Hi peoples. I'm back and, hey, I have a great idea. Why don't we learn more about verbs? Yeah, grammar is a lot of fun. To make this easier for anyone who hasn't gotten their hiragana and katakana down you can hover over anything in Japanese to get its pronunciation.
I think I went over sentence order before. In case you forget it's Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) so remember to put that verb at the end. Now I'll just talk a little about what you can do with a verb, mainly what different forms it has. I might be repeating myself some from previous posts so just skip what you know already. There's a lot ahead so maybe you'll want to read only part for now.
Verbs
First of all I hope everyone knows what a verb is because I don't want to explain that. Japanese verbs can be written several different ways and it can get confusing remembering some of the irregularities so if you can practice using them that would be best to helping you remember them.
Dictionary Form
The standard way a verb is written is its dictionary form, which is, you guessed it, how it would appear in a dictionary. It might also be called the simple form or informal form or standard form or plain form depending on what you're reading and what they choose to call it, but it's all the same thing. This is the basis from which all other forms of verbs take their shape.
Before going on there are a few things to mention about verbs. All Japanese verbs (in their dictionary forms) will end with one of nine different kana: う つ る む ぶ ぬ く ぐ and す. Notice that they're all 'u' sounding kana. Notice also that some 'u' kana aren't listed. Dictionary forms of verbs will never end in ふ ぷ ゆ ず or づ.
It's also very common for verbs to have kanji in them. Almost without exception they will be at the beginning of the verb and they will absolutely never be at the end. Verbs will usually have just one kanji and one or more kana with the last kana being one of the nine listed above. Some verbs will also have no kanji. Got it? Example time. 話す: This verb has one kanji and one kana. The kana is one of the 9 used to end verbs.
食べる: This verb has one kanji and two kana. The last kana is one of the 9 kana used to end verbs.
頑張る: This verb has two kanji and one kana. The kana is one of the 9 used to end verbs.
する: No kanji. The last kana is one of the 9 kana used to end verbs.
There's a good reason the last part of a verb needs to be in kana and that's because the last kana can change.
Ch-ch-changes
There are several grammatical reasons verbs need to change: tense (such as past or present), negation (whether the verb is positive or negative) and formality.
Formality
To start off let's talk about formality because it's the easiest to understand. The Japanese language, as you might know, has different levels of politeness or formality to it. It can get quite complex, but for our purposes we'll simplify it by saying there are formal and informal ways of speaking. Some of this involves word choice, but some of it changes the structure of words entire, such as verbs.
When you want to use a verb in its formal form you change the ending kana by replacing the it with a similar kana and adding ます to the end of it. The kana you replace is the 'a' sound of whatever consonant you had. So for example, if your verb ended in む you would change it to み and add ます. If the verb has more than one kana in it you only change the last kana. Keep in mind that if the last kana is す you have to change it to し as there is no kana for 'si'.
Examples: 話す becomes 話します
飲む becomes 飲みます
掘る becomes 掘ります
Important exceptions!
Sometimes you do something different if the last kana is る. If it is preceded by a kana or kanji that ends in an 'i' or 'e' sound you often remove the る entirely. 食べる becomes 食べます and not 食べります
出る becomes 出ます and not 出ります
And right after saying that I'm going to confuse you even more with an exception to the exception. There are two particular verbs which sound the same and change differently. If the verb is いる (to be) then you change it to います. If it is いる (to need) then you change it to いります. Confused yet? There's more.
Important irregularities!
Some specific verbs have their own rules on how they become formal.
来る [kuru] (to come) becomes 来ます [kimasu]
する [suru] (to do) becomes します [shimasu]
There are also a very verbs that change completely when you want to be extra formal, but that's getting way to far ahead so I'm not even going to touch those.
Negation
Still with me? Negation is simply whether a verb describes something as doing something or not doing something. In English we use separate words for this ("I eat cookies" / "I don't eat cookies"), but Japanese just changes the ending of the verbs again.
If you want to say that something does something normally you don't change anything, but if you want to say something doesn't do something then you have to make changes. Remember back a bit. To make verbs formal we changed their 'u' sounds to 'i' sounds and added ます to the end. To make verbs negative we change their 'u' sounds to 'a' sounds and add ない to the end.
Examples: 話す becomes 話さない
飲む becomes 飲まない
掘る becomes 掘らない
Important exceptions!
If the verb ends with う then instead of changing it to あ and adding ない you use わ and add ない.
Examples: 歌う becomes 歌わない
買う becomes 買わない
Important irregularities!
A couple of verbs become negative in special ways. They are:
来る [kuru] (to come) becomes 来ない [konai]
ある [aru] (to be/to have) becomes ない [nai]
する [suru] (to do) becomes しない [shinai]
To make one of the formal, ます -verbs negative you change the ます to ません.
Examples: 食べます becomes 食べません
します becomes しません
Tense
Have I lost you yet? This next one is the big one: tense. There are quite a few tenses out there, but I'm only going to talk about the most common ones: future, present, and past.
Future Tense
You're going to love this one because there is no future tense. Well, that's not entirely accurate. You've already been learning the future tense without realizing it. That's because all the dictionary forms you have been learning are used to indicate the future tense. "Wait!" you're thinking. "I thought those dictionary forms were, like, the regular present tense." They are. They're both. It'll make more sense when you read about the present tense, which is coming up.... now!
Present Tense
Present tense comes in two categories. I don't really know the proper terms to describe them so I'll just call them the habitual present and the ing present. What do I mean? Compare these two sentences from English: "I go to school." / "I'm going to school." Both are present tense, but their meanings are slightly different. The first one you use when you explain what you do regularly or habitually - the things you do in certain situations: "When I'm at the gym I lift weights." The other present tense, the one I call the ing present is how you talk about the things you're currently doing. "Hey, where are you going?" "I'm going to school." or "What are you doing at the gym?" "I'm lifting weights."
