Monday, April 11, 2022

-masu Stem

In some Japanese textbooks, the term -masu stem (or masu-stem) refers to what you get when you conjugate a verb to its polite form, which ends in ~masu ~ます, and then remove the ~masu suffix, leaving you with the stem of the conjugation. It generally refers to the same thing as the term ren'youkei 連用形. Usually the term "-masu stem" is used when talking about adding a different suffix to the masu-stem (ren'youkei) than ~masu. For example:

ichidan verb godan verb
Dictionary form kiru
着る
To wear.
kiru
切る
To cut.
Polite form kimasu
着ます
kirimasu
切ります
masu-stem
or ren'youkei.
ki~
着~
kiri~
切り~
tai-form
(masu-stem + ~tai)
kitai
着たい
To want to wear.
kiritai
切りたい
To want to cut.

This term has the problem that, for some verbs, the stem of masu isn't also the stem of other suffixes, e.g. in osshaimasu おっしゃます, ossharitai おっしゃたい, but in most cases it works just fine.

A masu stem conjugation chart.

Grammar

See the article about the ren'youkei 連用形 for details about grammar.

See the article about stem if you want to know what the word "stem" in masu-stem is supposed to mean.

vs. Ren'youkei

The ~masu ~ます suffix (jodoushi 助動詞) is suffixed to the ren'youkei, hence the ren'youkei is called the ~masu stem, however, these two terms aren't technically the same. We'll see below why.

Adjectives

Although adjectives have a form called their ren'youkei (e.g. kawaii 可愛い to kawaiku 可愛), they do not have a masu form, you can't say *kawaiku-masu, so they don't have a masu stem.

Onbinkei

The word shinda 死んだ, "died," is the past form of shinu 死ぬ, "to die." In this word, the ren'youkei shini~ 死に~ is the stem for the past tense jodoushi ~ta ~た. When combined, shini~ and ~ta become shinda 死んだ. You could say shini became shin~ and ~ta became ~da, so shin is considered a ren'youkei and you might find ~ni/~n に/ん as ren'youkei endings in some resources.

Despite this, the masu form is shinimasuます, not *shinmasu 死んます, so shin~ isn't a masu stem, only shini~ is.

The above (~ni to ~n) is called a hatsuonbin 撥音便. The same idea applies to other onbinkei 音便形 like asondaだ, asobimasuます, kaitaた (i-onbin イ音便), kakimasuます, and so on.

~imasu ~います Endings

Sometimes a word unexpectedly ends in ~imasu ~います because the masu form produces an i-onbin イ音便, even though the past form does not. This occurs with some verbs that end in ~aru ~aる.

For example, the masu form of nasaru なさる is nasaimasu なさます (i-onbin), while its past form is nasatta なさった (sokuonbin 促音便). Compare to a regular ru-ending godan verb: kiru 切る, kirimasuます (no i-onbin), kittaた (sokuonbin).

This i-onbin only affects the masu form conjugation. The tai-form, for example, would be nasaritai なさりたい, with an unchanged nasari~ ren'youkei.

Some other examples:

Words like gozaimasu(福島, 2016:182)
Dictionary form Polite form
gozaru
ござる
gozaimasu
ございます
nasaru
なさる
nasaimasu
なさいます
ossharu
おっしゃる
osshaimasu
おっしゃいます
irassharu
いらっしゃる
irasshaimasu
いらっしゃいます
kudasaru
くださる
kudasaimasu
くださいます
satsushiyaru
さつしやる
satsushiyaimasu
さつしやいます

In the late Edo period, both gozarimasu and gozaimasu were used, but in modern Japanese the variant without onbin is almost never used, and the i-onbin gozaimasu is the standard.(福島, 2016:181)

With this in mind, if you see a character that says the words above with ~rimasu instead of ~imasu, that could be a hint that they aren't from modern Japan, but from some ancient time period.

Misconjugation

Sometimes anime characters not used to polite speech will misconjugate the polite form by suffixing the ~masu jodoushi directly to the nonpast form of a verb, in which case the masu stem would technically be the nonpast form. Of course, nobody teaching Japanese uses the term "-masu stem" like this. For reference:

  • ?ganbarumasu!
    がんばます!
    [I'll do my best]!
    [I'll work hard]!
    • Misconjugation of ganbarimasu 頑張ます, created by suffixing ~masu directly to the nonpast form ganbaru 頑張る rather than its ren'youkei ganbari~ 頑張り~.
リチェもそう思う・・・ます リチェ・・・
Manga: Witch Hat Atelier, Tongari Boushi no Atelier, とんがり帽子のアトリエ (Chapter 31)
  • Context: Riche, a child character not used to speaking politely, tries to speak politely.
  • ?Riche mo sou omou... masu
    リチェもそう思う・・・ます
    I also think so.
    • Riche uses her own name as first person pronoun, something children do.
    • ?omoumasu is a misconjugation of omoimasu 思います. She uses the plain form omou 思う at first, which is how she would normally speak, but a moment later (indicated by the ellipsis), she realizes her mistake and adds the ~masu she forgot about.
  • Riche...
    リチェ・・・
    (character name.)

In some cases, ~masu is misused where desu です should be used instead.

ちち!はは! こまってるひとがいるます! たすけます! はんかちあげるます だいじょうぶます よしよし
Manga: SPY×FAMILY (Chapter 4)
  • Context: Anya アニャ has to speak politely, but conjugating the polite form correctly is too hard for the 4–5 year old girl, so she just ends all her sentences with ~masu.
  • chichi! haha!
    ちち!はは!
    Dad! Mom!
  • ?{komatteru} hito ga irumasu!
    こまってるひとがいるます
    There is someone [who] {is troubled}!
    That person over there needs help!
    • komatteru - contraction of komatte-iru 困っている.
    • ?irumasu いるます - wrong.
      imasu います - correct.
  • tasukemasu!
    たすけます
    [We] will help [him]!
    • This one is correct.
  • ?hankachi φ agerumasu
    はんかちあげるます
    [I] will give [you] a tissue.
    Here's a tissue for you.
    • ?agerumasu あげるます - wrong.
      agemasu あげます - correct.
  • ?daijoubumasu
    だいじょうぶます
    [It] is alright.
    • ?daijoubumasu 大丈夫ます - wrong. This isn't even a verb.
      daijoubu desu 大丈夫です - correct.
  • yoshi yoshi
    よしよし
    [There there].

References

Verb Forms

No comments:

Post a Comment

Leave your komento コメント in this posuto ポスト of this burogu ブログ with your questions about Japanese, doubts or whatever!

All comments are moderated and won't show up until approved. Spam, links to illegal websites, and inappropriate content won't be published.