Post by Jembru on Apr 30, 2015 20:23:48 GMT
I have another lie I'd like to discuss with my fellow learners.
So, in a desperate attempt to improve my grammar, I've gone back to basics and am reading the very first grammar book I ever studied from. It's super technical offering practice exercises such as 'make the following sentence pairs into a single sentence using an adjectival clause. Make any other changes the sense demands'. Now that I know Japanese I can follow this book, but how I ever managed to learn from it as a noob I'll never know. I blame this for my somewhat lax use of correct grammar, but think that re-visiting and reading it's page-long explanations might actually add the depth to my knowledge that I missed out on the first time around.
Anyway, one thing that stood out to me, and is something I've read in other books too was..
Noun + suru verbs drop 'suru koto' in the potential with 'dekimasu'
This is referring to the fact that it's 泳ぐことができます but 運転ができます or 勉強ができます.
Then there are questions at the end of the chapter to practice this and one of them was to translate 'she couldn't marry the man she loves'. the answer given as 'kanojo wa suki na hito to kekkon suru koto ga dekimasen deshita. (the book is in romaji in case you're wondering). I re-read the whole chapter in case I missed something, but no where does it explain that sometimes you actually CAN use suru koto. I think I knew this instinctively anyway. I even said 'suru koto' and then corrected myself when I was doing the exercise and something felt out of place without it. I was sure the answer was the right way to say it and not just a typo.
When I thought about it. There seems to be a difference in meaning too. So I propose that you CAN say 運転することができません but this implies that I have a license and am able to drive, but I don't have access to my car, or I've been banned from driving, or something else external is preventing me despite having the ability. 運転ができません (which is true) simply means 'I wouldn't know the first thing to do if you sat me behind a steering wheel.'
So it's permission vs ability. That girl could have married the man she loves, she'd have maybe been disinherited by her parents, or got into trouble with the law and his current wife, but she could have physically signed the papers and exchanged vows. Marrying him was in some way forbidden though.. maybe he didn't return her feelings, maybe she was forced to marry a man of her parent's choosing.. but in some way, she wasn't allowed. So 'suru koto' is appropriate here.
What do you think? Am I jumping to conclusions again, or does this seem right?
So, in a desperate attempt to improve my grammar, I've gone back to basics and am reading the very first grammar book I ever studied from. It's super technical offering practice exercises such as 'make the following sentence pairs into a single sentence using an adjectival clause. Make any other changes the sense demands'. Now that I know Japanese I can follow this book, but how I ever managed to learn from it as a noob I'll never know. I blame this for my somewhat lax use of correct grammar, but think that re-visiting and reading it's page-long explanations might actually add the depth to my knowledge that I missed out on the first time around.
Anyway, one thing that stood out to me, and is something I've read in other books too was..
Noun + suru verbs drop 'suru koto' in the potential with 'dekimasu'
This is referring to the fact that it's 泳ぐことができます but 運転ができます or 勉強ができます.
Then there are questions at the end of the chapter to practice this and one of them was to translate 'she couldn't marry the man she loves'. the answer given as 'kanojo wa suki na hito to kekkon suru koto ga dekimasen deshita. (the book is in romaji in case you're wondering). I re-read the whole chapter in case I missed something, but no where does it explain that sometimes you actually CAN use suru koto. I think I knew this instinctively anyway. I even said 'suru koto' and then corrected myself when I was doing the exercise and something felt out of place without it. I was sure the answer was the right way to say it and not just a typo.
When I thought about it. There seems to be a difference in meaning too. So I propose that you CAN say 運転することができません but this implies that I have a license and am able to drive, but I don't have access to my car, or I've been banned from driving, or something else external is preventing me despite having the ability. 運転ができません (which is true) simply means 'I wouldn't know the first thing to do if you sat me behind a steering wheel.'
So it's permission vs ability. That girl could have married the man she loves, she'd have maybe been disinherited by her parents, or got into trouble with the law and his current wife, but she could have physically signed the papers and exchanged vows. Marrying him was in some way forbidden though.. maybe he didn't return her feelings, maybe she was forced to marry a man of her parent's choosing.. but in some way, she wasn't allowed. So 'suru koto' is appropriate here.
What do you think? Am I jumping to conclusions again, or does this seem right?