So where does the future tense come in? I'm getting to that, but first let me get to using the present tense in Japanese. To use the habitual present tense you use the forms you already learned. So, take for example:
話す (plain), 話さない (plain, negative), 話します (formal), 話しません (formal, negative)
All are in the present tense and all are in the habitual tense. And, get this, all are in the future tense. The only difference between habitual and future is context. Here are two examples:
明日、何するの？ (What will you do tomorrow?) 学校へ行く。(I'll go to school.)
水曜日に何するの？ (What do you do on Wednesdays?) 学校へ行く。 (I go to school.)
The first answer answers in the future tense, the second in the present. Both answers are written with the same tense in Japanese.
The
ing present tense is a little more difficult. Like most of what we've done so far it involves replacing the last kana of the verb with something else and attaching something to the end, in this case it's
いる. The difference is that there is no 1-to-1 correspondence like before. You'll need to memorize what each of the 9 ending kana turn into. So without further ado:
When you have a verb that ends in う, つ, or る you replace it with って
When you have a verb that ends in む, ぶ, or ぬ you replace it with んで
If the verb ends in く you replace it with いて
If the verb ends in ぐ you replace it with いで
If the verb ends in し you replace it with して
So, for example:
待つ becomes 待って and you add the ending to get 待っている
飲む becomes 飲んで and you add the ending to get 飲んでいる
書く becomes 書いて and you add the ending to get 書いている
泳ぐ becomes 泳いで and you add the ending to get 泳いでいる
話す becomes 話して and you add the ending to get 話している
It is also very common to drop the い from the
いる at the end so that
待っている becomes 待ってる and so on.
Important exceptions and irregularities!(You knew it was coming)する [suru] (to do) becomes して [shite]
来る [kuru] (to come) becomes 来て [kite]
行く [iku] (to go) becomes 行って [itte]
Formal ます -ending verbs don't normally change like the above examples. Instead you change the
いる at the end to
います. You can still drop the い.
To make these
ing tense verbs negative (oh boy, here we go!) you change the
いる at the end to
いない or the います at the end to
いません. So let's go over what we can do so far:
話す (plain),
話さない (plain, negative),
話します (formal),
話しません (formal, negative)
話している (plain, ing),
話していない (plain, ing, negative),
話しています (formal, ing),
話していません (formal, ing, negative)
alternately -> //
話してる (plain, ing),
話してない (plain, ing, negative),
話してます (formal, ing),
話してません (formal, ing, negative) //
Okay, one more tense to go.
Past Tense
After all that work and there's still more. You use the same formula you use to make the
ing verbs, but instead of changing the kana to ones that end with an 'e' sound you change them to 'a' sounds. So then:
When you have a verb that ends in う, つ, or る you replace it with った
When you have a verb that ends in む, ぶ, or ぬ you replace it with んだ
If the verb ends in く you replace it with いた
If the verb ends in ぐ you replace it with いだ
If the verb ends in し you replace it with した
And the examples:
待つ becomes 待っだ
飲む becomes 飲んだ
書く becomes 書いた
泳ぐ becomes 泳いだ
話す becomes 話した
Important exceptions and irregularities!
The same irregular verbs come into play here and like above you only change the last kana.
する [suru] (to do) becomes した [shite]
来る [kuru] (to come) becomes 来た [kite]
行く [iku] (to go) becomes 行った [itte]
Now, to create a formal ます verb in the past tense you change it to ました.
To make a very negative and past tense you take the non-past tense version and change the ない to なかった. So for example.
話さない becomes 話さなかった
If you want to make a verb negative, past tense AND formal you take the non-past tense but still formal and still negative form of the verb (ません) and add to the end of that でした to get the combined ませんでした.
話しません becomes 話しませんでした
You can also combine the ing present tense with the past tense to make sentences like "I was doing." along with the simple past tense "I did." type of sentences. In these cases you take the ending いる or います and make them past tense. So...
話している becomes 話していた
And to make them also negative:
話している becomes 話していなかった
Are you still with me? I'm not even sure I'm still with me. Let's summarize what we know:
Summary Example
All the following examples use the verb
話す:
to speak or talk. I stopped adding the hover over effect on these because I lost the strength to keep going after so much typing. orz
話す (plain, present or future tense) [I talk.] / [I will talk.]
話さない (plain, negative, present or future tense) [I don't talk.] / [I won't talk.]
話します (formal, present or future tense) [I talk.] / [I will talk.]
話しません (formal, negative, present or future tense) [I don't talk.] / [I won't talk.]
話している [or 話しる] (plain,
ing present tense) [I am talking.]
話していない [or 話してない] (plain, negative,
ing present tense) [I am not talking.]
話しています [or 話してます] (formal,
ing present tense) [I am talking.]
話していません [or 話してません] (formal, negative,
ing present tense) [I am not talking.]
話した (plain, past tense) [I talked.]
話さなかった (plain, negative, past tense) [I did not talk.]
話しました (formal, past tense) [I talked.]
話しませんでした (formal, negative, past tense)
[I did not talk.]
話していた [or 話した] (plain,
ing past tense) [I was talking.]
話していなかった [or 話してなかった] (plain, negative,
ing past tense) [I was not talking.]
話していました [or 話してました] (formal,
ing past tense) [I was talking.]
話していませんでした [or 話してませんでした] (formal, negative,
ing past tense) [I was not talking.]
And don't forget about the irregular verbs!
Okay! That's it! No more... for now. If you read all of that and remembered anything then give yourself a pat on the back. If you see any errors please let me know.
