Verbs

[Kinsao]

Hi.
I have a question.
I'm trying to learn grammar (haha, I know, a long task), starting with verb endings of different tenses/moods.
I have verb tables (written in hiragana), with examples of different verbs in the three 'groups', and how their endings change. All well and good, I find that perfectly understandable so far, and it is just a question of committing the verb endings to memory and incorporating them into practical situations/sentences, to get used to them actually being used. ^^

I am starting off with verbs in Group 1 (that is, verbs not ending in ~iru or ~eru). Of course, there are slight differences in the way the verbs change depending on the stem. But in order to try and more quickly get a basic 'feel' for the tenses, minus the finesse for the time being, I've drafted out a rough 'table of endings', and I want to know whether you think it will be of some use.

Quite simply, I don't want to bother with something that's going to lead me up the garden path and confuse me in the long-term. However, I am aware that I can't apply simplistic rules to everything, and I will of course have to learn the 'proper' rules. I'm not trying to take a short-cut; just to get off the ground.

OK, here's what I've come up with about endings for Group 1 verbs - with the idea that catching them in conversation or hiragana, I can then more quickly tell what tense they are in. (I hope you understand what I'm driving at! )
(Oh, and I'm sorry, I can't type kana on this machine. ><)

Negative: ~nai
Conjunctive: ~de or ~te
Past: ~da or ~ta
Potential: ~eru
Passive: ~areru
Volitional: ~u
Causative: ~aseru
Causative passive: ~aserareru
Conditional if: ~eba
Conditional when: ~dara or ~tara
Imperative: ~e

Do you think that learning these kinds of 'endings' would help me quicker identify verb tenses (in the Group 1), or only blind me to the more subtleties of the differences between the Group 1 verbs? :?

 

[Glenn]

I like the idea, but there are a few inconsistencies that I see. This is just for recognizing them, right? If that's the case the list is fine. If you want to use it to conjugate verbs, I think it needs a little tweaking.

 

[kioshi]

I was just talking about learning japanese after watching fast and the furious tokyo drift. So.....what would it need for it to be better?

 

[Glenn]

Well, you have to know what form of the verb to stick these endings to. Now, it can get a little complicated with some of them, so I didn't really want to muddy the waters unless it was absolutely necessary. Without getting into the sticky areas (-te, -ta, -tara), I'd say that it might be better to make nai anai, to show better how it sticks to the verb stem; e.g., for kaeru the stem is kaer, and you attach anai to it to get kaeranai. But, since she's doing it in kana you can't really do that.

Hmm, maybe I shouldn't have said anything. I haven't really dealt with doing this the kana way.

 

[Kinsao]

My mistake - I forgot to put 'a' in front of 'nai'. >_<

In real life I'm not necessarily doing it 'the kana way', and certainly not with romaji! It's just that I don't have Japanese language facility on my main machine, and not permission to install it. -_- (I have no excuse I can give for needing it for works purposes!)

Thanks very much for your input! I realise that there are things that get missed this way, but what I was thinking of was a 'quick recognition' in listening, rather than the stricter, more detailed grammar rules that you apply to writing.

(Plus, I find that the more I listen, if I at least mostly understand the principle of what I'm hearing, I tend to pick up things unconsciously; not always quite correct of course, but I often find that when I come to learn some 'formal rule' I discover that I actually knew it anyway without realising it.)

But once again, not trying to shortcut anything.

Conjugating verbs, takes more work. :auch:

And, that doesn't touch on transitive and intransitive verbs. But I have to learn a bit slowly!

 

[Glenn]

I agree. This way is good for you, it seems, so stick with it. 頑張ってね！