence in this paragraph, which introduces an elementary school teacher as a character.

ミス・ハニーは、おだやかな口数の少ない人で、けっして大声を出すことはなく、めったに微笑もしなかった。しかし、うたがいもなく彼女は、受け持ちのクラスのどの子からもしたわれるという、あの、きわめてまれな天分をもっていた。彼女は生れてはじめて教室に押しこめられ命令にしたがうことを求められている、小さいな子どもたちの当惑とおびえを、完全に理解しているようだった。

Is this translation good, would you say?
"(Even) the very first time she was put in (front of) a classroom, she demanded that her orders be obeyed, and it was as though she completely understood the embarassment and fear of the students."

I guess what's confusing me is that double use of the passive in the 「押しこめられ命令にしたがうことを求められている」 part. Her demanding her orders be obeyed does not seem to line up with the description of her as quiet.

I'm a n00b so feel free to ignore me, but couldn't that section be that the first time she was 申し込む'd by the class, dot dot dot? Could 申し込む be ‘challenged’ here? Perhaps while she was requesting that they follow orders?