7.2 Asking what things are called — Epoché
What you will be able to do Ask what something is, and ask what it is called, and say how the two differ. Ask how something is said in another language. Understand four different ways of being told that the other person does not know. Say that you do not know, without sounding unhelpful. Prerequisites : lessons 7.1 and 4.7 — the greeting, and the question words. This lesson is short and it is the most useful in the volume. A beginner with this question and a finger can learn a hundred words a week from the world rather than from a list, and the words learned that way stay, because they come attached to an object, a place and a person who told you. Both exchanges below end without an answer. That is not an accident of the corpus: it is what happens. Half of asking is understanding the refusal, so the refusals are the lesson. The first exchange A walk in a park. The visitor points at things; the local is not a naturalist. Visitor あれはなんというとりですか。 [1] — What's the name of that bird? Local ぜんぜんわかりません。 [2] — I have no idea. Visitor このはなはなんといいますか。 [3] — What do you call this flower? Local なまえはちょっとわからないんですけど。 [4] — I'm not sure of the name. Two questions with the same shape — that, what-called, is it? — and two refusals. The first refusal is blunt and complete; the second softens itself twice over, with a hedging word meaning a little and an unfinished ending that trails off. The second is what a stranger will usually say to you, and the trailing ending is worth noticing now: Japanese sentences often stop before the end, and the stopping is the politeness. The second exchange A classroom, where the student is asking about languages rather than things. Student ドイツごで「さようなら」をなんといいますか。 [5] — How do you say "good bye" in German? Teacher ドイツごはまったくわかりません。 [6] — I don't understand German at all. Student このさかなはえいごでなんといいますか。 [7] — What do you call this fish in English? Teacher おっしゃるいみがわかりませんが。 [8] — I don't understand what you mean. The frame is in language X, what do you call Y? — the language first, with the particle meaning by means of , then the thing, then the question. It is the same particle you would use for going by train or writing in pencil, and it is the ordinary way of naming the language you are speaking in. Who is speaking to whom Everything here is polite, and it should be, because you are interrupting a stranger. The opener for that is the apology word, which is doing the work of excuse me ; without it the question is not rude but it is abrupt, in the way that walking up to somebody in English and saying what is that bird? is abrupt. The plain version exists and is short. Between friends, children and family, the whole question collapses to two syllables and a rising tone, as the second line of the table below shows. It is the first sentence Japanese children say and the first one foreigners overuse. With a stranger, keep the polite form. The refusals are ranked. The blunt one in the first exchange is fine between equals and slightly cold to a stranger; the hedged one is the safe version. The difference is one word and one unfinished ending, and a learner who only knows the blunt one will sound, over a week of asking questions, like somebody who is always a little annoyed. Saying it another way Six lines. The first two are the same question at the two registers, and the gap between them is the whole of Japanese politeness in one pair. Japanese English When これはなんですか。これはくるまです。 [9] What is this? This is a car. the textbook pair: what is this, and the answer 「これはなに？」「ももだよ」 [10] "What's this?" "It's a peach." the same question between friends — two syllables and a rise あれはなんというかわですか。 [11] What is the name of that river? asking the name of something large and fixed これとあれはなんがちがうの？ [12] What's the difference between this and that? asking what the difference is, which is the next question you will want ぜんぜんわかりません。 [2] I have no idea. I have no idea — blunt, between equals まったくしりません。 [13] I have no idea. the same with a different verb: I know nothing about it What is going on Asking what a thing is and what it is called are different questions. The first asks for the thing's nature — it is a car, it is a kind of pastry — and the second asks for the word. English uses what is that? for both and sorts it out from context. Japanese has two shapes, and the one with the verb for calling is the one that gets you vocabulary. If you ask the first, you may be told what something is for. Pointing. Pointing at a person with one finger is rude; pointing at an object is not. For people, and for anything you are being polite about, the hand is turned palm up and open, fingers together, which is the gesture a shop assistant will use to show you the way to something. It costs nothing to adopt and it is noticed. You will get the answer in writing. A Japanese speaker asked for a word will very often write it down, in characters you cannot yet read, because to them the written form is the word. Ask for it in kana — there is a phrase for this, and it is worth carrying: please write it in hiragana . Nobody will mind, and you will be able to look it up. The names of things are often not the names you expect. A great many everyday objects in Japan have names borrowed from English and then reshaped, which volume 2 dealt with, and a great many others have native names with no relation to anything. Asking is the only reliable method. Guessing from an English word is right about half the time and the failures are memorable. New words Word Meaning Notes とり ja tori bird Part of speech noun Note for English speakers Also the word for poultry on a menu, where it means chicken. あれはなんというとりですか。 — What's the name of that bird? かわ ja kawa river Part of speech noun Note for English speakers Any river, of any size. There is no separate word for a stream. あれはなんというかわですか。 What is the name of that river? はな ja hana flower Part of speech noun Note for English speakers The same syllables as the word for nose, distinguished by pitch, which vol