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Formal Present Tense Affirmative Japanese Verbs

Japanese-Language
by Morris Servaessen | 25 Feb 2023 Formal Present Tense Affirmative Japanese Verbs

Introduction

In this blog post we are going to learn how to conjugate the Formal Present Tense Affirmative Verb.

We will show you the grammar rules and some examples.

To form the Formal Present Tense Affirmative Verb, first you have to understand there are 3 different groups of Verbs in the Japanese Language.

Japanese verb groups:

  • Group 1 - Godan Verbs 【五段動詞】
  • Group 2 - Ichidan Verbs 【一段動詞】
  • Group 3 - Irregular Verbs 【不規則動詞】

Because there are only two Irregular Verbs in the Japanese language, we will only focus on Ichidan and Godan Verbs.

Ichi means one and dan means level, so ichidan means one level. Go means five and dan means level, so godan means five levels.

One and five are referring to the number of verb-stems that can be formed, one for ichidan verbs and five for godan verbs.

Ichidan Verbs

Good to know: It's a fact that all ichidan verbs end with a る-syllable.

For example:

  • 食べる「たべる」- to eat
  • 寝る「ねる」- to sleep
  • 疲れる「つかれる」- to get tired

To form the verb-stem of an ichidan verb, you take the dictionary form of the verb and remove the last る-syllable.

For example:

  • 食べる「たべる」➝　食べ「たべ」
  • 寝る「ねる」➝　寝「ね」
  • 疲れる「つかれる」➝　疲れ「つかれ」

Verb-stems are important to understand because they won't change when conjugating verbs in the Japanese language.

To form the Formal Present Tense Affirmative Verb, you take the verb-stem and add ます at the end.

For example:

  • 食べ「たべ」＋　ます　➝　食べます
  • 寝「ね」＋　ます　➝　寝ます
  • 疲れ「つかれ」＋　ます　➝　疲れます

Godan Verbs

Good to know: It's a fact that the dictionary form of a godan verb always ends with one of the following 9-syllables.

9-syllables in godan verbs:

  • う
  • く
  • す
  • つ
  • ぬ
  • む
  • る
  • ぐ
  • ぶ

Here will follow 9 examples of godan verbs ending with one of the 9 ending syllables:

Godan verbs with the 9-syllables endings:

  • 洗う「あらう」- to wash
  • 書く「かく」- to write
  • 話す「はなす」- to speak
  • 立つ「たつ」- to stand
  • 死ぬ「しぬ」- to die
  • 読む「よむ」- to drink
  • 乗る「のる」- to ride
  • 泳ぐ「およぐ」- to swim
  • 遊ぶ「あそぶ」- to play

To form the verb-stem of a godan verb, we first have to look into the Hiragana Chart as shown below:

Hiragana Chart
1 2 3 4 5
あ い う え お
ば び ぶ げ ご
か き く け こ
が ぎ ぐ げ ご
ま み む め も
な に ぬ ね の
ら り る れ ろ
さ し す せ そ
た ち つ て と

The yellow 3rd column presents the godan verbs last syllables as discussed above.

To form the verb-base of godan verbs, we replace the verb ending syllables as presented in the 3rd column with the syllables in the 2nd column.

Hiragana Chart
1 2 3 4 5
あ い う え お
ば び ぶ げ ご
か き く け こ
が ぎ ぐ げ ご
ま み む め も
な に ぬ ね の
ら り る れ ろ
さ し す せ そ
た ち つ て と

We use the examples as discussed before to form the verb-base for all 9-syllable endings:

Verb-base for all 9-syllable endings:

  • 洗う　➝　う　➝　い　➝　洗い
  • 書く　➝　く　➝　き　➝　書き
  • 話す　➝　す　➝　し　➝　話し
  • 立つ　➝　つ　➝　ち　➝　立ち
  • 死ぬ　➝　ぬ　➝　に　➝　死に
  • 読む　➝　む　➝　み　➝　読み
  • 乗る　➝　る　➝　り　➝　乗り
  • 泳ぐ　➝　ぐ　➝　ぎ　➝　泳ぎ
  • 遊ぶ　➝　ぶ　➝　び　➝　遊び

To form the Formal Present Tense Affirmative Verb, you take the verb-base and add ます at the end.

Formal Present Tense Affirmative Verb for godan verbs:

  • 洗い　＋　ます　➝　洗います
  • 書き　＋　ます　➝　書きます
  • 話し　＋　ます　➝　話します
  • 立ち　＋　ます　➝　立ちます
  • 死に　＋　ます　➝　死にます
  • 読み　＋　ます　➝　読みます
  • 乗り　＋　ます　➝　乗ります
  • 泳ぎ　＋　ます　➝　泳ぎます
  • 遊び　＋　ます　➝　遊びます