I'm just curious if anyone else around here is in a similar situation as me. I didn't know what a single grammar term meant until I started learning Japanese. I've managed to learn what an adjective and what a verb is from my Japanese studies, however I still have no idea what transitive/intransitive means and all sorts of other things.

It's also kind of funny, because I'm taking a grammars class right now for programming languages. And even with programming languages, which have virtually unchanging grammar rules, I still get confused when pulling their grammar apart.

One of my homework problems was to write the grammar out for a C++ switch statement. Despite C++ being my "native" programming language, and understanding how to use switch statements perfectly, I was still clueless for quite some time on how to write the grammar for it.

I just don't get along with grammar very well >.<

Of course learning how to deal with the grammar for a programming language is much simpler. Especially since they have specific notations like (E)BNF to use and all that. But I found the comparison somewhat interesting at the time.

arch9443 Wrote:I'm just curious if anyone else around here is in a similar situation as me. I didn't know what a single grammar term meant until I started learning Japanese.

I think this is pretty common since I think US and UK schools these days don't teach formal grammar for English any more, so the first encounter many people have with the terminology is when they're learning a foreign language.

Quote:I've managed to learn what an adjective and what a verb is from my Japanese studies, however I still have no idea what transitive/intransitive means and all sorts of other things.

Transitive: takes an object marked with を (eg 落とす); intransitive: doesn't (eg 落ちる). Easy :-) The Japanese terms are 他動詞 自動詞 which I think are easier to remember which way round they go...

pm215 Wrote:

arch9443 Wrote:I'm just curious if anyone else around here is in a similar situation as me. I didn't know what a single grammar term meant until I started learning Japanese.

I think this is pretty common since I think US and UK schools these days don't teach formal grammar for English any more, so the first encounter many people have with the terminology is when they're learning a foreign language.

I'd be very surprised if they weren't teaching what nouns, adjectives and verbs are in schools in the UK. They most certainly were when I was at school.

The only (important) grammar words I've learned through learning Japanese are transitive and intransitive, because we generally don't distinguish between the two in English.

arch9443 Wrote:I'm just curious if anyone else around here is in a similar situation as me. I didn't know what a single grammar term meant until I started learning Japanese. I've managed to learn what an adjective and what a verb is from my Japanese studies, however I still have no idea what transitive/intransitive means and all sorts of other things.

This is actually the reasoning behind why many (decent) high schools in the US now require at least 2 foreign language classes, sometimes 3 now (but that's mostly for college entrance reqs). Some things like verb conjugation are not apparent to people until they learn them through a foreign language. Things like transitive/intransitive verbs as well are good examples of language rules in a language that we just don't realize.

I think this guy has a nice opinion here:
http://www.fluentin3months.com/grammar-and-speaking/

I sort of think the 'middle approach' is good. I'm not really far enough in to know if it is useful beyond my level, but I reckon you probably spend more on it up to N1.

It's only confusing because you don't know it, and you shouldn't expect yourself to know it. The learning curve might be slightly higher at beginner level because you're learning both grammatical concepts and Japanese language. Once you get past hurdles like topic, subject, objects, transitivity, voice, causative etc, so-called grammar, like にもかかわらず, をとわず etc, isn't too different from learning vocabulary.

fakewookie Wrote:I'd be very surprised if they weren't teaching what nouns, adjectives and verbs are in schools in the UK. They most certainly were when I was at school.

The only (important) grammar words I've learned through learning Japanese are transitive and intransitive, because we generally don't distinguish between the two in English.

I remember them coming up repeatedly in school, but there are a shocking number of adults who don't know what they are.

English categorises all verbs as either transitive or intransitive. It's just as important a concept for learners of English, so that they don't make sentences like "yeah, I do need." The difference with Japanese is that some verbs can be used as both.

fakewookie Wrote:

pm215 Wrote:

arch9443 Wrote:I'm just curious if anyone else around here is in a similar situation as me. I didn't know what a single grammar term meant until I started learning Japanese.

I think this is pretty common since I think US and UK schools these days don't teach formal grammar for English any more, so the first encounter many people have with the terminology is when they're learning a foreign language.

I'd be very surprised if they weren't teaching what nouns, adjectives and verbs are in schools in the UK. They most certainly were when I was at school.

