Hello, I'm confused about a grammar topic. I learned that we can treat Verb Clauses as Adjectives… - Feed Post by Hutreb
Hello, I'm confused about a grammar topic. I learned that we can treat Verb Clauses as Adjectives by attaching it into a noun, or treat Verb Clauses like Nouns by attaching 事 or の.
But what are Verb Clauses? And when do I need to treat them like Adjec tives or Nouns? I'm so confused >_<
But what are Verb Clauses? And when do I need to treat them like Adjec tives or Nouns? I'm so confused >_<
posted by Hutreb
Comments 8
(I was suppose to write "Adjectives" not "Adjec tives". I'm not good at typing)
@Hutreb, Where are you currently learning grammar?
(which book / website / ...)
I don't know what a "verb clause" is either... I do notice the Tae Kim page which Jack posted a link to does mention "verb clause" too; but I have no idea how "verb clause" could mean something different to the term "clause". I thought clauses always contain some form of verb...
Roughly speaking, verb clauses are basically a clause that acts like a single world in the sentence. It can act like an adjective or a noun.
Let's take a simple state-of-being phrase, such as「甘いものが好き」(Amai mono ga suki - Like sweet things) and use it as a verb clause in a sentence, 「甘いものが好きな人は、悪い出来ないです」(Amai mono ga suki na hito ha, warui dekinai desu - People that like sweet things cannot be bad).
When adding「な」to「甘いものが好き」(Because it ends with a na-adjective), the entire sentence becomes a na-adjective by itself, and also the verb clause that we used in the sentence. (For i-adjectives you don't have to add「な」)
We put it with the noun「人」and the entire phrase turns into a "noun" meaning "People that like sweet things". Basically, "Amai mono ga suki" is a na-adjective that describes "hito".
Now, to use the entire phrase as a part of a bigger sentence, we'll use the particle「は」and a comma「、」(Yeah, obvious) and attach everything with a complement (I think it can also be called a predicate), so we can form a complex and complete sentence "People that like sweet things/cannot be bad"
It's like you're adding two sentences, but the first one acts like a single word, which act like a adjective to a noun (It's obligatory that a noun exist, otherwise it's not a verb clause but just an adjective.「甘い、あまり好きじゃない」is just a normal sentence with an adjective as the matter)
You just need to pay attention to the difference between ending a phrase with an adjetive and a noun.
「この素晴らしい世界の物は、大好きですよ！」(Kono subarashii sekai na mono ha, daisuki desu yo ! - Really like the things of this wonderful world) (I'm so sorry for the examples)
As you can see, i used「の」to attach "This wonderful world" and "Things" and the entire phrase become a single word and the rest is the compliment.(It's easier if you ignore the limits of the words, cause Japanese doesn't use space between them, think as them founding like a Gundam and becoming one)
Also think about the stuff in the verb clause as an adjective as "details" of the noun in matter, so this is different of just using an adjective and a bit more complex.
「クラスの終わりに一緒に帰る約束です」(Kurasu no owari ni issho ni kaeru yakusoku desu - I promise we are going home together after class). "Kurasu no owari ni issho ni kaeru" is a verbal clause that defines the details of "Yakusoku".
Use a verb clause as a noun using「の」or「こと」is also really easy and useful.
「運動をするのが好き」(Undou wo suru no ga suki - Like doing exercises). "Undou wo suru" acts as a noun cause it's used as a single word so it's not a verb, besides it has one (And looks like one).
You just use「の」when speaking specifically about the context,「こと」can be used as "things like"(I highly recommend that you just use that "meaning" to have a understanding that「こと」 is a more general statement while「の」is specific to the context of the sentence and not as a literal meaning.) Such as「皆と付き合いことは、楽しい」(Minna to tsukiai koto ha, tanoshii - (Things like) Going out with everybody is fun).
You will use them whenever you feel like using a more complex way of describing things. You'll use it even when you don't know that you're using it. Whenever you try to write a complicated sentence it turns you to use a verb clause, do you want or not (I used it a lot of times without even care about it, cause the grammar takes you to do it)
I'll give you some other examples so you can precisely understand the concepts. (No roomaji, sorry)
「優しいと可愛い動物は、最高です」(Friendly and cute animals are the best)
「先輩に失礼することは、本当に悪いですよ」((Things like) Being rude with your seniors is really bad (,you know))
「銀行の泥棒の投獄のは、昨日に起きました」(The imprison of the bank burglar happened yesterday)
「今で買い物行くつもりです」(I intend to go shopping now)
I tried to be brief, if you didn't understand something i can try again (I hope you do, it takes me more than a hour to write it xD). If somebody found any error, forgive me i'm not a teacher. Both Japanese and English are still under construction.
Oh. I see.. That makes sense. thank you for the info. ????????- Well, thanks to you, I finally understand why and when we should turn a verb clause into an adjective. But, why do we have to turn it into a noun? Can we just attach the particle to it and say 「先輩に失礼するは、本当に悪いですよ」 without using 「の」 or 「事」?
(@mog86uk, I'm learning from Tae Kim's guide to Japanese but for some reason, I can't understand this grammar topic even though I read it thousands of times! Which is weird because I always understand what he says, he explains things really amazingly and he gives really good examples! Maybe this topic was too complex for me to understand even with his explanations.) - Huntreb, i recommend you to study by "Grammar Guide", the Complete Guide is kinda incomplete and haven't being proofread so i guess you could be better studying the Grammar Guide. I also study with the Tae Kim-sensei guide and it really is amazing, i have the entire Guide copied in a notebook.
About your question, apparently you can use it without「の」and「こと」when using some nouns that are appropriated to this use, such as「訳」(Reason, cause),「つもり」(Intention, plan),「予定」(Plans, arrangement) and etc.
It's just like it explains itself if you just say the verb clause followed by it, and i already saw「訳」being used this way a lot of times with verb clause (The others too). Basically, this kind of noun can be used this way, you can express their meaning using them (Without する or 出来る). For example「満点を取るつもりだ」or「どう言うわけで？」 - I think I found the exact page in the "Complete Guide" you were learning from:
http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/complete/verb_clauses
In the "Grammar Guide", these are the most closely related pages to that topic:
http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/clause
http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/nounparticles#part4
The "Grammar Guide" version is definitely better written; but I see he still uses the term "verb clause" (and even more confusing terms like "state-of-being clause" and "relative verb clause"). Interestingly, "noun clause", "adjective clause", and "adverb clause" are all found on www.dictionary.com and www.wikipedia.org, while "verb clause" isn't found...
I'm guessing what Tae Kim calls a "verb clause" is just any clause that isn't a so-called "state-of-being clause"?
The two types of clause:
・主節（しゅせつ）"principle clause / main clause" (independent clause)
・従属節（じゅうぞくせつ）"subordinate clause" (dependent clause)
And the three sub-categories of subordinate clauses:
・連体修飾節（れんたいしゅうしょくせつ）"adnominal clause" (relative clause / adjective clause)
・副詞節（ふくしせつ）"adverbial clause" (adverb clause)
・補足節（ほそくせつ）"supplementary clause" (nominal clause / noun clause)
