Learn about 取捨選択 and 心機一転
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| INTRODUCTION |
| なつこ: こんにちは、なつこです。 |
| Peter: Peter here. |
| なつこ:四字熟語 |
| Peter: Lesson 9. Decisions through Elimination. Interesting title right? |
| なつこ: Yes. |
| Peter: It has everything to do with our first phrase. |
| なつこ: Oh first Yojijukugo.0 |
| Peter: That’s right, which is a four kanji character compound which has another meaning than just the character. So it’s kind of an idiomatic phrase. |
| なつこ: Right. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Peter: So what do we have first? |
| なつこ: 取捨選択 |
| Peter: To sort something out, to make a choice but there is a little more to this phrase than how we just translate it. Natsuko san, can you give it to us one more time, break it down. |
| なつこ: しゅしゃせんたく 取捨選択 |
| Peter: The first character is |
| なつこ: 取 |
| Peter: Meaning take. Second character, |
| なつこ: 捨 |
| Peter: Throw away. Third character, |
| なつこ: 選 |
| Peter: Select. |
| なつこ: 択 |
| Peter: Choose. So take throw away select choose. So what’s the first two kanji character compound? |
| なつこ: 取捨 |
| Peter: To take and throw away. What’s the second two kanji character compound? |
| なつこ: 選択 |
| Peter: To sort out. So we put them together |
| なつこ: 取捨選択 |
| Peter: And it means to select something you need by throwing away what you don’t among many things. |
| なつこ: Quite logical, isn’t it? Well sorting out is all about selecting something and throwing out something you don’t need. |
| Peter: Kind of prioritizing things. |
| なつこ: Right. |
| Peter: You know what like really helped me remember this phrase? |
| なつこ: What? |
| Peter: You know like a multiple choice test |
| なつこ: Uhoo |
| Peter: Like process of elimination. |
| なつこ: I see. This is not it. This one is also not it and you cross out all those not it ones and the remaining is the answer. |
| Peter: Yes not because you knew it but because you knew the other ones weren’t it. So I don’t need this one, don’t need this one, don’t need – okay I guess it’s this one. |
| なつこ: I think that’s exactly what this Yojijukugo is about 取捨選択 |
| Peter: Now Natsuko san, how do we usually use this phrase? |
| なつこ: So this is usually used as a suru verb. |
| Peter: So to the four kanji character compound, we attach |
| なつこ: Suru. |
| Peter: And it literally means to throw away or to select, to choose. |
| なつこ: 取捨選択する |
| Peter: Can we have a couple of sample sentences? |
| なつこ: みんなのアイデアを取捨選択して三つに絞る |
| Peter: We are going to narrow down everyone’s ideas to just three. So we are ______ (0:02:56) yours, yours, yours and we get it down to three. How about another one? |
| なつこ: インターネットの情報は取捨選択して利用する必要がある |
| Peter: So you need to make a choice when you get information on the internet. Okay Yojijukugo #2. |
| なつこ: 心機一転 |
| Peter: To make a clean start, to start off on a clean slate. |
| なつこ: しんきいってん 心機一転 |
| Peter: Let’s take a look at it character by character. First character |
| なつこ: 心 |
| Peter: Mind, heart. |
| なつこ: 機 |
| Peter: Mechanism. |
| なつこ: 一 |
| Peter: One. |
| なつこ: 転 |
| Peter: Revolve. Let’s take a look at the two kanji character compounds inside of this. First we have, |
| なつこ: 心機 |
| Peter: Which literally means mind mechanism. |
| なつこ: Uhoo… |
| Peter: And it indicates something, Natsuko san, what does it indicate? |
| なつこ: Like action of mind. |
| Peter: Okay. Now let’s put this together with the second two kanji character compound. |
| なつこ: 一転 |
| Peter: And this means to totally change. |
| なつこ: Yes this 一転 is used by itself quite often right? |
| Peter: Yes. Again if you have the PDF which we can’t recommend enough, you can see the character but the second character here is the character for 転ぶ so to fall or to rotate. |
| なつこ: Yes. So something is going upside down. |
| Peter: So we put it together |
| なつこ: 心機一転 |
| Peter: And it literally means someone totally changed their mind and usually it’s triggered by a certain event. Would that be a pretty good assumption? |
| なつこ: Yes I think so. |
| Peter: So Natsuko san, how do we use this? |
| なつこ: This is used when someone changes his or her mind in a positive way. |
| Peter: So it’s a very good thing. |
| なつこ: Yes. So it’s kind of like a let’s make a new start. |
| Peter: The power of positive thinking. |
| なつこ: Yes. |
| Peter: That should have been the title. |
| なつこ: What? |
| Peter: The Power of Positive Thinking. Now a common sentence structure would be |
| なつこ: 心機一転なになにを始める |
| Peter: Which means to start fresh and do something new. |
| なつこ: Umm nice word. |
| Peter: Right nice phrase. |
| なつこ: Yes. |
| Peter: Now if you can use this in the classroom or with some friends. Again eyebrows go up, serious faces appear. Where are you getting this stuff from? Let’s start off with a kind of set phrase that’s used quite a bit and if you use it, I think a lot of Japanese people recognize it. |
| なつこ: 心機一転のチャンス |
| Peter: And which means a good opportunity to start something new. |
| なつこ: Yes. |
| Peter: Good. How about a sample sentence? |
| なつこ: 彼は会社を辞め心機一転ラーメン屋を始めた |
| Peter: He quit the company and made a fresh start and opened his own Ramen shop. |
| なつこ: Wow! |
| Peter: That’s quite a change. How about another one? |
| なつこ: 私は心機一転アメリカに留学します |
| Peter: I will go study abroad in the states and start out fresh. This seems likeよくありますねlike one that would be around that’s kind of used quite often. |
| なつこ: Yes. |
| Peter: And how about our last one? |
| なつこ: 大学入学は心機一転のスタートです |
| Peter: Entering University is a really good chance to start over now, start over fresh. Huh this is a really good one. |
| なつこ: Right. Makes you feel fresh. |
| Peter: So let’s ask everybody out there. Try to use this. Visit the site and leave us a comment trying to use this expression. In the last few, we’ve had a lot of listeners come to the site, comment and thenゆうきsensei orもりsensei, he actually fixes them. |
| なつこ: Wow! |
| Peter: So you can give it a try and then we will correct it or give our overwhelming sign of approval if it’s right. So this is a really good chance to kind of practice how to use this for the next time you meet a Japanese person. |
| なつこ: Yes. Before you use it in a classroom |
Outro |
| Peter: That’s right. Okay that is going to do it for today. Again don’t forget the PDF and we also have a review track which you can listen to to really practice saying this phrase and the previous one, these two idiomatic phrases. |
| なつこ: それじゃあ今日はこのへんで。心機一転頑張ってください |
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