The only (important) grammar words I've learned through learning Japanese are transitive and intransitive, because we generally don't distinguish between the two in English.

i guess it differs from school to school, because i never learnt it at all... i had to look up noun, verb, adjective, etc multiple times when i started learning japanese. i still forget what an adjective is even now...

the only grammar term i learnt was adverb, and that was at university because it appears a lot in philosophy of language...

My situation was a little odd, because I went to a private school till the 4th grade. By that point any English class I had expected me to already understand those terms, and we were building upon them. I passed all my English classes simply by reading a sentence aloud and asking myself if it sounded correct or not. If not I would alter it till it worked, and I got As and Bs using that strategy.

My situation is a bit weird as well, since the equivalent of first grade in France I've been in a bilingual french, english school. Whereas I've done 0 grammar in english, we're constantly pounded with grammar in French (till the equivalent of 9th grade). Without that I don't think I would've ever known what a direct object was in Tae Kim and I often look at the verb tenses in french because we've never been taught that in english.

I find it kind of strange that the most prominent form of grammar study that was given to me growing up in Canada was 'Mad Libs.' That's gotta say something about the schooling system.

Javizy Wrote:It's only confusing because you don't know it, and you shouldn't expect yourself to know it. The learning curve might be slightly higher at beginner level because you're learning both grammatical concepts and Japanese language. Once you get past hurdles like topic, subject, objects, transitivity, voice, causative etc, so-called grammar, like にもかかわらず, をとわず etc, isn't too different from learning vocabulary.

fakewookie Wrote:I'd be very surprised if they weren't teaching what nouns, adjectives and verbs are in schools in the UK. They most certainly were when I was at school.

The only (important) grammar words I've learned through learning Japanese are transitive and intransitive, because we generally don't distinguish between the two in English.

I remember them coming up repeatedly in school, but there are a shocking number of adults who don't know what they are.

English categorises all verbs as either transitive or intransitive. It's just as important a concept for learners of English, so that they don't make sentences like "yeah, I do need." The difference with Japanese is that some verbs can be used as both.

Even though the same is true in English as well, it's not a concept I'd ever even thought of before starting to learn Japanese. Which is quite weird really.

fakewookie Wrote:

pm215 Wrote:I think this is pretty common since I think US and UK schools these days don't teach formal grammar for English any more, so the first encounter many people have with the terminology is when they're learning a foreign language.

I'd be very surprised if they weren't teaching what nouns, adjectives and verbs are in schools in the UK. They most certainly were when I was at school.

That comment was based on my (admittedly now 20 year old) memories of only hitting grammar terminology in (UK) high school French lessons, not in English...

IceCream Wrote:

fakewookie Wrote:

pm215 Wrote:I think this is pretty common since I think US and UK schools these days don't teach formal grammar for English any more, so the first encounter many people have with the terminology is when they're learning a foreign language.

I'd be very surprised if they weren't teaching what nouns, adjectives and verbs are in schools in the UK. They most certainly were when I was at school.

The only (important) grammar words I've learned through learning Japanese are transitive and intransitive, because we generally don't distinguish between the two in English.

i guess it differs from school to school, because i never learnt it at all... i had to look up noun, verb, adjective, etc multiple times when i started learning japanese. i still forget what an adjective is even now...

the only grammar term i learnt was adverb, and that was at university because it appears a lot in philosophy of language...

I'm using an srs to learn more about grammar(english). So I can retain it for the long-term, it seriously does help.

You should check out Making Sense of Japanese Grammar by Zeljko Cipris and Shoko Hamano. It is written specifically for "people who have little or no linguistic training and who may be unfamiliar with grammatical concepts." The sections (Units 19 and 26) on transitive and intransitive verbs explain the concept in an easy-to-understand fashion. Furthermore, they actually go as far as to discuss degrees of transitivity and how English and Japanese draw the line in different places. This explains why Japanese has transitive verbs that are intransitive in English and vice versa. All of this is supplemented with loads of example sentences. It's a great book to start with when learning Japanese grammar. It's not nearly as dry as some grammar books and I read it cover to cover in a couple of days before diving into more advanced books on Japanese Grammar.

I keep confusing that Making Sense... book with Rubin's, but it looks good, stands on its own.

My thing right now is looking at genre-based approaches to Japanese study, e.g. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob...archtype=a

Or: http://books.google.com/books?id=zeWBQWm...&q&f=false

Even if you're not familiar with SFG/SFL concepts, genre has taken off across multiple areas of linguistics and pedagogy, from basic to advanced levels.