このかばんはだれですか

[ゴドフィスト]

Hey guys, was looking for a forum where I can ask some simple questions where I can hone my love of Japanese. New here like most. Im just beginning and learning grammar and words at the moment, so please forgive me.

I've been burning through my genki textbook that I bought and im currently on confused on grammar. Right now im learning これはどれのかばんですか？　Which is roughly "whose bag is this?" I was wondering is it still grammatically correct to say このかばんはだれですか？ If this is also grammatically correct then i'd be able to freestyle a little bit with additional sentences. Also is this gramatically correct saying これはだれですか？　If I wanted to say "Whose is this?"

Thank you, super excited and hopefully I can learn and get more understanding of grammar.

 

[Toritoribe]

There is a typo in これはどれのかばんですか？. It's だれの.

このかばんはだれですか？ is ungrammatical. It should be このかばんはだれのですか？. Can you see the difference?

これはだれですか？ means "Who is this?". Now you can say "Whose is this?" in Japanese, right?

 

[Mike Cash]

I've been burning through my genki textbook that I bought and im currently on confused on grammar.

See the connection between the two?

 

[ゴドフィスト]

There is a typo in これはどれのかばんですか？. It's だれの.

このかばんはだれですか？ is ungrammatical. It should be このかばんはだれのですか？. Can you see the difference?

これはだれですか？ means "Who is this?". Now you can say "Whose is this?" in Japanese, right?

Ahh ok. Sorry for the typo. So I would deffinitly still would have to add the partical の even though I specified the bag using この already. Strange, but I got it! So to say "Whose is this" it would be これはだれのですか？ By adding の im asking "whose" instead of "who" if im understanding correctly. Thank you! Super excited

edit: I think using the same knowledge, when asking このかかばんだれのですか your saying whose bag is this, instead of missing the particale の you'd be asking who is this bag. Am I understanding that correctly?

 

[nice gaijin]

Ahh ok. Sorry for the typo. So I would deffinitly still would have to add the partical の even though I specified the bag using この already. Strange, but I got it! So to say "Whose is this" it would be これはだれのですか？ By adding の im asking "whose" instead of "who" if im understanding correctly. Thank you! Super excited

edit: I think using the same knowledge, when asking このかかばんだれのですか your saying whose bag is this, instead of missing the particale の you'd be asking who is this bag. Am I understanding that correctly?

Yep, you got it.

Although このかばん、そのかばん、あのかばん、どのかばん all use "の," think of their function like adjectives* that indicate "this bag," "that bag," and "which bag," and always precede a noun.

これ、それ、あれ、どれ can be used in place of the above "modifier+noun" phrases, and are non-specific--If you're reading the question, you may not know what the person is referring to unless the context is made clear elsewhere in the text, like saying これはだれのかばんですか。"Whose bag is this?"

If you're standing in front of the person and they hold up a bag and say これはだれのですか It's obvious what they're talking about, and you may not hear the word かばん at all.

*technically, they are prenominal modifiers (modifiers that come before a noun; functioning similar to adjectives in Japanese, and serving a similar purpose to demonstrative determiners in English)

PS: it's "particle"

 

[Toritoribe]

So I would deffinitly still would have to add the partical の even though I specified the bag using この already. Strange, but I got it!

Not strange at all. Notice that これはだれのかばんですか？ and このかばんはだれのですか？ are the same in meaning, but different in the sentence construction. The literal translation of このかばんはだれのですか？ is "Whose is this bag?". Thus, この modifies かばん in this sentence as same as "this" modifies "bag" in English. As you can see in the English sentence, だれの is the independent possessive pronoun "whose", meaning "whose one", so it doesn't modify かばん.
Note that dependent possessive pronouns and independent possessive pronouns are always the same form in Japanese, just like "his" or "whose" in English, but unlike "my vs. mine" or "your vs. yours".
cf.
これはわたしのかばんです。
This is my bag.

このかばんはわたしのです。
This bag is mine.

