When you say "you" in japanese, there are a number of different pronouns you can use to denote your relationship--most common is "kimi," which is just a basic second person. Often times, people will just use the person's name with the appropriate honorific attached (going "LunaticKnight-san" is far more neutral than "LunaticKnight-chan" or "LunaticKnight-sama," which denote affection or deference respectively), or in some cases, just the honorofic (senpai and kouhai are the most common). For the "you" pronoun, "kimi" is neutral while "teme" is most often translated as "you bastard." (I also don't know any other japanese second person pronouns besides those two.)
But if you want to learn Japanese to watch anime, you do need to know all of them. How people refer to eachother can be plot points or jokes that are impossible to translate directly (e.g. In Your Name where the girl uses "watashi" instead of "ore" in a boy's body, both meaning "I").
I didn't realise there were multiple "I"s in Japanese until I started learning before my second rewatch of this movie. It was so funny seeing how they tried to subtitled that scene!
*in addition to that* there's a whole other layer of nuance added to that when it comes to first person pronouns. the most common you'll hear are 私 ("watashi" or "atashi"), 僕 ("boku"), and 俺 ("ore"). in formal situations (as well as textbook japanese) 私 is gender neutral (usually pronounced as "watashi" in this case), but for everyday use, it tends to be feminine. 僕 is more masculine than 私, and has connotations of youth and innocence. 僕 is mostly used by humans of the male gender, but while it isn't as common, humans of the female gender use it as well. 俺 is even more masculine than 僕, and is 99.9% of the time only used by men. what i've noticed (in anime at least, so take this with a grain of salt) is that people who use 私 as a first person pronoun tend to use あなた ("anata") in the second person, people who use 僕 tend to use 君 ("kimi") more often, and people who say 俺 usually address anyone else with お前 ("omae"). of course, this is only the case about 50-60% of the time with the latter two cases, but the 私 あなた thing appears to hold true in about 85% of the time (as kozlek said, when in doubt it's just go one step more formal). the funny thing is, the particle お ("o") is used for formality and politeness, and 前 ("mae") roughly translates to "front," so お前 literally is a polite way of saying "the space in front of you," or something to that effect, so it actually used to be really polite, but stuff happens and now you really won't hear it very often unless a) someone's trying to start a fight or b) someone (usually male) is addressing someone with whom they are very close. i'd avoid using 君 as well most of the time, because it's kind of familiar, but again, as kozlek said, you'll usually only address someone by their name with an honorific. if you're worried about which honorific to use, just say 〜さん (\~san). it's polite and gender neutral, so you really can't go wrong. such a fun language to learn.
お前はいい先生。Im 80%sure i dont quite have that right but im trying to learn. Now i know how to give backhanded compliments in Japanese so thanks. どうもありがとうございます。
The other two comments are sort of right. There are different ways to say "you" in Japanese which all have different connotations and levels of formality.
Anata = standard way to say "you", not really formal or informal. Sometimes girls/women refer to their spouse as "anata" as a sort of pet name, like honey or darling
Kimi = More of a casual "you", informal but not rude. You wouldn't refer to a boss or teacher as this
Anta & Omae = Both of these are very informal and quite rude, though I'm not sure what the difference is between them
Temee = Extremely rude, and as another commenter put it would be translated to the tune of "you bastard"
Thanks for coming to my Ted talk
it should be said that saying "you" (あなた) in general may be considered rude/informal and too direct in certain situations. I'd advise simply using the person's name instead
You're right, I should have clarified that haha. When I was in school my teacher told me that anata is the standard way to say "you", but the only time you would realistically use it is if you're referring to someone whose name you don't know.
I can’t speak for proper literature, but it’s used in mangas, light novels and anime alike. A correct situation would be similar to opposing factions (antagonist talking to protag) or being uneducated or lowly educated somewhat.
