Day 34 Lesson 1 ( Video )Talking between husband and wife at home

Day 34 Lesson 1 

家いえで   夫婦ふうふで  話はなしている = Talking between husband and wife at home

場所 ばしょ = Location:  家  いえ  = House

登場人物   とうじょうじんぶつ = Characters:  妻 つま = wife, 夫 おっと = husband

For the new words in this video, please check the subtitles and refer to the vocabulary section.

Grammar point

Today’s topic is ふつうけい (plain forms). Since these are forms without 「です・ます」, these are traditionally called plain forms. These forms are generally used in many types of subordinate clauses. We study some of the most important ones for several days tomorrow and thereafter. 

However, these forms are also used in main clauses, that is, at sentence final positions. These are divided into two completely different types: 1) casual conversations (within family or with very familiar friends only), 2) usual written texts including newspapers, academic texts etc, including diaries except casual e-mails or SNS messages. We refer to discourse where plain forms are used in main clauses as plain style, while the style we have studied so far and continue to study until the end of this course where 「です・ます」 occur in main clauses, 「です・ます」style. 

We exemplify plain forms in casual style conversations. These conversations may sound completely different from the ones we studied so far. This is another reason we would like to show some examples of casual conversation to you. However, we strongly recommend not to use this style at this stage of study. As we explained above, the relation of participants is so strongly restricted that it should be very difficult for you to find yourself in such situations. Besides, natural intonation is much more important than 「です・ます」 style conversation so that before challenging to use in actual situations, enough exercise is inevitable. Today please feel another atmosphere of colloquial Japanese only.

Then let’s start!

Plain forms of verbs

Plain forms of 「たべます」

We have studied three of four as follows:

The only new one, 「なかった」, is the past form of 「ない」like other いadjectives and the same formation rule as ないforms are applied.