これはあなたのかばんですか？
Is this your bag?

このかばんはあなたのですか？
Is this bag yours?

このかかばんだれのですか

There are two typos there.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

Excellent, I get it now. I guess in my brain I was thinking how can I say it in a different way. Its good to know that the word construction can be different but mean the same thing like in English. I think I was getting confused on だれ vs だれの as well thinking they meant the same thing, thinking の was just a possessive modifier like 私は vs 私の.

Thank you so much guys, hopefully I can ask more questions. Actually understanding the grammatical aspect of Japanese is difficult. I'm onto reading more about "particles" lol. Sorry for all my typos.

 

[Mike Cash]

I think I was getting confused on だれ vs だれの as well thinking they meant the same thing, thinking の was just a possessive modifier like 私は vs 私の.

It is a possessive modifier there. "Whose" is the possessive form of "who". Adding the possessive modifier to "who" in Japanese makes it possessive...."whose"

Slow down. Don't burn your way through the book in a mad rush to get to the cool stuff.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

I see, thanks. Me and a friend are learning JP together and we try to speak to each other in JP. He said 今日は私の金曜日です which is "its his friday" which I understand because we are talking about work schedules, and its his weekend. I had to look up the "Friday" kanji lol.

I want to respond with "What do you want to do this weekend?" I'm in the process of learning particles and conjugating verbs. Would this be grammatically correct? 週末は何をしますか？ I'm kinda thinking that, that roughly means "What are you doing this weekend?" instead of "What do you want to do this weekend?"

Thank you.

 

[nice gaijin]

it's more like "[this] weekend, what will you do?"

I put [this] in brackets because it's understandable from the context, but if you wanted to be explicit you'd use 今週末

"what do you want to do" would be 何をしたいですか, but this is a structure you should save for after you have a strong understanding of how verbs and adjectives are conjugated

 

[Toritoribe]

今日は私の金曜日です sounds odd. It can be barely valid in the context where the speaker is comparing today with another Friday when the focus is on someone else, for instance, a player made the biggest impact in the game on the last Friday, but the speaker did it in today's game (needless to say, today is Friday). It's uncommon even in these situations, though.
私の金曜日 can be valid when talking about your schedule/event on Friday, but other expressions such like 金曜日は～ or 私は金曜日に～ is far more commonly used.

 

[nice gaijin]

@Toritoribe I think the intended meaning was the guy has a different work schedule than the usual Monday-Friday, and their "weekend" starts on a different day. Saying "today is my friday" means "it's the last day of my work week/my weekend starts tomorrow"

@ゴドフィスト, grammatically, I understood what your friend was referring to, because I understand the English usage of that phrase, but be careful about directly translating idiomatic English phrases into Japanese, as native speakers will have a hard time deciphering what you mean.

 

[Toritoribe]

Ah, I see. The point is that 金曜日 hardly has a meaning "the end of weekdays" in Japanese. 明日から週末です might be barely acceptable, but 金曜日 or 週末 usually refer to Friday or weekend just as on calendar, so 明日から休みです would be the most common expression for the context.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

@Toritoribe I think the intended meaning was the guy has a different work schedule than the usual Monday-Friday, and their "weekend" starts on a different day. Saying "today is my friday" means "it's the last day of my work week/my weekend starts tomorrow"

@ゴドフィスト, grammatically, I understood what your friend was referring to, because I understand the English usage of that phrase, but be careful about directly translating idiomatic English phrases into Japanese, as native speakers will have a hard time deciphering what you mean.

Yes, thats exactly what was intended. So if he was to say that to a native speaker it would have to be more specific I'd assume. Probably sounds a little vague to a native speaker as the workdays may be slightly different than in the states. Also I believe したい is the conjugated form of "to want". I was going for "What do you want to do this weekend" like us as a team, not in "what are you doing this weekend" as in just asking from an outside perspective.

So it would be この週末何をしたいですか？Would it be acceptable to drop the です？since we are friends?

