4.2 Particles instead of prepositions — は and が — Epoché
What you will be able to do Use a particle: a small word placed after a noun to say what job that noun is doing. Tell は (topic) from が (subject), and say what each one is actually doing. Build 〜は〜です sentences, the basic frame of Japanese. Know the four places where が is compulsory, so that you have a rule to fall back on. Prerequisites : lesson 4.1 — the verb comes last, and particles rather than order carry the grammatical roles. Lesson 4.1 said that Japanese marks roles with particles. This lesson introduces them, and starts with the pair that English speakers get wrong for years. Be warned in advance: は and が encode a distinction English does not make with words at all, so there is no translation to lean on. What there is instead is a description of what each one does, and four situations where the answer is fixed. What a particle is A particle is one or two kana placed immediately after a noun, marking that noun's job in the sentence. English uses prepositions, which go before the noun; Japanese uses postpositions, which go after it. That is the whole structural difference, and it is easy. English Japanese to Tokyo とうきょう へ — Tokyo-to in the house いえ で — house-in with a friend ともだち と — friend-with But two of the commonest particles have no English counterpart in any position, because what they mark is not a relation like "to" or "with". They mark topic and subject , and English distinguishes those by intonation and by what it chooses to put first, not by a word. は marks the topic は — written with the character ha and read wa , as lesson 0.3 explained — says: this is what I am going to talk about . The nearest English phrasings are "as for …", "speaking of …", or simply putting the word first and pausing. The frame it produces is the first sentence pattern in Japanese: AはBです , "A is B". Japanese English あなたはせんせいです。 [1] You are a teacher. あなたがたはふたごですか？ [2] Are you twins? あれはきょうかいです。 [3] That is a church. Three things about は that are worth having straight from the start. The topic need not be the subject. In ふゆは、ストッキングをはきます from lesson 4.1, the topic is "winter" and the subject is an unstated "I". The topic just sets the frame; anything can be the frame. The topic is something already in play. You mark as topic what the listener can already identify: something visible, something mentioned, something obvious. This is roughly the work English does with the as against a , and it is one reason Japanese manages without articles. は carries a whiff of contrast. Saying おちゃはすきです ("as for tea, I like it") quietly implies something about coffee. The implication is faint and usually harmless, but it becomes deliberate in negatives, which is why は turns up so often in them. が marks the subject が marks the grammatical subject — who or what is doing the verb, or what the adjective is true of. Where は says "here is the frame", が says "here is the thing itself", often as new information. Japanese English あそこにせんせいがいます。 [4] There is a teacher over there. ここにこどもがいます。 [5] There are children here. あれがことしのカタログです。 [6] That is this year's catalogue. Compare the third with あれはきょうかいです above. With は : "that thing — it's a church", where the thing is already under discussion and the new information is what it is. With が : " that is this year's catalogue", where the catalogue was already under discussion and the new information is which object it is. The new information sits on the opposite side of the particle. That is the clearest single test there is. Which is why が is the answer to a question word. "Who came?" — だれがきましたか , and the answer is かれがきました , never かれはきました . The question is asking you to supply the subject, so the subject is the new information, so it takes が . Conversely a question word can never take は , because you cannot set up as a known frame the very thing you are asking about. How English does it English has no topic particle, and this is not a gap English feels, because English does the same work three other ways. By position. "As for the fish, I ate it." English can front a phrase to make it the frame, and when it does, it usually needs a helper — as for , when it comes to , or a comma. By articles. A dog barked / the dog barked. The article tells you whether the dog is new or known, which is a large part of what は and が are doing. Japanese has no articles and needs none. By stress. " He broke it" against "He broke it ". English moves the emphasis with the voice; Japanese cannot, because lesson 1.3 established that it does not use loudness that way. The particle does it instead. So the honest statement is not that Japanese has something extra. It is that the two languages cut the same cake differently, and the cut Japanese makes — known frame against new information — is one English makes with articles and intonation rather than with a word you can point to. That is why no translation of は exists and why "as for" sounds so stilted: it is the only English phrasing that is explicit, and English prefers not to be. Four places where が is compulsory The general distinction takes a year to develop a feel for. These four cases are rules, and they cover a large share of what you will need in phase 1. Where Example 1. Existence: あります , います ここにこどもがいます — there are children here 2. Liking, wanting, being able: すき , ほしい , できる , わかる あなたのこえがすきです — I like your voice 3. Body and states: what hurts, what is lacking おなかがいたいです — my stomach hurts 4. Answering a question word, or being one だれがきましたか — who came? Case two is the one that catches English speakers, because the English equivalents are transitive verbs with objects. I like your voice has "your voice" as the object of "like". In Japanese the construction is closer to "your voice is pleasing", with "your voice" as the subject — and so it takes が , and を would be wrong. The same is true of わかる : it means "is clear" rather than "understand", so what you understand is the subject. Case three follows the same logic. おなかがいたいです is "the stomach is painful", not "I