Conquering the Myths of Japanese Verbs – Part 2 – Verbs in Disguise
Fast question:
Is Tabemasu a verb?
If you said yes: congratulations, you are about to defeat your second myth of learning Japanese verbs.
I bet if you’re like me, you’ve probably started learning all kinds of Japanese “verbs” like the tabemasu above.
One of the first expressions I learned in Japanese was:
Nani or tabemasu ka?
What are you eating?
At the time, I thought (logically) that tabemasu was the verb in the sentence. Worse still, up to a point, is the verb in that sentence. It does everything a verb should do. Create action in prayer. It shows ‘what’ someone or something is doing.
So why does believing that tabemasu is a verb make your life difficult?
Imagine that you are an alien who lands on Earth and heads to a Halloween party to ask for directions. The person who opens the door wears a black cape, off-white face makeup, platform shoes, red contact lenses, and Dracula’s teeth. Behind him / her is a crowd of other people dressed as the undead. You’ll form some pretty quick (and possibly gruesome) impressions of the people on this planet.
Why shouldn’t you?
How is he supposed to know (without turning on his space age scanning gear) that the natives are in disguise?
The same goes for Tabemasu. Tabemasu is a verb in disguise.
And just like with people, it is a bad idea to form a real impression of a verb based on its disguise.
The first step to really knowing your verb is to take off the costume you are wearing.
Tabemasu wears a very common costume generally called the masu form.
This costume is very easy to put on and relatively easy to wear once you know how to put it on.
So let’s get dressed:
First, start with the real / naked verb. The best way to find naked verbs is to look them up in the dictionary. The naked verb is just the dictionary form of the verb. It is also called the simple or infinitive form.
The nude form of Tabemasu is:
Taberu – to eat.
This is an ichidan verb. You can easily recognize ichidan verbs because they always end in iru or eru. If your naked verb ends in iru or eru, 98% of the time it is an ichidan verb.
Other fun verbs in ichiban include:
Iru – exist (animated objects)
Dekiru – power to do
Uragiru – betray
Eru – win / get
Tsutomeru – to work
The other type of verbs are called godan verbs. If you see a simple verb and it doesn’t end in eru or iru, it’s a godan verb (with the exception of Kuru (to come) and Suru (to do), the only two really irregular godan verbs)
Godan verbs come in nine flavors:
RU – for example: Odoru – dance (note – this ends with oru NOT eru or iru, hence a godan verb)
SU – for example: Hanasu – speak
KU – for example: Iku – to go
GU – for example: Oyogu – swim
MU – for example: Yasumu – to take a break / vacation
BU – for example: Yobu – call (someone)
NU – shinu – die (often sinu romanized)
Vowel + U – Ex: Warau – laugh
Every now and then a godan verb will look exactly like an ichidan verb. The three most common examples of these are:
Hashiru – run
Kaeru: only when it means returning home / to your place of origin
Hairu – to enter
Highly irregular: (you have to memorize them)
Suru (to do) and Kuru (to come)
When learning verbs, it is vitally important to learn the simple / naked form of the verb and form all the conjugations from there. The simple form is the center of your conjugation wheel. The masu form of the verb is one of the many radii that come from this simple form of the verb. It is one of many costumes.
This is how you saw your naked verb in the masu form:
For Ichidan verbs:
1. Take your basic verb.
2. Release the RU.
3. Add masu.
That’s!
E.G:
1. Taberu
2. Tabe
3. Tabemasu
For Godan verbs:
1. Take the last U of your verb
2. Make it an I
3. Add masu
That’s!
E.G:
1. Hanasu
2. Hanashi (remember, there is no SI in the Japanese alphabet, so SI is pronounced SHI)
3. Hanashimasu
What about this one:
1. Warau
2. Warai
3. Waraimasu
Easy, isn’t it?
Lastly, the two Irregulars: (there is no rhyme or reason for these, just be glad there are actually only two)
1. Suru (do) = Shimasu (this looks exactly like you would if you put the SU ending of a Godan verb in this form masu. Scroll up and take a look. That’s the best way to remember how Suru is conjugated in This formulary)
2. Kuru (to come) = Kimasu (Aside from the fact that it sounds like Shimasu, a bit, you just have to memorize this)
What’s even better is that you can attach more than just masu to step two of this conjugation.
For example, what if you want to say, I start talking:
1. Start with Hanasu (talk)
2. Take it to step 2 of the Masu = hanashi change.
3. Add hajimeru = hanashihajimeru
Congratulations, you just did your first compound verb.
If you want to keep doing something, try tsuzukeru.
I keep talking = hanashitsuzukeru.
You can combine tons of verbs using the base just before where you normally put the masu.
That’s because, in reality, the familiar form masu is just one of many endings you can attach to the basic STEP 2 conjugation of your naked verb.
So, be sure to strip your verbs before you have fun dressing them up.
Part 3: How to conjugate
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