... does the example box have distal and formal confused? It seems to, if I understand the terms correctly. --Aponar Kestrel (talk) 04:20, 2004 Sep 5 (UTC)
- Nope, "formal" here refers to formal writing. Kaustuv 17:03, 2004 Sep 9 (UTC)
Hmm, I was surprised to find this page. It isn't linked from many things. It ties in heavily with Japanese honorifics and Uchi-soto, which are all sort of dancing around the same topic. Would someone who's not as busy as I am care to try linking these together?
Also, this page seems a little general. It seems to me there's "politeness", which is a function of Japanese grammar and verb conjugation, and "formality/respect", which is how and when they're used. "Da" is just a contraction of "de aru", both of which are casual tense. The fact that you use da in speaking and de aru in semi-formal writing seems to be another issue that could earn its own treatment. So perhaps this should be separated out into grammar aspects and usage aspects somehow? Like I said, I don't have the time to be doing such major things. Bigpeteb
- I think this article should be merged back into Japanese grammar. Taking it out was a mistake. I myself am very low on free time, but this is part of a long list of updates to the grammar page that I've been meaning to make. Kaustuv 04:04, 2004 Oct 7 (UTC)
- Another quick note: the da/de aru point you make is not popular among linguists. I was very interested in this interpretation a while back, but Shibatani puts it to rest in his survey The Languages of Japan. (I can dig up page numbers, etc. if you want.) Kaustuv