 

[Mike Cash]

Did you know the Imperial Japanese Navy was the first employer in Japan to adopt a standardized five-day work week?

 

[Toritoribe]

So it would be この週末何をしたいですか？Would it be acceptable to drop the です？since we are friends?

You also need to drop か, thus, the correct casual version is この週末何をしたい？ with a rising intonation. Note that it's a very common mistake for beginner learners to add the question particle か directly to the non-polite form of verbs/adjectives. Incidentally, there are many other variations for this meaning such like この週末は何したい？, この週末何したいの？, この週末何かしたいことある？, etc.

 

[nice gaijin]

Another possibility is the volitional なにをしましょうか, as it's closer to the "what should we do" meaning he mentioned in post #14

Again, another structure that you should tackle after you get a solid feel for standard ichidan/godan verb conjugation. The key here is there are a lot of different ways to express things that may only differ slightly in meaning, but your best bet is to listen to native speakers and the way they express those concepts, rather than trying to transcribe your thoughts directly from English. I don't recommend anime for this purpose, but TV shows like dramas can be a good way to gain some exposure.

As an aside, なにをしたいですか can still include you in the plans; it neither specifies or excludes participants, it's just asking what the listener wants to do. You could be more specific and say "Name/pronounと一緒(いっしょ)に" first, which means "together with" the person specified.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

Hey guys. I'm now on particles and wondering if this would be grammatically correct. If someone asked me "Where is hiro?" and I responded "He is in the library reading." It would be "ひろさんはどこですか”　and the response would be ひろさんは図書館でよみます。

Hiro being the subject so to add は particle, library being the place at for the particle で and the conjucated verb よむ as よみます. (Would it also correct to say a bit more casually "Where is hiro?" as "ひろさんは?")

 

[Toritoribe]

Notice that the tense of "is reading" is present progressive.
読む usually always needs an object, unlike a similar meaning verb 読書する.

library being the place at for the particle で

で and "at" are not always in one-to-one correspondence. For instance, the particle for "to stay at a location" is に (location にいる). で is for the location of action, whereas に is for the location of existence. "To read" is an action, so で is used in this case.

Would it also correct to say a bit more casually "Where is hiro?" as "ひろさんは?"

Yes.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

Notice that the tense of "is reading" is present progressive.
読む usually always needs an object, unlike a similar meaning verb 読書する.

読書する would be the present progressive form of よむ？So would the sentence would be ”ひろさんは図書館 で読書する”

 

[Toritoribe]

Not really. Those are two different verbs in similar meanings. You need to conjugate 読む (and also 読書する) for the present progressive tense just like "to read vs. to be reading" in English.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

Ahhh ok ok, I think I got it. Haven't learned present-progressive yet but I found the verb for よむ present progressive form. I'm pretty confident the sentence should read ひろさんは図書館で読んでいる。I acutally had to look up the conjugated verb, but the point is to see if I'm making sense and if I said this to someone they would understand me.

 

[Toritoribe]

Yes, the conjugation form is correct, but 読んでいる is not the polite form, and 読む usually always needs an object, as I pointed out.
読む/読みます is interpreted as the future tense in that sentence, thus, it shows that Hiro is not reading yet, or even he is not in the library now just like the impression you would have when hearing "He will read in the library" in English. You'll learn the ~te iru form in the lesson 7 in Genki Ⅰ.
By the way, I edited my previous post, and mention the particles で there.

 

[ゴドフィスト]

I see. 読んで います being the polite form. Had to look that one up. Im not sure I understand when you say it needs an object. Library is the object right? Are you referring it to needing an を to indicate direct object like ”図書館を読んでいま"? If thats the case how would I say "in the library" if its missing the particle で. Would it make sense to add them both (図書館でを読んでいます) or would I have to construct the sentence different?

 

[Toritoribe]

Object (grammar) - Wikipedia

I'm talking about "direct object" for transitive verbs. 図書館 is not the one. Think about "He read a book in the library" in English.