Talk:Japanese/Existence and Copula

Thoughts
I realized after I started on the topic of Existence that this page was getting a little loaded. So, it'd be fine with me to separate this up if ya want.

It's 2:30 am, so I don't really think my prose is up to snuff, but it should be decent. I'll look into cleaning it up a bit when I'm more awake. I just really wanted to get something up tonight, for some reason.

Anyway, the two things I debated with myself about for a bit:
 * 1) Whether to use は, or が.  Doesn't really matter to me, I was taught は first, and it seems to  be used with basic sentences more often.
 * 2) Plain versus Polite forms of verbs.  Now that I think back on it, it probably would've been better to use the polite forms, as it'd be better to teach them to conjugate those first, just cause it's easier.  But, truthfully, it doesn't really matter on this page, so if someone feels like going through and editing them all to います, and あります, then feel free.

--Xepo 06:32, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * Personally, I think it'll be better to be consistant; you used です so you might as well stay polite. --151.203.51.100 17:45, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Necessity of the だ copula
Compare these two sentences in the text:
 * 1) これ は ほん だ (uses the だ copula)
 * 2) きみ は つよい (doesn't use the copula)

My guess is that if you want to write "/noun/ is /adjective/" (example "you are strong"), either
 * 1) the だ copula is optional (which is ommited in the example), or
 * 2) the だ copula cannot be used

I think this should be explained and some accompanying samples should be added to the は section. My creations:
 * かのじょ は きれい (she is beautiful)
 * あの ぼうし は しろい (that hat is white)

I just learned these stuffs so if the examples are wrong please write out :). Agro1986 11:05, 2 October 2005 (UTC)


 * There are two classes of adjectives. Unfortunately, there is no agreement about what to call these word classes in English.
 * i-adjectives (also called attributive verbs, etc). Notice the final i, which we will later learn conjugates. The copula だ cannot follow i-adjectives, although we will see that the polite form です can be used to indicate politeness.
 * つよい
 * しろい
 * na-adjectives (also called noun adjectives, attributive nouns, etc.) Like nouns, these words generally require some form of the copula, although there are rules for omitting だ in informal speech. (na comes from the use of な when these words are used in front of a noun,)
 * きれい　(the i here is part of the long ei and does not conjugate)
 * げんき
 * Your example above for きれい is missing the copula.
 * かのじょ は きれいだ. (She is beautiful.)
 * It would be best to avoid using かのじょ in examples since pronouns are usually omitted/avoided.
 * In summary, Japanese has these basic sentence structures.
 * [noun/ na-adjective] だ.
 * [i-adjective]
 * [verb]
 * These are all complete sentences. Note that だ may change form.
 * -ToothingLummox 20:44, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

である
There's another verb I've seen that acts as a copula, that one being である. Unless I'm mistaken, だ/です is actually a contraction of である. And there's also でございます. Should these be mentioned? --151.203.51.100 17:45, 26 February 2007 (UTC)


 * You seem to be right. I've merged that bit in from another page. --Swift (talk) 09:20, 9 March 2009 (UTC)