Learn how to use Japanese adjectives to describe nouns
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Jessi: Hi everyone! ジェシーです。Jessi here! |
| Natsuko: こんにちは！なつこです！Hi everyone, I'm Natsuko. |
| Jessi: Welcome to Lower Beginner series 1 lesson 8. So Natsuko, what are we going to learn in this lesson? |
| Natsuko: In this lesson we're going to learn how to use adjectives to describe nouns, like 'a delicious meal' or 'a pretty girl'. |
| Jessi: And where does this lesson's dialogue take place? |
| Natsuko: In a cafeteria where Ken Wood and a colleague are having lunch. |
| Jessi: OK, let's listen to the dialogue. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Jessi: Natsuko, we heard a really important word in the dialogue. |
| Natsuko: What's that? |
| Jessi: 定食! |
| Natsuko: Ah, 'set meal'! Yes, this IS an important word for those who like their food (笑）. This is the most common style of meal in Japan. |
| Jessi: A teishoku often comes on a lacquer tray and has a main dish, a bowl of rice, miso soup, and one or more side dishes, such as a small salad and Japanese pickles. |
| Natsuko: It's usually cheaper to order a teishoku than to order the same dishes individually, so people who are watching their pennies, such as students and salarymen, often have teishoku for lunch. |
| Jessi: Japanese restaurants often have a variety of lunch teishoku, and sometimes they have 日替わり定食, which changes depending on the day of the week. |
| Natsuko: There are also 定食屋, which are restaurants that specialise in set meals. |
| Jessi: Now let's move on to this lesson's vocabulary. |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Jessi: Let's have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Jessi: What's the first word we're looking at today? |
| Natsuko: セルフサービス |
| Jessi: "self-serve". This is a Japanese-English word, or 和製英語, made with the English words, "self-" and "service." It's used to refer to a system in a restaurant in which the customers help themselves to something - for example, a buffet, water, cold or hot tea, or coffee. OK, and the next word is? |
| Natsuko: It's a phrase - お待たせしました |
| Jessi: "Thank you for waiting" or "I'm sorry to have kept you waiting". We heard the waitress say this when she brought the orders to the table. |
| Natsuko: That's right. This is 敬語, or a polite and respectful phrase used to someone with higher social status. In Japan "the customer is god", so you'll hear it very often in Japanese shops and restaurants. |
| Jessi: Even if you haven't been waiting long at all - it's just part of polite Japanese customer service. OK Natsuko, next word! |
| Natsuko: It's この |
| Jessi: "This". In the dialogue we heard Ken say |
| Natsuko: このスプーン |
| Jessi: "this spoon". Remember in Absolute Beginner Season 1 Lesson 11, we learned the words for "this, that, and that over there"... |
| Natsuko: これ、それ、あれ |
| Jessi: And "which?" |
| Natsuko: どれ |
| Jessi: Those words can be used on their own to replace a noun. But この and its partner words, "that noun" "that noun over there" "which noun?"... |
| Natsuko: その、あの、どの |
| Jessi: These have to be followed by a noun. So for example, if Ken wanted to say "this spoon is dirty", he would say |
| Natsuko: このスプーンは汚いです。 |
| Jessi: But if he wanted to just say "this is dirty", indicating the spoon, he would say |
| Natsuko: これは汚いです。 |
| Jessi: Got that? Great! Now let's look at this week's lesson focus. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Jessi: In this lesson we're going to learn how to use adjectives directly in front of nouns, to say for example "a pretty girl" or "a clean room". OK, Natsuko, so how do we begin? |
| Natsuko: As you learned in Absolute Beginner Season 1 Lesson 15, you can use adjectives with the structure, [noun] wa [adjective] desu, which means "[noun] is [adjective]." |
| Jessi: That's right. In this lesson, however, we'll be changing this pattern to just say [adjective] [noun]. |
| Natsuko: First we have to explain that there are two types of adjectives in Japanese language called [-i adjectives] and [-na adjectives]. |
| Jessi: This refers to how the adjective ends. Can we have examples of some -i adjectives? |
