please check these sentences

[Nostrum]

Hi, i´m trying to translate some sentences just for practise...
Can someone please tell me if they´re all right?

Code: Select all

シモンくんは何になりたいですか。What does Simon want to do?(occupation)
マネージャーになりたいと言います。He says he wants to be a manager.
阿蘇山と富士山では、どちらか高いですか。What mountain is taller, Aso or Fuji?
明日どこに行きたいですか。Where do you want to go tomorrow?
どこでもに行きたくないです。I don´t want to go anywhere.
日本の作家の方では、誰かが一番大好きですか。What japanese writer do you like the best?

thanks...

They are all wrong and I am not just being mean

I suggest you use a site called lang-8 for corrections, on that site you have native speakers correct your sentences. Native speakers' corrections would be better than any people on this English forum's.

Here is why those are wrong:
1. Don't use -たい form for what others want to do (that mistake is in a bunch of those).
2. Don't say どこでもに, the に is redundant.
3. 誰か means "someone", 誰 means who, so the last one is not properly translated.

Lastly, don't translate English to Japanese as practice, you will come up with and ingrain mistakes. It is bad for your Japanese.

[keatonatron]

Nevertheless, I find the whole situation odd because when I think of something as being a favorite, I think of it as the most liked. In my head, I can't possibly see there being more than one most liked, since 'most' is so absolute.

That's the problem

"Favorite" doesn't necessarily mean "most liked". It just means preferred (favored), or "liked more than others".
It's certainly possible to have only one favorite, but it isn't limited to only one.

[furrykef]

1. Don't use -たい form for what others want to do (that mistake is in a bunch of those).

Err... no it isn't... I think it's only a mistake in the first sentence, where I think です should be でしょう. Though maybe it's still OK since it's a question and not a statement, I dunno. In the second sentence I think it's fine because he said he wanted to be a manager, so it's actually a first-person reference (He said, "I want to be a manager"). The sentence uses reported speech rather than a direct quote, but I don't think that matters here (though I could be wrong...). Then in the fourth sentence, it's fine because it's asking the listener; "~たいですか" is the standard way to ask "Do you want to X?". Then in the fifth sentence, it's fine because of course it's used in the first person. So it's actually only a mistake in the first case, and maybe not even then.

Lastly, don't translate English to Japanese as practice, you will come up with and ingrain mistakes. It is bad for your Japanese.

I think this is only a problem if mistakes are particularly frequent and they go uncorrected for too long. You certainly shouldn't do it without having experienced or native speakers checking your work, though.

- Kef

[Yudan Taiteki]

Hi, i´m trying to translate some sentences just for practise...
Can someone please tell me if they´re all right?

Code: Select all

シモンくんは何になりたいですか。What does Simon want to do?(occupation)
マネージャーになりたいと言います。He says he wants to be a manager.
阿蘇山と富士山では、どちらか高いですか。What mountain is taller, Aso or Fuji?
明日どこに行きたいですか。Where do you want to go tomorrow?
どこでもに行きたくないです。I don´t want to go anywhere.
日本の作家の方では、誰かが一番大好きですか。What japanese writer do you like the best?

thanks...

They are all wrong and I am not just being mean

Maybe not mean, but mistaken.

1. Don't use -たい form for what others want to do (that mistake is in a bunch of those).

Perfectly fine as long as it's in a question, or followed by some qualification like と言いました。

2. Don't say どこでもに, the に is redundant.

It's not redundant. In that case it should be どこにも, but でこにでも is possible in the right context (i.e. どこにでも歩いて行ける)

Lastly, don't translate English to Japanese as practice, you will come up with and ingrain mistakes. It is bad for your Japanese.

Agreed.

[becki_kanou]

They are all wrong and I am not just being mean

I suggest you use a site called lang-8 for corrections, on that site you have native speakers correct your sentences. Native speakers' corrections would be better than any people on this English forum's.

For sentences as simple as these high level non-native speakers can correct them just as well, and can offer explanations in English which many native Japanese speakers may not be able to do.

Here is why those are wrong:
1. Don't use -たい form for what others want to do (that mistake is in a bunch of those).

In everyday speech V~たい is fine for asking questions about what others want to do, although V~たがる is also OK, and is to be preferred in formal or written contexts.

2. Don't say どこでもに, the に is redundant.

As Nilecat pointed out, it should be どこにも行きたくない, the に is necessary, but misplaced.

Lastly, don't translate English to Japanese as practice, you will come up with and ingrain mistakes. It is bad for your Japanese.

This is good advice. Trying to translate directly between English and Japanese will often lead to confusion and unnatural sentences.

[phreadom]

I have to throw in my 2 cents here as well...

"most favorite" sounds illiterate to me. I think of "favorite" in the same way as "best". You have good, better, and best. You don't have "most best". You have something that is either the best (or favorite), or not.

This might not be correct as per the dictionary or classical usage, but that's how I think of it in usage today.

Q: "What is your favorite song?"
A: "Well, I can't really pick just one... I like different songs for different reasons, so I guess I have favorites in different genres."

ie; I have a "best" liked song in different areas, but for each area, there can be only one "best" or "most liked". I don't have several most liked songs and then a "more moster likederer song". hehe

[NileCat]

Hey, Nostrum

I suggest you use a site called lang-8 for corrections, on that site you have native speakers correct your sentences. Native speakers' corrections would be better than any people on this English forum's.

