I randomly found this article today about the differences between Japanese and English.

http://esl.fis.edu/grammar/langdiff/japanese.htm

It concentrates on how the differences between Japanese and English cause native Japanese speakers to have trouble in specific areas when speaking English. Being an English teacher, I think the article does a great job.

My question is, does anyone know an article or resource that explains this in the opposite direction? That is, how the differences between the two languages cause native English speakers to have particular problems when learning Japanese.

I think all of us Japanese learners know something about this, because we often notice our own shortcomings and we've read about this kind of thing before. But if there was one good resource that covered this whole topic well it might be useful.

Have you seen Japanese for the Western Brain?

Inny Jan Wrote:Have you seen Japanese for the Western Brain?

Not sure how accurate that info is. On the numbers page, it claims there's no way to pluralize Japanese words, and that it always relies on a number to do so.

But that's not actually true.

かれ he
かれら they

わたし I
わたしたち we

Those are just 2 I thought of off the top of my head. And they aren't used for just those 2 words, either.

It's possible they're trying to simplify things, but that's a mistake. Lying to someone and then later telling them you lied isn't good. Especially if they never get to the point where you tell them you lied.

wccrawford Wrote:Not sure how accurate that info is. On the numbers page, it claims there's no way to pluralize Japanese words, and that it always relies on a number to do so.

But that's not actually true.

かれ he
かれら they

わたし I
わたしたち we

Those are just 2 I thought of off the top of my head. And they aren't used for just those 2 words, either.

It's possible they're trying to simplify things, but that's a mistake. Lying to someone and then later telling them you lied isn't good. Especially if they never get to the point where you tell them you lied.

I think those count more as pronouns which are covered here: http://kimallen.sheepdogdesign.net/Japanese/nouns.html

If you wanted to actually count and pluralise people, then you would use ひとり、ふたり、三人/3人, etc...

It's right that in general though there is no suffix/prefix/variation of the word that indicates plurality though.

Quote:English is one of the rare languages that has neither counters nor gendered nouns. That's why it seems so silly to be required to say yon-mai for "four sheets of paper" in Japanese

This however... I don't know what to say. Does he not realise "sheet of" is a counter?

qwertyytrewq Wrote:I think those count more as pronouns which are covered here:

There's really no "pronoun" class in Japanese. If you don't like those examples, just replace them with 先生たち or 子供ら.

I read that -tachi is a "plural marker to personal pronouns or to human (proper) nouns". 田中たち, 先生たち, 私たち fall into that category. What about 花 or 机?

dizmox Wrote:It's right that in general though there is no suffix/prefix/variation of the word that indicates plurality though.

Quote:English is one of the rare languages that has neither counters nor gendered nouns. That's why it seems so silly to be required to say yon-mai for "four sheets of paper" in Japanese

This however... I don't know what to say. Does he not realise "sheet of" is a counter?

Well, not exactly. A Japanese says something more like "four-thin-objects sheets of paper", isn't it? Additionally, in English, once it's clear you're talking about sheets of paper, you can very well say "I want four (of them)": no counter.

But you can't just say "four papers," right? You have to say four sheets or four pieces of paper.

kusterdu Wrote:But you can't just say "four papers," right? You have to say four sheets or four pieces of paper.

Right, unless someone can give a context where saying "four papers" would mean "sheets of paper" and it would make sense.

The only context that "four papers" make sense in for me is when talking about essays or reports; basically a bundle of papers. "Do you have any research papers on you? I have 4 papers with me." is ok, but "How many sheets of paper do you have? I have 4 papers." sounds odd to my ear.

I think in the case of "sheets of paper," you can't say "4 papers" because "paper" isn't what you're asking for. You're asking for a "sheet" which happens to be made of paper.

So when are we going to start talking about Hitler?

Neither たち nor ら are proper plurals anyway. 田中さんたち, for example, could mean a group of people named Tanaka (a family or something), or it could mean Tanaka and his group of friends. If it were a proper plural it would just indicate plurality. (In this situation it almost works like the Latin/English "et al.")

* On plurals
I think that anybody with some knowledge of Japanese will agree that the way you make plurals in Japanese can not be compared to the way it works in English. As such trying to find similarities between those two seems a very dubious exercise to me. So why even bother? You are not going to make plural of 花 no matter how hard you try.

* On Japanese for the Western Brain
I don't think that the guy I posted the link to makes any claim to be an authority in Japanese. His article lists difficulties that he encountered while learning the language and he was willing to share his experience. I don't understand people who are being nitpicking on those little details which you are sooner or later going to discover yourself (if you are serious about your Japanese, that is). And he does a good job in explaining difficulties/differences that are ahead of you when you start your studies.

Inny Jan Wrote:* On plurals
[...]
You are not going to make plural of 花 no matter how hard you try.

花々

:-D