The first topic in our today's lesson is honorific suffixes. Surely you know what we will be discussing if you have heard or talked to the Japanese at least once. An example is the suffix SAN that may be added both to a person's surname and name. It is traditionally translated as Mr, Ms or Mrs if added to a surname while left untranslated if added to a name. This suffix is used both when addressing someone. For example, Mr. Tanaka, how are you? When speaking of a third person: Mr. Tanaka is well. One does not use this suffix when speaking about oneself. In very polite speech, for example, when addressing a client, the suffix SAMA is used for the same purpose. For example, "Are you Mr. Tanaka?" Let us move on to the system of personal pronouns. Please look at the table and repeat after me. We have already discussed that the category of number in the Japanese language is rather limited and used only in certain cases namely, adding the suffix -TACHI to personal pronouns forms plural. For example; I, we, you-single, you-plural, she, they for females and the plural of the pronoun is formed by adding the suffix -RA; he, they for males. The next important topic is the structure of a simple declarative sentence in Japanese. Let us start with the basic structure. Subject plus predicate expressed with a noun. In Japanese, support order is comparatively fixed and the sentence structure can be schematically presented as a nesting doll in which is the main lower part is a predicate that always stands at the end, and the subject is the upper part. It always stands at the beginning or is missing as in the case with nominative sentences; I am Tanaka, nice to meet you. Inside the nesting doll, that is between the subject and the predicate, all the other members of the sentence are objects, adverbial modifiers. The rule must be observed in a sentence that states that dependent word always precedes the main word. For example, the attribute always precedes the word it modifies. So both word combinations, adjective plus noun and noun plus noun will be composed based on the same principle as in English; a bad man, a university student. The subject in Japanese is in the nominative case, but the nominative case may be expressed with two case particles. WA; the topic particle written down with the Hiragana character HA. GA; the particle of the grammatical nominative case itself represents a subject. A nominative case particle may also be substituted with the MO particle which in English will mean to also. For example; I'm a student. I'm also a student. In this lesson's dialogue, you will encounter the topic particle WA and the MO particle which are attached to the noun expressing the subject. A nominal predicate, that is a predicate expressed with a noun or an adjective is formed with the help of the copula to be someone, something. In polite colloquial speech, this is a copula. Please note one more time what it is spelled while pronounced, its meaning is similar to that of the verb forms is, am, are, and this is an auxiliary verb. It serves to compose affirmative and negative forms of a nominal predicate in the present and future tense in polite colloquial speech. Have a look at the following example; topic particle, I'm a student. The negative form of the copula is. That is to say I'm not a student. One should add to the word student a negative form of the copula. The sentence is the following. Another case particle we are going to cover today is the possessive case particle. It attaches the dependent word to the main one, the attribute to the word it modifies. It is the only case particle that does not define the relation of a noun to a verb, but rather the relations within nouns. Let us have a look at the phrase, university teacher, instructor. First, following the word order principle, we should put the dependent word before the main one, then we need to add the possessive case particle to the word university. The result is. Let us see how this particle interacts with pronouns. Let us take a pronoun we already know; I. If we add -NO to it, we get my, mine. Now try to form the following pronouns on your own; yours, his, hers. Do you remember how we form the plural of personal pronouns. We add the suffix -tachi and how we can say our that is correct. Other plural possessive pronouns are formed, following the same rule. It is time to talk about adjectives. In the Japanese language, there are three groups of adjectives. Today we will study one of them, the so-called na-adjectives or adjectival nouns. They are called so because they have the same form as nouns, but then they attributive position are attached to the main modified word with the auxiliary suffix NA rather than with the particle -NO as nouns are. Please compare; a silent room but a room at university. In the predicative position, these adjectives behave the same as nouns. Tense, style, and negation are all expressed using a copula. In the first lesson, we discussed that general questions are asked in Japanese using the interrogative particle KA but in colloquial speech, there are also short questions. For example, I'm a student, and you? "And you," in this case is a short question without a predicate. In Japanese, it will be formed using the topic particle with a rising intonation on the syllable; "And you." The concluding particle in Japanese is most often used to politely tone down your sentence. It might be translated as a tag question. Talking like that, a Japanese person is looking for support, approval, or understanding. In most cases, this particle is not translated at all, and people are usually discussing something well known or obvious for both of them. For example, "The weather is good, isn't it?" We have already studied the system of personal pronouns. In the Japanese language, there is another polite designation of personal pronouns besides and, or, here it is, I, you, they. In fact, those are polite demonstrative pronouns of place meaning, space relevant to the speaker translated as here, near me, my home, my family. Space relevant to the conversation partner translated as; there, at your place, near you, you, your family. Space irrelevant to the speaker or the conversation partner translated as there, at their place, they. Pronouns take case particle the same as nouns. For example; this is near me Mr. Tanaka, Professor Tanaka is there. By the way, the word teacher is used as a respectful honorific suffix of their surname instead of the suffix SIR when speaking not only about a professor or a teacher, but also about respected scientists, cultural luminaries, and athletes. The last pronoun that we are going to study in this lesson is an adverbial demonstrative pronoun SO translated as so, in this way. As you are saying, it is often used in phrases such as: Really? Is that so? Yes, it is so. In any case, those are phases expressing the speaker's attitude towards the partner's words. The general rule for all demonstrative pronouns starting with the syllables KO, SO or A is the clear distinction between the areas they designate. KO is everything within the speaker's realm. SO is the first syllable of pronouns designating everything related to the conversation partner and A, of pronouns designating something equally irrelevant or unknown to both the speaker and their conversation partner.
