In generative grammar, one proposed structure of Japanese nominal phrases includes three layers of functional projections: #P, CaseP, and QuantifierP. Japanese Nominal Structure as proposed by Akira Watanabe Phrase structure involving numerals and counters "two-long-thin-count POSSESSIVE beer OBJECT drank") would only be appropriate when emphasizing the number as in responding with " drank two bottles of beer" to "How many beers did you drink?". In contrast, 二本のビールを飲んだ nihon no bīru o nonda (lit. "beer OBJECT two-long-thin-count drank"). For example, to say " drank two bottles of beer", the order is ビールを二本飲んだ bīru o nihon nonda (lit. They generally occur after the noun (following particles), and if used before the noun, they emphasize the quantity this is a common mistake for English learners of Japanese. Grammatically, counter words can appear either before or after the noun they count. There are numerous counters, and depending on the kind or shape of nouns the number is describing, different counters are used. "bread one-loaf") and パン一枚 pan ichimai (lit. In Japanese, the equivalents would be パン一斤 pan ikkin (lit. In English, one can say "one loaf of bread" or "one slice of bread". Just as in English, different counters can be used to convey different types of quantity. "paper two flat-count"), "two green pieces of paper" must be rendered as 緑の紙二枚 midori no kami ni-mai, akin to "two pieces of green paper". So while "two pieces of paper" translates fairly directly as 紙二枚 kami ni-mai (lit. However, they cannot take non-numerical modifiers. Some nouns prefer 幾 iku, as in 幾晩? iku-ban? "how many nights?" and 幾日も行っていた iku-nichi mo itte ita "I was gone for many days." Ĭounter are similar in function to the word "pieces" in "two pieces of paper" or "cups" in "two cups of coffee". "what people-count honored-ones QUESTION"). "some people-count honored-ones"), and "how many guests?" as 何名様? nan mei-sama? (lit. For example, "some guests" can be translated as 何名様 nan mei-sama (lit. The number can be imprecise: 何 nan or, less commonly, 幾 iku, can both be used to mean "some/several/many", and, in questions, "what/how many/how much". Here 二 ni is the number "two", 匹 hiki is the counter for small animals, の no is the possessive particle (a reversed "of", similar to the " 's" in "John's dog"), and 犬 inu is the word "dog".Ĭounters are not independent words they must appear with a numeric prefix. For example, to express the idea "two dogs" in Japanese one could say 二匹の犬 ni-hiki no inu (literally "two small-animal-count POSSESSIVE dog"), or 犬二匹 inu ni-hiki (literally "dog two small-animal-count"), but just pasting 二 and 犬 together in either order is ungrammatical. In Japanese, as in Chinese and Korean, numerals cannot quantify nouns by themselves (except, in certain cases, for the numbers from one to ten see below). There are numerous counters, and different counters are used depending on the kind or shape of nouns that are being described. Counters are added directly after numbers. In Japanese, counter words or counters ( 助数詞, josūshi) are measure words used with numbers to count things, actions, and events.
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