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J. A. Crippen
3rd April 2002, 10:25
I have a pet theory I'd like to air here (plug your noses!)... The *real* reason why Japanese people avoid using nouns for 'I' and 'you' and instead tend to use titles or names, or just omit the personal reference altogether and leave it to context is because there are *so damned many* words for 'I' and 'you'. Just looking at a table in one of my grammar books:

I: watakushi, watashi, kochira, kochi, atashi, uchi, boku, ore, washi, jibun
You: anata, anta, sochira, sochi, kimi, omae, kisama

Now dammit which do you use when? Instead of trying to figure this out Japanese people just use the appropriate title.

But of course, the title is not always easy... Even for addressing a husband one has a pile of options depending on situation and nuance:

My: shujin, danna, otto, hazu, daarin, <name>sama, <name>san, <name>chan
You: anata, anta, otoosama, otoosan, otoochan, papa, <name>sama, <name>san, <name>chan
Your, their: goshujin, dannasama, dannasan, dannachan, <name>sama, <name>san, <name>chan, <name>kun

Gee, Japanese men are hard on their wives! Not only do they expect them to cook, but they expect them to figure out how to address them too!

BTW, 'hazu' comes from eigo 'hazubando'. No clue where 'daarin' comes from. Anyone else know?

Ben Bartlett
3rd April 2002, 14:31
No clue where 'daarin' comes from. Anyone else know?

Darling, perhaps? A total guess on my part, but that's kind of what it looks like.

NumeroUno
3rd April 2002, 19:43
Originally posted by J. A. Crippen
I have a pet theory I'd like to air here (plug your noses!)... The *real* reason why Japanese people avoid using nouns for 'I' and 'you' and instead tend to use titles or names, or just omit the personal reference altogether and leave it to context is because there are *so damned many* words for 'I' and 'you'. Just looking at a table in one of my grammar books:

I: watakushi, watashi, kochira, kochi, atashi, uchi, boku, ore, washi, jibun
You: anata, anta, sochira, sochi, kimi, omae, kisama

Now dammit which do you use when? Instead of trying to figure this out Japanese people just use the appropriate title.


I'm hardly familiar with Japanese, but here's the information I know.

Watashi is a neutral "I".
Boku is a somewhat more informal "I" generally used by men.
Atashi is in some ways a similar women's equivalent to boku.
Jibun means oneself.

I have not heard the word "kochira" and "kocchi" used regarding oneself; they both literally mean "this direction", and "kochira" can be used to introduce another person to your interlocutor (one would rarely say 'kore' ["this"] regarding a person the way you would in English e.g. "Mr. Crippen, this is Ben Bartlett." --> "Kochira wa Bartlett san desu." and generally not "Kore wa Bartlett san desu.").

Anata is a neutral "you".
Anta is a familiar "you" used generally by women.
Kimi is "you" limited to use by close friends.
Omae is a particularly rude method of saying "you".

Hopefully I've not disinformed you. Good luck!

Rahul Bhattacharya

Jeff Hamacher
8th April 2002, 02:57
my take on the situation is that the strict, vertical nature of social relationships in japan has come to be reflected in the language. each nuance is expressed with different terms. having said that, i think many languages include a huge variety of colloquialisms which can be difficult for the foreign learner to understand much less use appropriately. my study of french supports this position.

regardless, i think James put it best: in most reasonably polite speech the subject "you" is avoided in preference for a listener's title, their family name with appropriate honourific, or left out altogether. the vocabulary used elsewhere in the expression is often enough to indicate clearly who is being referred to. using any form of "you", including anata, to someone of similar or higher social rank may be interpreted as rude or too familiar by some japanese.

of course, dropping the subject from everyday speech is also the source of much confusion for japanese speakers; they often have to confirm and reconfirm in the course of a conversation just what or whom is being discussed. on the other hand, in casual speech a japanese speaker usually includes very direct references to their listener and so forth, so often things balance out.

J. A. Crippen
8th April 2002, 07:37
The part about *any* subject being dropped is importantly true for any student of Japanese. It's reassuring to know that even the Japanese get confused about what exactly they're talking about.

Of course, similar situations happen with colloquial English. Just consider the number of times you've asked or been asked "Wait a minute. You're still talking about X aren't you?" or "You mean X, right?". It's the same situation, where the subject was dropped from the conversation and is implicit. Enough discourse has happened to where the hearer is confused about whether the implicit subject is still in effect, or whether it has been passed over in favor of a new subject.

Good style in speech and writing in both Japanese and English is knowing how long a subject should be left implicit until it is explicitly included again, and how often explicit repetition of the subject is considered pedantic or even irritating. Since the formal written language has a great effect on the formal spoken language in most language communities, the formal spoken style tends to adopt the trends of the formal written style. Hence the two tend to reinforce each other in terms of implicit and ellipted subjects. The colloquial spoken language is however little affected by the formal written language, and this can be seen by how in colloquial situations the subject is much more often reaffirmed.