| Natsuko: 高い |
| Jessi: expensive |
| Natsuko: 安い |
| Jessi: cheap |
| Natsuko: 汚い |
| Jessi: dirty. OK, so what about [na] adjectives? |
| Natsuko: 奇麗な |
| Jessi: beautiful, clean. Be careful of this one - although it sounds like an i adjective, it's a na adjective. |
| Natsuko: 簡単な |
| Jessi: easy |
| Natsuko: 大切な |
| Jessi: important, precious. There are more examples in the lesson notes, but you see that the endings of i and na adjectives are different. But when describing a noun with an adjective, this doesn't affect the pattern. Now Natsuko, can we have an example of first how to use an i adjective to describe a noun? How would we say "a delicious set meal"? |
| Natsuko: おいしい定食 |
| Jessi: You just stick the noun directly after the adjective. You don't need anything to connect them. Now listeners, listen and repeat. A delicious set meal. |
| Natsuko: おいしい定食 |
| Jessi: (wait 5 secs) Now listeners, try saying "a delicious set meal" in Japanese. |
| Natsuko: (wait 5 secs) おいしい定食 |
| Jessi: Great. Now let’s try it with a na- adjective. What’s the word for clean again, Natsuko |
| Natsuko: きれいな |
| Jessi: And what’s the word for spoon? |
| Natsuko: スプーン. So if you want to say a clean spoon, it would be - きれいなスプーン. |
| Jessi: Please repeat after Natsuko. |
| Natsuko: きれいなスプーン |
| Jessi: (wait 5 secs) Now listeners, try saying "clean spoon" in Japanese. |
| Natsuko: (wait 5 secs) きれいなスプーン |
| Jessi: Okay, now let’s introduce a different point here really quickly. |
| Jessi: Remember we learned in Absolute Beginner series Season 1 lesson 5, how to ask for something saying [item] + おねがいします？ |
| Natsuko: Noun + ください means almost the same as [item] + おねがいします but ください implies “give me [item].” the usage is the same as おねがいします. You can use this simply by putting ください after the item you like to ask for. For example, “A spoon, please.” would be スプーンください。 |
| Jessi: Now let’s combine asking for something with the phrases we learned earlier. Here’s an example we heard in the dialogue... |
| Natsuko: きれいなスプーンください |
| Jessi: "Please give me a clean spoon." Now let's try saying "hot tea, please" or "please give me hot tea". First, do you remember the word for "tea"? |
| Natsuko: [pause] お茶 |
| Jessi: Now, the word for “hot” in Japanese is あつい. We first touched on this in Lesson 15 of Absolute Beginner Season 1. So you can talk about the weather being hot, or something hot to the touch. However, we don’t use it when talking about a hot drink. Instead, we would use... |
| Natsuko: あたたかい. |
| Jessi: Right. It literally means “warm”, but this is the appropriate word to use when talking about a hot drink. あたたかい can be a bit of a tongue-twister, but 頑張って！ Listen and repeat - hot |
| Natsuko: あたたかい |
| Jessi: [5 secs] Now let's put it together and say "hot tea". |
| Natsuko: あたたかい おちゃ |
| Jessi: Now listeners, listen and repeat. hot tea |
| Natsuko: あたたかいおちゃ |
| Jessi: (wait 5 secs) Now let's add the "please". |
| Natsuko: あたたかいおちゃください |
| Jessi: Now we have the whole sentence. Listeners, listen and repeat. "Hot tea, please". |
| Natsuko: あたたかいおちゃください |
| Jessi: (wait 5 secs) Now listeners, try saying "hot tea, please" in Japanese. |
| Natsuko: (wait 5 secs) あたたかいおちゃください |
| Jessi: Great! Now what about a な adjective? |
| Natsuko: Hmm, let’s practice the sentence we saw in the dialogue. |
| Jessi: Okay! A clean spoon, please. So clean is... |
| Natsuko: きれいな |
| Jessi: And "spoon" is... |
| Natsuko: スプーン |
| Jessi: So put those together and... |
| Natsuko: きれいなスプーン |
| Jessi: (wait 5 secs) Now let's add the "please". |
| Natsuko: きれいなスプーンください |
| Jessi: Now we have the whole sentence. |
| Jessi: Listeners, listen and repeat. "A clean spoon, please." |
| Natsuko: きれいなスプーンください |
| Jessi: (wait 5 secs) Now listeners, try saying "A clean spoon, please." in Japanese. |
| Natsuko: (wait 5 secs) きれいなスプーンください |
Outro |
| Jessi: Well, that about does it for today. |
| Natsuko: How did you find the lesson? |
| Jessi: We have a more complete list of adjectives in the lesson notes, so please be sure to check those out! See you next time! |
| Natsuko: じゃ、また！ |
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