The potential form has an え e sound (e, te, re, ke, ge, ne, be, me, se) The volitional form has an おう ō sound ( ō , t ō , r ō , k ō , g ō , n ō , b ō , m ō , s ō ). Please master the usage here. The meaning of "can" has already been included in the verb without using できる. Most students of Japanese will have some familiarity with casual conjugation already, as it’s the how most dictionaries and … All rights reserved. ***The attributive form of the copula is de aru, but the particles no and na are generally used instead. When would you use this form? Sometimes you might opt to use ~koto ga dekimasu instead, which makes the sentence even more polite because in Japanese, the longer a sentence is, the more polite it is. The potential form of a Japanese verb is one way to express the ability or possibility to do something. The way I learned Japanese conjugations for the potential form of “eru/iru” verbs was to remove the stem and add ~られる。All other verbs involve removing only the last character and then adding a character with the same consonant, but with a え sound, (for example く would change to け ) followed by a る. Here are the versions using either 「が」 or 「は」 instead: There are two verbs 「見える」 and 「聞こえる」 that mean that something is visible and audible, respectively. The third function is to express attributes. There are three functions: to express ability, situations, and attributes. 書かく => 書かける or 書かくことができる Here are more examples. The second pattern is to use the particle が. If however, you wanted to say that you were given the opportunity to see or hear something, you would use the regular potential form. Imperative form The best way to learn Japanese? As we said above, English has two ways to express potential. できる is an individual verb. There are certain way to do so by several types of form as shown below : Altering the verb which is in dictionary form into a verb which is classified as a potential form. 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Cut the blah blah blah and get straight to the point. This form means "be able to do" or "can do". The table begins with the dictionary form. This sounds natural mostly in negative sentences. u-verbs: Drop the final –u and add –eru Ex: 行く -> 行ける In other words, you are describing your potential to do or not do something. 貸せた is correct. The potential form is one of the most frequently occurring expressions in everyday life. Affirmative ones are not suitable. For example, watashi wa hiragana ga yomemasu or hiragana wo yomemasu ? You can also just use generic noun substitution to substitute for 「こと」. You can see that example 3 uses the generic noun for an event to say literally, “The event of seeing movie was able to be done.” which essentially means the same thing as 「見られる」. The first pattern is to use the particle を to express direct objects. First, let’s look at the rules for how to create potential form, and then how we can use it in a sentence. The Potential Form Vocabulary. The first function is to express ability. But remember, you must use "ga" instead of "wo". Potential forms do not have direct objects, Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Review and more sentence-ending particles, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0, あまり/あんまり – not very (when used with negative), 有り得る 【あ・り・え・る/あ・り・う・る】 (ru-verb) – to possibly exist. Pick a verb. Nowadays, younger generations conjugates ru-verbs and 来くる by omitting ら. Grammatically speaking, it is not correct, but sounds natural to the majority of Japanese people today. This form is often used to create a potential form from group 2 (or nidan katsuyou) verbs. Next, you will learn Japanese passive form. It is, in practice, the potential form of godan verbs. Some grammar guidebooks say the particle should be が. In Japanese, the ability to do a certain action is expressed by conjugating the verb rather than adding a word such as the words "can" or "able to" in the case of English. Actually, the proper usage is still controversial among linguists. At Easy Japanese Grammar you will find short video tutorials here explaining Basic and Intermediate Japanese Grammar patterns in clear and easy to follow English The Potential Form: I can do - Easy Japanese Grammar Copyright © 2020 Wasabi - Learn Japanese Online. 見 み える and 聞 き こえる are intransitive verbs and don’t have the potential form. You sometimes intentionally look at or listen to something. The potential form indicates that something is possible but no actual action is actually taken. However, the potential form of the verb 「する」 (meaning “to do”) is a special exception because it becomes a completely different verb: 「できる」 (出来る). However, the combination between the particle を and the potential form is frequently used in practice. This form is used among close friends and family in informal situations. We have created a learning community on Facebook where learners can ask and answer questions, share learning tips, and motivate each other. Potential verbs are used to say that someone “can” or “has the ability to” do something, or that something is possible. For example: yomeru 読める, "to be able to read," or "can read," is the potential verb variant of yomu 読む, "to read." The table below summarizes the conjugations of various type I verbs. When you say “can” or “can’t” in Japanese, you’re using the Japanese potential form. Notice that 「聞こえる」 always means “audible” and never “able to ask”. As you learned in the previous lesson, the particle が expresses objects of potential, e.g. 1. While the potential form is still a verb, because it is describing the state of feasibility, in general, you don’t want to use the direct object 「を」 as you would with the non-potential form of the verb. Use context to tell which meaning is intended. For example, if you are invited to a party, but you cannot join due to your busy schedule, sentence should be like this. For example the following sentences sound unnatural. I suggest learning the official 「られる」 conjugation first because laziness can be a hard habit to break and the shorter version, though common, is considered to be slang. Constructing potential verbs: ru-verbs: Drop the final –ru and add –rareru Ex: 見る -> 見られる. The potential form is constructed in the same way as the standard passive form, but the grammatical subject of the sentence is usually separated by the particle は (wa). However, when you use できる, the particle が is more suitable. Replace the ~ます with ~ましょう. Wasabi’s members are also there to support your learning and hear your feedback to improve our materials. I think there are not that many “iru-verb” which we often use in daily life so let’s remember them as soon as possible and be master of “iru-verb potential form” xD haha ボブには才能さいのうがある (Bob has a talent). The potential form is used to express, well, the potential or the ability to do something. Konnichiwa! The conjugation and the functions of the potential form are not difficult, but you need to know one more thing in order to compose natural sentences. The difference is simple. “先生せんせいになる: I will become a teacher,” and “子こ供どもを先生せんせいにする: I will make my child a teacher”. Japanese kids naturally master the complex rules of Japanese verbs as they interact and communicate with people on a daily basis. Also, you will learn some utilization of the potential form later. It's meant to say: In order to be able to go into medicine, I need a good OP score. Believe it or not, Japanese verbs in Dictionary Form are way more difficult to conjugate than MASU Form. In that case, you use the transitive ones: 見みる and 聞きく because there must be objects. What about hiragana wo yomu koto ga dekimasu? Potential form is identical to passive form for -ru verbs (because they're using different senses of the same auxiliary verb, which can also express respect or spontaneity, though the last two are rare in modern Japanese). All verbs conjugated into the potential form become a ru-verb. For example, 「食べる」 becomes 「食べれる」 instead of 「食べられる」. That is the type of sentence patterns. You can say that something has a possibility of existing by combining 「ある」 and the verb 「得る」 to produce 「あり得る」. This verb is very curious in that it can be read as either 「ありうる」 or 「ありえる」, however; all the other conjugations such as 「ありえない」、「ありえた」、and 「ありえなかった」 only have one possible reading using 「え」. Similarly, Japanese has another form, which is …ことができる.