Japanese Polite Views

• General Goods

One of the trickiest parts of the Japanese language is unfortunately also very common: multiple levels of politeness and formality. In English, there are lots of way to be polite or rude, but they all use more or less the same words. In Japanese, not only can you be polite or rude, but different words actually have different levels of formality associated with them, and you're supposed to use different words depending on who you're talking to (whether they're higher or lower in social status than you).

As far as these lessons go, we're mostly going to start with what is considered polite Japanese. Not particularly formal, but not exactly hangin' with friends either, and it doesn't imply that the speaker is higher or lower in status than anybody else. This a good place to start, because polite language is used frequently, and you probably won't end up offending anybody by talking to them that way (we will get into more informal Japanese, though, since you're an anime fan, not looking to move to Japan... and if you are, go take a proper class). If you're interested, though, here's some more detail.

The bottom line is, don't worry about it too much. Once you get the hang of polite Japanese, it's easier to get a feel for other types, even if you can't really understand them. Oh, and watch out for Samurai movies if you're practicing listening--they tend to speak very formally in addition to some old-fashioned words that aren't used anymore.

From the bottom of the social ladder upwards, the Japanese language changes in sometimes subtle, sometimes noticeable ways. Let's start in the middle, with Standard Polite language. This is comprised of ていねい (teinei, or polite) verbs, grammar, and nouns. (As a side note, all foreigners should begin learning Japanese with Standard Polite forms, then move around from there.) One would use verbs ending in -ma + the ending, standard honorifics when required, and state the subject every few times once understood until the subject changes. Even further upwards, at the top, highly irregular verbs replace the more common ones, one would speak in a way to make the listener or object more honored and the speaker lower and humbler.

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