I don't agree with this at all.
I suppose you're only in your early stage of your Japanese study, by your wrong conclusion,

They are all wrong and I am not just being mean

Which means you have no idea in distinguishing errors in various " corrections " you have from various natives.

And who thinks " natives are all correct at grrammar " ?
Oh, no... you can't be that naive.

[Nostrum]

In this game called internet forums, the only way to win is not to play...

And who thinks " natives are all correct at grrammar " ?
Oh, no... you can't be that naive.

Natives are surely better at grammar than non-natives, it is their language after all.

I suppose you're only in your early stage of your Japanese study

hmmmmmmmm........ well then.......I don't know if English is your first language (if it is I am not trying to be rude), but the way that is phrased, it sounds condescending.

[furrykef]

In this game called internet forums, the only way to win is not to play...

And who thinks " natives are all correct at grrammar " ?
Oh, no... you can't be that naive.

Natives are surely better at grammar than non-natives, it is their language after all.

They're obviously better at understanding whether a sentence sounds right, but that doesn't mean that they're better at explaining why. Some non-natives are better than natives at this and vice-versa. And native speakers do occasionally have misunderstandings about their own native language (albeit generally not nearly as many as a foreign speaker is likely to have).

I don't know if English is your first language (if it is I am not trying to be rude), but the way that is phrased, it sounds condescending.

Well, on the right side, it does say "Native language: Japanese" But anyway, it may be phrased a little bluntly, but I have to say I agree with the conclusion. I mean, I can barely understand any Japanese and I still pointed out mistakes in your advice. ;

I also have to say that, to be honest, saying things like "They are all wrong and I'm not just being mean", and being wrong about it, doesn't reflect all that well on you either. I'm not saying I think less of you for it, because I don't, but the lesson here is to be careful before making bold declarations.

- Kef

[phreadom]

In this game called internet forums, the only way to win is not to play...

And who thinks " natives are all correct at grrammar " ?
Oh, no... you can't be that naive.

Natives are surely better at grammar than non-natives, it is their language after all.

I suppose you're only in your early stage of your Japanese study

hmmmmmmmm........ well then.......I don't know if English is your first language (if it is I am not trying to be rude), but the way that is phrased, it sounds condescending.

You realize that the person you're arguing with is a native Japanese person, right?

And you also realize that many of the people who help correct Japanese on this site are either native Japanese, or have lived there for years and speak it fluently etc, right?

I think it's quite bold to come in and tell people they're completely wrong, when they are native Japanese, and then continue on to argue about it with that native person and with others who seem to have a much better grasp of the language than you.

What exactly qualifies you (or doesn't, given your failure) to sit in judgment and denigrate this forum and its users in your promotion of Lang-8? Not that we mind people promoting Lang-8, but you seem to have done so in a very poor manner.

It's like saying "you shouldn't sit at the bottom of the lake because you'll turn into a fish". While it's true you probably shouldn't sit at the bottom of the lake, it's most certainly not because you'll turn into a fish, but because you'll drown. Fine advice in practice, but reached through entirely faulty reasoning.

[furrykef]

Natives are surely better at grammar than non-natives, it is their language after all.

By the way, I should add to what I said above that I've received several incorrect "corrections" on lang-8 from native Spanish speakers when practicing my Spanish there. Sometimes this was due to dialect -- somebody replacing a Latin American word or grammar construction with a European Spanish one, for example -- but occasionally the corrections were simply wrong. Amusingly, at one point I made a post expressing my annoyance at receiving false corrections, and what do you know, I received a false correction to it!

Of course, the native speakers will still be right more often than they're wrong, but it just goes to show that you can't trust somebody's opinion completely merely because they're a native speaker.

- Kef

[astaroth]

By the way, I should add to what I said above that I've received several incorrect "corrections" on lang-8 from native Spanish speakers when practicing my Spanish there.

Couple of times I saw this occurring on Italian posts, a subjunctive removed for a conditional or an indicative: it's a common mistake among native speakers too. I pointed it out to the person ... I was once also corrected for a misused irregular verb in Italian ...
lang8 is a great site but few times one has to be careful on whether a correction is right or wrong. After all even native speakers make grammar mistakes, it's not that whatever comes out of one's mouth is automatically perfectly grammatically correct.

[Yudan Taiteki]

Indeed, you can even see this on the thread -- "most favorite" gets responses ranging from "fine with me" to "illiterate" (which I don't quite understand; what does it mean for an expression to be "illiterate"? I'm pretty sure I'm not illiterate, and I use that expression).

[justinh]

I think the issue with "favorite" is because of the common phrase, "least favorite". "Best" has its opposite in "worst" so you don't usually see people using "most best", but "favorite" doesn't have an opposite that can be used to simply replace it directly in the same way. So "least favorite" is just meant to be the poor soul at the other end of whatever list is being referred to. Come back around, and you get "most favorite", which is less correct (rather than illiterate) in that it's redundant, really.

In any case, I'd say the phrase is common in every day speech, but it would be entirely out of place in a formal setting.

[Yudan Taiteki]

That's what I would have thought, but a search of Google Books shows that the phrase is used even in academic writing, which tends to be pretty formal. There's some uncertainty because I can see from the hits that "most favorite" is sometimes used to mean "the thing that most people name as their favorite", but the intensive meaning is used as well.

It seems to have little "historical" literary precedent, though, so it's a relatively recent phrase, although some of the google books hits are from the 19th century.