Learning Japanese (上級)

[Ryuou]

Originally Posted by ACGalaga

You're all probably familiar, but I'll give a shout-out for smart.fm. Good place to practice vocab as well as pronunciation.

What's this?

[Vexx]

LOL... smart.fm has one of the most UNinformative homepages I've ever seen. There's almost no clue as to its purpose outside of a couple of Japan references and vague "apps""blogs" stuff.....

So yeah, please enlighten us more about this site because it sure is opaque.

[ACGalaga]

Oh, sorry
If you make a profile you can study Japanese vocab through an application called iKnow.

Also, It complies list of vocabulary from things such as Hiragana times, so you can read the articles and practice the vocab as well.

Isn't there a "take a tour" link on the home page? None the less, I've been enjoying studying on that site (but by no means should it be your only means of studying).


Recently, they applied a new feature that allows you to d/l a podcast of recently studied words. Pretty neat site.

[Kylaran]

Originally Posted by Doraneko

Since Ryuou has mentioned Nagi from Kannagi in the previous speech, I am wondering if there is a specific name for her speech pattern.

AFAIK Horo from Spice and Wolf specifically uses 花魁言葉 in her speech. Nagi's speech pattern although feels quite similar (old-fasion casual), somehow the two look technically different in a few ways.

Grateful if anyone can shed some light on this.

ナギ（@ ep1）：
わらわも取り敢えずは、そちの傍におれば安全のようじゃからの。よろしく頼むぞ｡

現代語：
私も取り敢えずは､あなたの側にいれば安全のようだから｡よろしく頼むよ｡

勝手に花魁言葉へ変換：
わっちも取り敢えずは､ぬしの側にいれば安全のようでありんすからの｡よろしく頼むよ｡

Nagi's way of talking isn't quite as foreign as it seems. According to wikipedia on kansai dialect (I was reading this article before, and it had several charts on the evolution of words from their old Japanese form into their modern kansai equivalent), the copulaic form "ja" was around roughly during the Muromachi/Edo period. This is some common knowledge, I believe, for those of you familiar with the usage of ja in relatively pre-modern Japanese.

Furthermore, we may be able to answer this question by analyzing the historical kana usage in the ED (むすひのとき）. There are some parts of it that make sense when analyzing the readings of the words vs. their written form.

For example:
罪と云ふ　is pronounced as つみという despite the different reading.
持ちて is the equivalent of 持って　(Someone confirm this for me, I remember reading this somewhere but I'm not sure where).
直き pronounced なほき in the song was read that way pre-Gendai Kanazukai, but holds the same meaning as なおき　（は　ひ　ふ　へ　ほ　＝　わ　い　う　え　お）.

Kana was often used in this way during the Edo period.

Also, the term 妾（わらわ） was used for "I" by females during the Edo period, itself derived from 童, which apparently means child, and thus is used in conjunction with humble form at times (although this seems like a bit of a contradiction considering Nagi's attitude of being somewhat proud).

I think it might simply be an early Edo dialect, or something along those lines. Plus, Nagi's way of using の instead of ね (see example above) sees modern usage in some Kansai dialects (chuugoku, specifically Hiroshima-ben according to Wiki), which I doubt is derived from a much earlier, secluded type of dialect like Oiran.

Or maybe Nagi is simply using an alternate form of 花魁言葉?

Even Horo's Oiran dialect is from the Edo period. The reason for its peculiarity is because of its retention of court dialects and talk, which was distinctly different from that of even lesser nobles and especially the common people. Agglutinating languages ftw. So I doubt it's a derivation of that, considering Nagi's method of speaking is much closer to the developments in the language as a whole, which -may- denote a relationship closer to the common tongue rather than something like Oiran.

Of course, this is all speculation.

Just to be sure, I asked a friend from Sendai about Kannagi, and he should give me a reply soon. After all, the locations in the manga/anime are based off Sendai the city. :P Maybe he'll know something about the language too.

[yononaka]

Originally Posted by Ryuou

Yeah I have the 6th version which I think is the latest one. But then I also have a computer dictionary application that has most of that dictionary in it. So unfortunately I don't use my hard copy very often which makes the money I spent on it sad. But they aren't exactly the same, fortunatley, so I sometimes check the hard copy if I can't find or don't like what I find in the computer one.

Yeah, I mostly use the electronic 広辞苑 as well, but I also decided to get a hardcopy with the expectation that I'd be inclined to look stuff up more often when I don't have the computer turned on. Unfortunately though, because of the large bulk and small print I hardly use it in reality. For some reason seeing it at your desk tends to impress the hell out of people who don't know Japanese, though. Generally, though, unless one is an old-school type person who's much more comfortable with books than computers, getting the print version is likely to turn out to be a waste if one already has some electronic variant of this.

Yes, something like that is what I'm looking for. Next time I'm at the bookstore I'll look for that and some others. It's kind of expensive though.

Well, there are "alternate means" of obtaining this particular title if one looks around. I found it that way first, but referencing a scanned copy of this type of book is a pain, and besides I do try to buy what I actually find useful.

