Wa and Ga

[Kevin Geaslin]

What's the difference in the usage of these? Do they both identify the subject or direct object of the sentence?

[Jock Armstrong]

Wa refers to the object, and ga refers to the object


Watashi wa onna ga suki desu. I like girls.

Wa is like "as for" in English-- As for me, I like girls.

Hope this helps.

[Jock Armstrong]

AAAAAAAARRRRGGGHHHH!!!! TYPO ALARM!

That should read "Wa" refers to the subject. DOH!

[Kevin Geaslin]

I see. I had read somewhere that wa is used when a noun is introduced for the first time, such as saying "my car". Then you can use ga when refering to that object, such as saying "its got a flat tire" in the next sentence. Thanks for the info!

[nicojo]

This is from my book, because my JPN 101 class had questions about it. I don't really understand it too well myself, but for what it's worth articles like this are cross-linguistically among the hardest things to "get" because they are used in so many different circumstances. Just listen to an esl speaker or better yet see how they write...they usually trip up on verb congugations and articles, especially not getting idioms, which are confusing a lot of the time b/c of the different article in it. That doesn't make sense, but here is what my book says:

"General Guidelines (it says there are more instances and I am only giving you a few examples, but these are some basic usages)

1. Use ga after a question word, and in the answer to a question using such a question word.

Which one is mr. kawamura's book?...dore ga kawamura san no hon desu ka?
This is mr. kawamuras' book....kore ga kawamura san no hon desu.


2. Use wa in statements or questions that seek to identify or describe X

This is a book...kore wa hon desu.
Is that a book?...are wa hon desu ka?

3. Use wa in negative statements.
That person is not mr. kawamura...ano hito wa kawamura san dewa arimasen."

Later the book says

"Ga is a subject particle. It marks a word or phrase that is the subject of a sentence. Wa is called the topic particle because it is often used to mark a word or phrase that tells what the sentence is about."

So I don't know if that helps, but at least asking questions is relatively easy. And there are a limited number of conjugations...much easier than English actually.

In some ways JPN is easier for me than german or old english were...

[Joseph Svinth]

There is also the noun form wa, as in "You Gotta Have Wa," a very fine book on Japanese baseball.

[Jeff Hamacher]

the sentence towards the end of Nicojo's post is about as succinct an explanation as you'll find: wa is a topic marker or particle and ga is a (grammatical) subject particle. my own take on learning to use particles well is based on learning good, idiomatically correct sentence patterns and using them. i never bothered trying to memorize big lists of "correct places to use such-and-such a particle".

ga is definitely not an object particle; direct objects are marked with wo. the sample sentence from Jock might make ga look like an object particle, but English and Japanese grammar express the message of this sentence differently. a more accurate analysis and translation:

Watashi wa onna ga suki desu. literally means something like

"As for me, women are liked."

(this isn't to say that onna ga suki desu is a passive construction as i've written here in English ... just another danger of explanatory translation)

the upside to Jock's example is that it's a very typical idiomatic expression to help you with learning particles. there are other sentence constructions quite a bit like it, too, so you can build on this towards more complex expressions.

[Poop Loops]

The way I was taught, is that wa is used when you need more emphasis on something.



Watashi wa onna ga suki desu. literally means something like

"As for me, women are liked."


Let's take this for example. If you said Watashi wa onna wa suki desu., it would mean you ONLY like girls. With ga, it's more casual, implying that you like more than just girls, wheras with wa it's like saying you don't like anything else (basically).

[Jeff Hamacher]

Originally posted by Poop Loops
The way I was taught, is that wa is used when you need more emphasis on something.

as a topic marker, wa is used to clearly indicate a particular situation or individual. in that sense, it can be used to emphasize a difference between specific people, things, or settings. even stronger than this is the marker nara, which carries the meaning, "as long as that's the case, ... ".

If you said Watashi wa onna wa suki desu, it would mean you ONLY like girls. With ga, it's more casual, implying that you like more than just girls, wheras with wa it's like saying you don't like anything else (basically).

i'm not convinced that this is an appropriate or accurate distinction, but my wife seems to agree with you! according to her examples, you could use wa to mark something that you like in contrast to something that you don't like. you could use ga to mark something that you like in particular amongst a number of things that you also happen to like.

again, i prefer to learn idiomatic sentences or expressions and avoid thinking too much about individual particles and their functions, although sometimes you have to. thanks for your post.

[Douglas Wylie]

My nihongo sensei says "ga marks the object of your affection". Wa means is or equals.

[Jeff Hamacher]

Originally posted by Douglas Wylie
My nihongo sensei ...

correction: nihongo no sensei

... says "ga marks the object of your affection", ...

in the above expression, yes.

... Wa means is or equals.

only in certain cases.

[Douglas Wylie]

Originally posted by Jeff Hamacher

My nihongo sensei ...

correction: nihongo no sensei



Corrected correction-

ENGLISH SENTENCE

My nihongo(ADJ) sensei(N)...

JAPANESE SENTENCE

Watashi no nihongo(N) no sensei(N)...


:rolleyes:

[Jeff Hamacher]

Douglas,

i'm not sure what purpose is served by arguing for the use of Japanese loan words as though they behaved grammatically like English words, so i'll let that continue to be your area of expertise. best of luck with your studies.