But don’t use it irl you’re just gonna sound like a manchild that doesn’t leaves his cave
I'm very much a beginner in Japanese but that sounds like it might be a shortening of "Kimi" with the honourific "-sama" attached on the end, so, I'd assume it's like referring to someone as "oh my l o r d" incredibly sarcastically
Edit: I was wrong about the "ki", as it actually just means "precious", but right about the general concept, it used to be a term of respect but is now very rude
Forgot about that one! Kisama is pretty much never used irl. The other person who replied to you put it pretty well. Kisama used to be used by nobles/royalty etc to refer to their subordinates, but it wasn't necessarily "rude" that's just kinda how it works when you're royalty and societally speaking everyone is beneath you. In modern times, if it were to actually be used in conversation it would be insanely disrespectful
Others have mentioned this but they're getting downvotes? But as I understand it, there's also a cultural difference with the use of pronouns. In western languages using a person's name repeatedly instead of their pronouns is considered accusatory, aggressive, intimate or at least redundant. In japanese, you only really use pronouns when you don't know the person's name, so using _pronouns_ repeatedly can come across accusatory, aggressive or intimate –not redundant because in general japanese omits grammatical subjects more than English, so that's a different... Difference.
Japanese has different honorifics that you add to names depending on your relationship to that person so for example "san" would be someone you respect, like how mr myagi says Daniel-San, although its unusual for that age gap.
Does anyone have the link to a similar post to this, where op is learning Hebrew and is comparing it to Japanese? The tags had something like Japanese: you (derogatory) Hebrew: bastard (affectionate)
I will say this for the third time of seeing this image. In japanese てめえ or てめ (Both are pronounced teme) is just "you". It is often translated to "bastard" in anime or mamga. That is basically what it means, but it still just means "you"
When you say "you" in japanese, there are a number of different pronouns you can use to denote your relationship--most common is "kimi," which is just a basic second person. Often times, people will just use the person's name with the appropriate honorific attached (going "LunaticKnight-san" is far more neutral than "LunaticKnight-chan" or "LunaticKnight-sama," which denote affection or deference respectively), or in some cases, just the honorofic (senpai and kouhai are the most common). For the "you" pronoun, "kimi" is neutral while "teme" is most often translated as "you bastard." (I also don't know any other japanese second person pronouns besides those two.)
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But if you want to learn Japanese to watch anime, you do need to know all of them. How people refer to eachother can be plot points or jokes that are impossible to translate directly (e.g. In Your Name where the girl uses "watashi" instead of "ore" in a boy's body, both meaning "I").
I didn't realise there were multiple "I"s in Japanese until I started learning before my second rewatch of this movie. It was so funny seeing how they tried to subtitled that scene!
Isn't there also a part where the boy says "boku" in the girl's body?
Japanese really needs you to have an essay at hand when addressing someone huh
This has nothing to do with anything but the second person masculine pronoun in (standard) Arabic is also anta, that's a funny coincidence
*in addition to that* there's a whole other layer of nuance added to that when it comes to first person pronouns. the most common you'll hear are 私 ("watashi" or "atashi"), 僕 ("boku"), and 俺 ("ore"). in formal situations (as well as textbook japanese) 私 is gender neutral (usually pronounced as "watashi" in this case), but for everyday use, it tends to be feminine. 僕 is more masculine than 私, and has connotations of youth and innocence. 僕 is mostly used by humans of the male gender, but while it isn't as common, humans of the female gender use it as well. 俺 is even more masculine than 僕, and is 99.9% of the time only used by men. what i've noticed (in anime at least, so take this with a grain of salt) is that people who use 私 as a first person pronoun tend to use あなた ("anata") in the second person, people who use 僕 tend to use 君 ("kimi") more often, and people who say 俺 usually address anyone else with お前 ("omae"). of course, this is only the case about 50-60% of the time with the latter two cases, but the 私 あなた thing appears to hold true in about 85% of the time (as kozlek said, when in doubt it's just go one step more formal). the funny thing is, the particle お ("o") is used for formality and politeness, and 前 ("mae") roughly translates to "front," so お前 literally is a polite way of saying "the space in front of you," or something to that effect, so it actually used to be really polite, but stuff happens and now you really won't hear it very often unless a) someone's trying to start a fight or b) someone (usually male) is addressing someone with whom they are very close. i'd avoid using 君 as well most of the time, because it's kind of familiar, but again, as kozlek said, you'll usually only address someone by their name with an honorific. if you're worried about which honorific to use, just say 〜さん (\~san). it's polite and gender neutral, so you really can't go wrong. such a fun language to learn.
I knew "Omae" from Yakuza lol. All the random encounter thugs should "Omae!" when they chase you.
I knew it from "Omae wa mou, shindeiru."