[Quarkboy]

I have heard that "every respectable Japanese household owns a copy of the 広辞苑"

Not sure if it's true or not, but frankly it's not actually that pricey .
The electronic version is 1000% more useful, though, unless you are really fluent in Japanese.

The ability to cross reference with a denshi jisho is invaluable to really understanding the entries anyway.


Ultimately, however, it is never really the best reference. There are more complete dictionaries of 4 character expressions, or old place names, or classical japanese, or kotowaza, or simply vocabulary. But being a decent reference for all of them in one book does make it impressive. The advent of having 10 different dictionaries in a single memory card has kind of damped the usefulness of it.

[Ryuou]

Originally Posted by yononaka

Yeah, I mostly use the electronic 広辞苑 as well, but I also decided to get a hardcopy with the expectation that I'd be inclined to look stuff up more often when I don't have the computer turned on. Unfortunately though, because of the large bulk and small print I hardly use it in reality. For some reason seeing it at your desk tends to impress the hell out of people who don't know Japanese, though. Generally, though, unless one is an old-school type person who's much more comfortable with books than computers, getting the print version is likely to turn out to be a waste if one already has some electronic variant of this.

Yeah, that's pretty much the case. Although I don't keep it at my desk due to its size.

Originally Posted by yononaka

Well, there are "alternate means" of obtaining this particular title if one looks around. I found it that way first, but referencing a scanned copy of this type of book is a pain, and besides I do try to buy what I actually find useful.

That's alright, I prefer to get it in person. Besides, it gives me a reason to head over to the store. Also I'll be able to fill up my stamp card that took a hit after I decided not to order ranobe anymore.

Originally Posted by Quarkboy

I have heard that "every respectable Japanese household owns a copy of the 広辞苑"

Actually so have I. From my Japanese, Japanese teachers.

Originally Posted by Quarkboy

Not sure if it's true or not, but frankly it's not actually that pricey .
The electronic version is 1000% more useful, though, unless you are really fluent in Japanese.

Well when I bought mine it was close to 9000円 I think.

@ Kylaran - I'm glad to see a spark of interest back in that direction. I'll try and get to it when I'm not so tired.

[Ryuou]

Shame on me for neglecting my own thread for so long. So let's see if I can save this from slipping into the abyss. First off is a reminder for -

For some reason I was immediately thinking of "Maiuuu". Big cookie for anybody who recognizes this.

Although I guess I should really say a modest-sized cookie.

Interesting points brought up by Kylaran. So he's suggesting that they're both Edo period dialects.

It's not guaranteed to be accurate but I did some research on wikipedia. Haha, which probably should've been done from the get go. What I found so far for Horo is interesting. What she uses is called 廓詞 (くるわことば), which is what the 遊女 or 花魁 used during the Edo period. So her dialect isn't called 花魁言葉 but rather 廓詞. And there are different forms within that, and Horo uses the ありんす詞 form. I'll post the links for the pages I found below along with what I think are the most important lines from them.

廓詞（くるわことば）は、江戸時代、遊郭で遊女が使用することば、そのことばづかいである。
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%BB%93%E8%A9%9E

廓詞（くるわことば）
遊女達は全国から集められており、訛りを隠すために「～ありんす」など独特の言葉を使っていた。廓詞は揚屋 によって異なっていた。里詞、花魁詞、ありんす詞とも。
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%8A%B1%E9%AD%81

I found the second one to be pretty interesting because it says that the 廓詞 was developed in order to hide the different accents that the girls had.

Let's see if I can find as much on Nagi's dialect...hmm...I'm not really finding much. I'll have to try searching again some other time.

I have some questions I wanted to post but I'll put them over in the other threads to avoid breaking my own rule. I’m not sure what difficulty they’d be considered.

[Doraneko]

Thanks a lot on the explanations on the 廓詞 used by Horo. It sound pretty interesting indeed. So maybe it means Horo is actually hiding something from Lawrence, by deliberately using a made-up accent to cover up her real one?

Btw I have been trying to find some site that teaches basic 廓詞 grammar and vocabulary, but to no avail . The wikipedia explanations you quoted also mention that the 廓詞 used is different from brothel to brothel. The lack of generalized grammar rules and linguistic structures probably makes it very easy to get swallowed by the tide of times.

[Ryuou]

Haha, interesting inference there about Horo hiding something. Giving the setting I would have to say that's not the case though. Besides, we already know where she comes from.

Hmm...that may be tough to find something for that. I'm pretty sure there would have to be something out there, but my guess would be that it's probably in books. You could email the author of 狼と香辛料 and ask him how he learned it, haha.

[Kylaran]

Originally Posted by Doraneko

Thanks a lot on the explanations on the 廓詞 used by Horo. It sound pretty interesting indeed. So maybe it means Horo is actually hiding something from Lawrence, by deliberately using a made-up accent to cover up her real one?

Btw I have been trying to find some site that teaches basic 廓詞 grammar and vocabulary, but to no avail . The wikipedia explanations you quoted also mention that the 廓詞 used is different from brothel to brothel. The lack of generalized grammar rules and linguistic structures probably makes it very easy to get swallowed by the tide of times.

