Japanese grammar reference

⚠️ 🏗️ Under Construction 🚧 ⚠️

Because I forgor 💀

This is a rather tacit, “cheat sheet”-styled grammar reference for Modern Japanese.

Some of the content here is from Wikipedia, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 4.0, but often heavily modified.

External resources

• This page lists all japanese particles, with explanations and usage examples. Since they are numerous and the topic is very deep (and that page is already very good), I have only described a few here.

Particles

も

noun + mo

verb stem + mo + suru/shimasu

Can also be used with question words, sometimes after に, to make their negative forms:

Lexicon

Frequency words

Some only occur in affirmative statements 🟢, while others only in negations 🔴¹. Many can also be used to express other concepts, like intensity.

Examples:

• たいてい９時にお茶を飲みます — I usually drink tea at 9 o’clock
• あまり５時に起きません — I don’t usually get up at 5 o’clock
• トマトを全然食べません — I never eat tomatoes / I don’t eat tomatoes at all

Adjective forms

Verb forms

Passive form

For all verbs, move the final character to the a-step then add -れる.

The object of the active sentence becomes the topic of the passive sentence, marked by は, and the (optional) agent of the passive is marked by に.

Examples:

• チーズはネズミに食べられた — the cheese was eaten by the rat

Adversity passive

Used to show something negative happening. The action doesn’t necessarily need to happen to someone, but it might have a negative impact on them.

The topic in this case does not refer to the object, which may occur with を.

Examples:

• 雨に降られました — it rained / (someone) was rained on
• 隣の人にタバコを吸われている — the neighboring person is smoking

Honorific passive

Used to show respect to the addressee. Often combined with the polite form. In this case, there will be no change in particles: agent and patient remain the same.

Examples:

• お客さまは車を運転されました — the customer was driving a car

Causative form

Can mean force or permission. The permission meaning can be selected by adding suffixes like てあげる, てくれる, or てもらう. Can also express that an action caused an emotion.

For godan verbs, move the final character to the a-step then add -せる.

Ichidan verbs end in -させる instead.

The one actually doing the action is marked with に.

Examples:

• 友達は私に歌を聞かせた — my friend made/let me listen to a song
• もう少し考えさせて下さい — please let me think a bit more
• お母さんの病気が治って安心させた — my mother’s recovery from the illness made me relieved

Causative-passive form

Indicates an action done on behalf of someone else (like the causative), but with agent and patient roles reversed (like the passive). Means specifically being forced to do something.

Drop the -る from the causative and add the passive -られる.

For godan verbs that do not end in -す, a variation is possible:

Examples:

• 生徒は先生に宿題をさせられた — the students were made to do the homework by the teacher

Registers

Honorific register

Used when talking to (or about) someone of a higher “status”. Usually, this means one’s superiors in a job, or customers/clients in a service role. It is never used when talking about oneself.

For most verbs, insert the stem between お- and -になる, but there are several irregular forms.

Since です is a contraction of である, its honorific form is でござる.

These forms also have -ます variants, but a few of them are irregular.

The choice of whether to use the honorific form has to do with one’s attitude toward the subject of the verb, whereas the choice of whether to use the polite form has to do with one’s attitude toward the addressee.

Examples:

• これをご覧に成ってください — please look at this
• 先生は何をおっしゃったの？ — what did the (respected) teacher say?
• これは親子丼でございます — here is your oyakodon

Humble register

Used to sound modest, or pay extra respect to the addressee when talking about one’s own actions, or those of one’s family, company, etc. The polite form is almost always used.

For most verbs, insert the stem between お- and -する, but there are several irregular forms.

For the forms that end in する (します) as a separate verb, it is also possible to use its humble variant いたす (いたします).

Examples:

• はじめまして、カオと申します — greetings, my name is Kao
• 先生から本を拝借しました — I borrowed the teacher’s book
• 先生から本を拝借いたしました — idem

Syntax

Comparisons