別 / から ... わかります / ある / でなければ

Hello,

1. A list of topics for students to write about is introduced by:

＜トピックの別＞

What exactly does 別 mean here? Does it imply that you can pick one of the topics listed but you don't have to (kind of like "example topics")? Or does it mean that you have to choose one of the topics listed?


2. This is part of a description of the "rock, paper, scissors" game:

石とはさみと紙の勝負ですから、グーはチョキに勝って、チョキはパーに勝つことがわかります。

My partial translation: "It's a contest between 'rock', 'scissors' and 'paper' ... 'rock' beats 'scissors' and 'scissors' beats 'paper'."

However, I do not understand exactly how から and わかります function here. I tried things like "It's a contest between 'rock', 'scissors' and 'paper' so you understand that 'rock' beats 'scissors' and 'scissors' beats 'paper'", but it doesn't seem right.


3. A heading for a vocabulary list:

名詞と形容詞がある単語

I'm assuming this means "Words that are / can be both nouns and adjectives". Is that right? If so, I can't quite get my head around the use of ある. Doesn't 名詞と形容詞がある mean "nouns and adjectives exist" or "there are nouns and adjectives"? Logically, how can this modify 単語?


4. 外国へ送る小包は、大きな郵便局でなければ取り扱いま せん。

Translation given: "Only larger post offices handle parcels being sent abroad."

I gather that the last part literally means, more or less, "if (it's) not a large post office then (they) won't handle (the parcel)."

However, I do not exactly understand the grammar of でなければ. It looks like a conditional form of でない (= で + ない?), but what is the grammar of that? I hope this is not a stupid question; I may be having a silly mental block with this one.

1. Pass. Seems like that isn't the whole thing to me, and I'm pretty sure I've never seen it. The only thing that comes to mind is something like "list of topics", which would seem like it should have 項目 in it, like 項目別のトピック. So, I don't know.

2. "Because it's a game of rock, scissors, and paper, you can see that..." I don't get the logic, but grammatically that's what it is.

3. 単語 is plural here, i.e., "(vocabulary) words". In that group there exist nouns and adjectives.

4. でなければ is the negation of である (だ) without the normally-there は in its conditional form: である→でない→でなければ. That's pretty much it as far as the mechanics of it go.

Glenn said:

1. Pass.

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Groan, sorry, I misread it (small print, bad light, bad eyes...). It actually says ＜トピックの例＞

Glenn said:

3. 窶儕ﾅ津ｪ is plural here, i.e., "(vocabulary) words". In that group there exist nouns and adjectives.

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As a heading for a list of words, it seems it ought to mean "These words (i.e. the words that follow) can be both nouns and adjectives". Do you see your interpretation fitting that meaning?

Glenn said:

でなければ is the negation of である (だ) without the normally-there は in its conditional form: である→でない→でなければ.

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Oh, OK, it's the lack of は that's throwing me then. Could we also say ではなければ or じゃなければ here? Would there be any different connotation?

eeky said:

As a heading for a list of words, it seems it ought to mean "These words (i.e. the words that follow) can be both nouns and adjectives". Do you see your interpretation fitting that meaning?

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Yes. I don't see why it wouldn't.

eeky said:

Oh, OK, it's the lack of は that's throwing me then. Could we also say ではなければ or じゃなければ here? Would there be any different connotation?

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Yeah, you can (I'm pretty sure), but I couldn't say what the difference would be.

Glenn said:

Yes. I don't see why it wouldn't.

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The conceptual problem I have is that, as I understand it, the verb ある signifies existence ("there is/are"), not a meaning of the type "X is/are Y". However, it seems that here we essentially do want a meaning like "X is/are Y" (like "these words are nouns/adjectives"). If we wanted to say a word was a noun, we would use something like 名詞です, right? I know that 名詞と形容詞です単語 is ungrammatical, but even so I do not understand why ある works. Often I gloss over pedantic points like this, but sometimes they bug me...

It's a relative clause. 名詞と形容詞がある is fine, right? It just means that there are nouns and adjectives. That's modifying the vocabulary (list), 単語. So it's essentially saying この単語は名詞と形容詞からなる.

The writer would want to say 名詞と形容詞（の用法）がある単語 "words that have the usages both of a noun and of an adjective" or 名詞としても形容詞としても使える単語 "words that can be used both as a noun and as an adjective".

eeky said:

Oh, OK, it's the lack of は that's throwing me then. Could we also say ではなければ or じゃなければ here? Would there be any different connotation?

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You can use じゃなければ/じゃなきゃ as a colloquial form, but you can't ではなければ(neither for ではあれば). Probably because the conditional ば originated from the topic marker は.

Toritoribe said:

The writer would want to say 名詞と形容詞（の用法）がある単語 "words that have the usages both of a noun and of an adjective" or 名詞としても形容詞としても使える単語 "words that can be used both as a noun and as an adjective".

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Ah, well... that does seem to feel better.

Toritoribe said:

The writer would want to say 名詞と形容詞（の用法）がある単語.

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With の用法 inserted it makes sense to me. Sorry, I don't exactly understand when you say "The writer would want to say". Do you mean that the original (名詞と形容詞がある単語) is an abbreviated form, which in full would have の用法 (or something similar) inserted?

I mean 名詞と形容詞がある単語 can be interpretable as 名詞と形容詞の用法がある単語. 名詞と形容詞がある is not so clear in meaning without the context but would be acceptable/understandable in the text, I suppose.

Thank you both very much for your help.