Very New Student: 窶堙債 and not 窶堙ｰﾂ？

[sasadajun]

こんにちは、みにさん！はじめまして。

にく は たべません。

Why is は used in this sentence and not を？

This was corrected for me on another site. The context was:

こんばん、さかな を たべます。
にく を たべません。


よんでくれてありがとう。

 

[Rinilex]

を is used to mark the direct object of a verb, or the object that is receiving the action of a verb. にく is marked by を, so in this case it is the にく that is being たべません.

は is a topic marker, and says what (or who) the statement that follows it is about. The topic here is the にく.

So にくはたべません loosely translated would be "as for meat, I don't eat it."

 

[SomeCallMeChris]

Sometime は is used when you making a contrast, and when you specify something that you don't eat it's always a contrast since you presumably -do- eat other foods, and it's especially a contrast when you've just named some foods that you do eat.
You'll find that は can replace が or を to make a change in emphasis like this.

You can say にくをたべません in some other contexts, if you were comparing what you eat to what someone else eats, or comparing what you're having for lunch and what you're having for dinner. But when you're making the general statement 'I don't eat meat', then you use にくはたべません。

 

[Glenn]

I agree with SomeCallMeChris, particularly since you have さかな contrasted with にく here. The most natural interpretation is contrast, and は is a contrastive marker as well as a topic marker.