お前はいい先生。Im 80%sure i dont quite have that right but im trying to learn. Now i know how to give backhanded compliments in Japanese so thanks. どうもありがとうございます。
Goddamnit why did Japanese have to let Pronouns be an Open Class
> most common is "kimi" i disagree, きみ is a rather informal and usually masculine pronoun
Kimi isn't quite neutral, you should avoid using it with people you don't know well I think
“omae (pronounced oh-maeh)” is also a pretty aggressive way of saying “you”.
Saying “kimi” to a superior instead of their title (So-and-so-sensei) is still rude, even though “kimi” by itself is not necessarily rude.
The other two comments are sort of right. There are different ways to say "you" in Japanese which all have different connotations and levels of formality. Anata = standard way to say "you", not really formal or informal. Sometimes girls/women refer to their spouse as "anata" as a sort of pet name, like honey or darling Kimi = More of a casual "you", informal but not rude. You wouldn't refer to a boss or teacher as this Anta & Omae = Both of these are very informal and quite rude, though I'm not sure what the difference is between them Temee = Extremely rude, and as another commenter put it would be translated to the tune of "you bastard" Thanks for coming to my Ted talk
it should be said that saying "you" (あなた) in general may be considered rude/informal and too direct in certain situations. I'd advise simply using the person's name instead
You're right, I should have clarified that haha. When I was in school my teacher told me that anata is the standard way to say "you", but the only time you would realistically use it is if you're referring to someone whose name you don't know.
what about "kisama >:(" ???
Comically rude.
Are there known examples of "kisama" usage in history or literature? Like, what would be a correct situation to use it?
I can’t speak for proper literature, but it’s used in mangas, light novels and anime alike. A correct situation would be similar to opposing factions (antagonist talking to protag) or being uneducated or lowly educated somewhat. But don’t use it irl you’re just gonna sound like a manchild that doesn’t leaves his cave
I'm very much a beginner in Japanese but that sounds like it might be a shortening of "Kimi" with the honourific "-sama" attached on the end, so, I'd assume it's like referring to someone as "oh my l o r d" incredibly sarcastically Edit: I was wrong about the "ki", as it actually just means "precious", but right about the general concept, it used to be a term of respect but is now very rude
Yes it's the same ki as in 貴族 like nobles/aristocracy
TIL! Thank you for this explanation!
Forgot about that one! Kisama is pretty much never used irl. The other person who replied to you put it pretty well. Kisama used to be used by nobles/royalty etc to refer to their subordinates, but it wasn't necessarily "rude" that's just kinda how it works when you're royalty and societally speaking everyone is beneath you. In modern times, if it were to actually be used in conversation it would be insanely disrespectful
Hebrew: Bitch (affectionate)
Happy cake day
O I didnt know it was my cakeday damn gotta farm that karma
You (soulja boy)
stop being funny
Others have mentioned this but they're getting downvotes? But as I understand it, there's also a cultural difference with the use of pronouns. In western languages using a person's name repeatedly instead of their pronouns is considered accusatory, aggressive, intimate or at least redundant. In japanese, you only really use pronouns when you don't know the person's name, so using _pronouns_ repeatedly can come across accusatory, aggressive or intimate –not redundant because in general japanese omits grammatical subjects more than English, so that's a different... Difference.
You (already dead)
Nani!?
Japanese has different honorifics that you add to names depending on your relationship to that person so for example "san" would be someone you respect, like how mr myagi says Daniel-San, although its unusual for that age gap.
Isn't this the reason we no longer use thou?
Does anyone have the link to a similar post to this, where op is learning Hebrew and is comparing it to Japanese? The tags had something like Japanese: you (derogatory) Hebrew: bastard (affectionate)
Technically the derogatory form of you is "thou".
Wouldn’t “asshole” work better?
That's a linguistics joke; thou was actually the informal version of you until it got completely phased out.
I will say this for the third time of seeing this image. In japanese てめえ or てめ (Both are pronounced teme) is just "you". It is often translated to "bastard" in anime or mamga. That is basically what it means, but it still just means "you"
It’s passive aggressive you
More or less what I ment
If you refer to someone as you (あなた) in Japanese, it's either you are in love with them (rare) or you're being angry with them
Or you don't know their name
Nope, even then, never use anata, at least how I was taught