Like much of the fads in language we have today, minor (and I consider different sentence endings that remain copulaic in essence to be such) differences from long ago usually aren't recorded.

In essence, the rules can be derived from reading into grammatical patterns of the more well known patterns of speech from the same time period. Considering that language, a tool for communication, requires that concepts and ideas be transmitted clearly in order to have actual communication, I doubt the basic structure and meaning of the words in the sentences differ significantly from their contemporary counterparts when working in the same language.

[Ryuou]

Man this thread gets buried quickly.

Well I finally went back to the Japanese book store at the Mitsuwa and tried looking for an advanced grammar book. Unfortunately I was only able to find ONE! Which was kind of disappointing. It looked like it'd be pretty useful but I didn't want to spend the $30 or so on it when there's probably better ones out there.

So my options are now to order one online or wait until I go back to Japan this August. I'm easily leaning towards the second, although I'd like to have one now as I plan on reading a lot of my novels over the summer. The problem with ordering online though, is not being able to flip through it to check it out. Hmm...

So nobody has an advanced Japanese topic they want to talk about?

Haha, myself included?

[RandomGuy]

Originally Posted by Ryuou

So nobody has an advanced Japanese topic they want to talk about?

Here, I'll shoot.

Can someone explain to me the difference in nuance between 「〜べからず」and 「〜まじ」?

[Kylaran]

Originally Posted by RandomGuy

Here, I'll shoot.

Can someone explain to me the difference in nuance between 「〜べからず」and 「〜まじ」?

~べからず is a predicative form of a request in the second person often used in writing. For example, 煙草を吸うべからず would be equivalent to the spoken 煙草を吸わないでください. It's a conjugation of べく/べし.

～まじ is also a predicative indicator of what one shouldn't do, but I've mostly seen it used in a first person sense. That is, その方と一生会うまじ would mean something along the lines of その人と絶対会わない.

I'm not really sure of the distinction myself, especially since まじ isn't very common.

[Ryuou]

Interesting. I didn't know there was a まじ with that meaning. I only know the "really?" one, or are they related in some way? And I know べく/べし, but I didn't know it conjugated. To add on top of Kylaran's explanation, here are some definitions from my dictionary. べからず is easy, but I can't find a nice concise one for まじ.

べからず -
①…してはいけない。…すべきではない。「立ち入るべからず」
②…することができない。「許すべからざる行為」

Although I don't know either well, judging by the definitions, it seems that the difference between them is that べからず is more "can't" and まじ is more "don't".

[Kylaran]

For further reference:

http://www.lingwiki.com/index.php?ti...panese_grammar

You'll find varying forms, including べからず and まじ. Seems like those two endings have been around for a while.

[RandomGuy]

"まじ" as frequently encountered in spoken Japanese (e.g. "まじで！？") is youth slang (presumably derived from 真面目), that roughly means "srsly!?" or "no wai!!11" It has no bearing on the historical grammatical suffix of the same spelling.

[Ryuou]

So the two まじ aren't related. I didn't think they were.

@ Kylaran - An interesting thing you posted there. I can't say I understand it all though. It'll take a little time to look through it and figure out what it all is. But for a bit of clarification, those are charts for old Japanese grammar? From what period though? I don't think I saw that in there, although I only skimmed through it.

[noraemon]

Is it the difference of the meaning of "〜べからず" and "〜まじ" ?
You talk about the difficult thing.
Even a Japanese does not understand it well.
Because it is old words.

｢〜べからず｣
1.（Use it for the end of a sentence）It is words to mean prohibition. You must not do it.（…してはいけない） Do not do it.（…するな）

2.（In form of "ざるべからず"）It is words to mean will to emphasize instructions and an order. Do it.（…せよ）

3.It is words to mean impossibility. I cannot do it.（…できない）

4.It is words to deny a natural thing. I cannot do it.（…するはずがない）

「〜まじ」
1.It is words to mean the will of the guess of the negation. There will not be it.（…ないだろう） There cannot be it.（…ないに違いない）

2.It is words to mean will of the negation. It is a few intention.（…ないつもりだ） I do not intend to do it.（…するつもりはない）

3.It is words to mean that I am natural that it is denied. I cannot do it.（…するはずがない） It is natural that there is not.（…ないのが当然だ）

4.It is words to mean the will of the guess of the impossibility. I do not seem to be it.（…できそうもない） I seem not to be able to do it.（…できないようだ）

5.It is words to mean will of the inappropriate and prohibition. You had better not do it.（…しないほうがよい） You must not do it.（…てはならない） Do not do it.（…するな）

"まじ" is regarded as negation of "べし".
After the Heian era, "まじ" was used for "べからず", but it was pushed in "まい" which occurred newly and tapered off.

[Ryuou]

Hm, nice explanations there, noraemon. I guess what I was thinking about the difference being "can't" and "don't" was pretty close.

If you wouldn't mind, could you explain that last part again for me? I think I know what you're saying, but not completely.

日本人ですか、noraemonさん？