Introducing Yourself

So, you want to know how to let people know who you are. And you want to be able to do it in Japanese, no less! Here's a quick guide and sentence pattern:

watashi no namae wa _______ desu.

Let's break it down a bit.

Watashi is the word for I, or me.
Namae is the word for name. (I hope you're making notes of all this new vocabulary!)

"But wait a minute!" I can hear you yell. "What about no, wa, and desu? What are they?"

Good question! no and wa are particles. These are the little words in English that don't mean anything by themselves, like "of" or "on."

no is the particle that indicates ownership, and it can roughly be translated to "of." So, "watashi no namae" is "the name belonging to me."

wa is the subject marker of the sentence. It marks whatever is before it in the sentence as the subject. It can be roughly translated to "is." Therefore, the subject of the sentence "watashi no namae wa ______ desu" is "watashi no namae," or, "my name."

"But what about desu?" you scream.

I honestly don't know how to explain desu. One of my dictionaries defined it as the verb "to be." Another doesn't have it at all. My first Japanese teacher said that it's just something they shove on the end of sentences. My current teacher says it means "is."

I like my first Japanese teacher's explanation the best.

Desu isn't used on the end of every sentence, though. To explain this, let's turn to syntax. No screaming about grammar, it's actually very simple. The syntax for Japanese sentences is STAPPOV, or Subject Time Anything else Place Purpose Object Verb. For example... let's say "In the park, at two o'clock in the afternoon, I eat sushi with chopsticks." in Japanese. But first, let's sort it into STAPPOV.

Subject: I
Time: Two in the afternoon
Anything else: Chopsticks
Place: Park
Purpose: (None)
Object: Sushi
Verb: Eat

Now then, let's put those in Japanese.

Subject: watashi (You know this one!)
Time: gogo niji (Gogo- afternoon, niji- 2nd hour)
Anything else: hashi (chopsticks)
Place: koen (park)
Purpose: (none)
Object: sushi (this one is easy!)
Verb: tabemasu (eat)

So, how about we put it in a sentence?

watashi wa gogo niji ni hashi de koen ni sushi o tabemasu.

See the conspicuous lack of desu at the end of the sentence? If we say that desu is a verb whacked onto the end of sentences, then we can see this sentence doesn't need a desu- it already has a verb, tabemasu! Does that make sense?

"Hey, what about these funny new particles?" you say incredulously. "Do I have to learn all this new stuff right now?"

Absolutely not! That was just an example sentence, made to demonstrate the use of Japanese syntax. I just want you to focus on the particles no and wa for the time being. However, I know some of you are probably curious and therefore will be mad at me if I don't tell you what the new particles mean.

ni: In, at or on. When referring to places, it's only used for places with no name. Therefore, koen uses ni, because it's just general- a park, not Fancy-Named Park.
de: In or by means of. Here, we use it to mean "by means of chopsticks."
o: You might occasionally see this romanised (put in English letters) as "wo." Both are correct, however, it is pronounced "o." It's used to mark objects- in this case, sushi.

Notice how particles always mark the thing before them? That's how Japanese works. It's incorrect any other way.

So, back to introducing yourself. Now that we know the mechanics of the Japanese language, it's all fine tuning and vocabulary. Your homework is to go to someone- Father, three-year-old daughter, stranger on the train- and introduce yourself in Japanese. Let's recap on that sentence pattern, shall we?

watashi no namae wa _____ desu.

A note: _____ is obviously where you put your name in. However, you can't just whack it in there in English. Oh no, no, no. That's sacrilege, that is. You have to try and put in Japanese sounds. As an example, let's use my name, Ashlyn. The Japanese can't say Ashlyn. Instead, they'll say Ashurin. See how that works? If you look at your handy-dandy hiragana chart, you'll see that the letters in my name have been replaced with the closest Japanese sounds available. So, Rebecca would be Rebeka, Lance would be Ransu and John would be Jon. So, when you go to introduce yourself, make sure you put your name in Japanese sounds too!