This article introduces the basic word order of Japanese, and a few basic grammar topics.

To beginners, it is often said that you only have to remember to put the verb at the end of the sentence. That is true to some extent, and you will get far using that rule.

To give you an idea of what it would feel like in English – before we look at Japanese – I would like to use the characters Darth Vader and Yoda from Star Wars as an example. If you have seen the movie you may remember that Yoda always says the verb at the end of the sentence. This is not exactly how it works in Japanese, but it will give you a feeling for it.

 

How Darth Vader would say it
How Yoda would say it
darthvader 。 It is a star. 。 yoda 。 Star it is.
I am Darth Vader. Yoda I am.

How the verb order works in Japanese

In Japanese, the verb is normally placed at the end of the sentence.  Let’s look at a few examples.

ペン です。
pen desu.
(It’s a) pen. [Literally: pen is]

ほし　です。
hoshi desu.
(It’s a) star. [Lit: star is]

In these examples we used the word desu. It is a special word that has the meaning of “is” in Japanese. To be grammatically correct, it is not a verb, but is treated very much like a verb, so you can think of the usage as a verb.

Main sentence order is Subject-Object-Verb

The basic rule of grammar is that Japanese is a Subject-Object-Verb language as compared with English which is a Subject-Verb-Object language.

SOV Sentence Order:
[subject] が [object] を [verb]
Example: [who] ga [with what/to what] o [does what]

The subject is marked with a が (ga) right after it. が (ga) is a special type of word called particle. Also the object of the sentence is marked with a particle, を (o). Let’s look at an example.

トラコ が ねずみ を 見ました。
Torako ga nezumi o mimashita.
Torako saw a mouse. (Literally, “Torako [subject] mouse [object] saw.”)

Post Positions, not Prepositions

In English, prepositions such as “in”, “to” and “at” are placed in front of the words they relate to, while in Japanese, the corresponding words are placed after the word.

In the following examples we use the words に (ni) marking direction, and で (de) marking a place for action.

とうきょう　に　いきました。

Toukyou ni ikimashita.
(I) went to Tokyo.

ラーメンやさん　で　たべました。

Raamenyasan de tabemashita.
(I) ate at the Noodle restaurant.

In Japanese the words corresponding to prepositions belong to a group of language constructs called particles. The particles are placed after the word they are modifying.

Some other basic sentence patterns

Here are some examples to illustrate how to form sentences. These illustrate some of the most useful sentence structures for beginners.

Word Sequence Japanese Example
[adjective] desu. 赤い です。
Akai desu.
(It’s) red. [Lit: red is]
[noun] desu. kuruma desu
(It’s a) car.   [Lit: car is]
[topic] wa [object] desu.

トラコ は ねこ です。
Torako wa neko desu.
Torako is a cat.   [Lit: Torako as for cat is.]

あれ は 東京タワー です。
Are wa toukyou tawaa desu.
That (over there) is Tokyo Tower.
[Lit: That as for Tokyo Tower is.]
[subject] ga [object] o [verb]. トラコ が ねずみ を 見ました。
Torako ga nezumi o mimashita.
Torako saw a mouse    [Lit: Torako mouse saw.]
[subject] wa [adjective] desu. 車 は 赤い です。
Kuruma wa akai desu.
(The) car is red.   [Lit: car as for red is]

 

Grammatical Notes on the Examples

The article mentions the following basic grammatical terms:

  • subject : who or what does the action in the sentence
  • object : on what is the action done
  • verb : what action is done
  • adjective : a description word (e.g. red, cold, beautiful)
  • particle : Japanese grammatical concept functioning as a grammatical glue in the sentence.
  • copula : the special word desu.

The article also introduces the following particles:

  • が (ga) : Subject marker
  • は (wa) : Topic marker
  • を (o) : object marker
  • に (ni) : direction marker
  • で (de) : marks place for action

As mentioned above, the word です (desu) is a particular word in Japanese. It is called copula, and has a meaning close to “is” in English. It is conjugated and placed in sentences very much like verbs, so a beginner you can treat it almost like a verb meaning “is” – just remember it is not a pure verb as you get more advanced.

There are three particles used in the examples above; は (wa), が (ga) and を (o). Particles are important grammatical glue in Japanese, that forms words into a context with meaning. Read more about particles in the article particles.

Note that each of the particles  は (wa) and を (o) is pronounced differently from the hiragana character used to write it. The topic marker は is written using the hiragana letter pronounced “ha”. But it is actually pronounced “wa” when it is used as a particle, therefore we write it in romaji as “wa”. The same thing goes for the object marker を that is written using the hiragana letter “wo” but is pronounced “o”.

The particle は (wa) is placed after the topic of a sentence, and が (ga) after the subject of a verb, to indicate what we are talking about. The particle を (o) is placed after a word to mark that it is the object of a verb. Note that the use of the particles は (wa) and が (ga) and how to choose between them is a complex topic in itself. If you don’t know which to choose, は (wa) would be understandable in most situations.

Credit

This page is based on a modified version of of “Some Notes on Japanese Grammar” published for your personal use, with the kind permission of Keith Smillie (http://www.cs.ualberta.ca/~smillie/)

Related posts:

  1. Free Japanese Lesson: Using “is”
  2. Free Japanese Lesson: Where are you from?