JAPANESE LANGUAGE HELP---I have two questions about Japanese grammar?

1. If the format of Japanese sentences follos the Subject-Object-Ver format, then why is it that sometimes sentences end with Kanji characters?





For Example--





a. パリ は、フランスの首都であり、イル＝ド＝フランス地域圏の首府。





b. 1563年、ギーズ公フランソワが戦死。





c. 1580年、フレックスの和議。





QUESTION 2





If you see compounds, you use the Chinese word and not the Japanese word. That is the rule but there are exceptions. One exception is the person's name, but whatare the other exceptions? I noticed that the word FUJISAN (Mt. Fuji) has a Chinese and Japanese word in the compound. ALso, the Japanese word for spine is SEBONE. Those are two Japanese words. Why an't you use the Chinese words if it is a compound?

JAPANESE LANGUAGE HELP---I have two questions about Japanese grammar?
Question 1





a. パリ は、フランスの首都であり、イル＝ド＝フランス地圏


の首府(でもある）。





b. 1563年、ギーズ公フランソワが戦死（した）。





c. 1580年、フレックスの和議（が成立した）。





These are the complete sentences in Japanese.


The reason for omitting () parts is as follows;





When we like to write some fact clearer and faster, we use that kind of form very often, especially on business scenes.


besides "b and c" are chronology, To me it seem that someone is trying to memorize them, so that sentences should be compact and clear, "a" is the same case.





About question 2, I almost agree with zwink,





"fujisan" could be;


富士山（in all kanji=chainese character)


ふじさん(hiragana, children may write this way )


フジサン(katakana)


ふじ山（hiragana+kanji, but not in common)





"sebone" could be;


背骨（kanji)


せぼね（hiragana)


セボネ（katakana)


背ぼね（kanji+hiragana, it is possible if you can not remenber the kanji骨）





Thus Japanes is such a flexible language if you will.


Good luck with your Japanese study.





hope this helps
Reply:2) The さん isn't the affectionate word that we put at the end of people's names, but an alternate reading of the kanji 山.





富士山, or "Fujisan" is the Kanji name of mount Fuji, but many Japanese people mistake the final kanji 山 (in this case read as さん) to be the suffix that we put on the end of people's name. So they write it as a Japanese word when it's actually an alternate reading of a kanji.





I'm not sure about the word for "spine", I've only ever seen it as two kanji 背骨. Maybe it's because 骨 spells "bone"!





1) In all of the sentences you've written, they have all been shortened down, and the final verb (Japanese word) has been left out. This is quite common. I think it's 「です」that has been left out.





I'm only 90% sure though, I'm not even sure what those sentences say without having them in context. If you want a proper answer, maybe try http://www.japanesepod101.com .
Reply:i dont know about question 1.





but fujisan, is made up out of three kanji.





富士山





king, ground, and mountain. sometimes however. the middle kanji 士 (ground) is replace by the hiragana letter じ。





the same happens in the days of the week. for example　kinyoubi has 3 kanji





金曜日





metal, day and sun. it is often written as 金よう日 again where the middle kanji 曜, is written phonetically as よう。





this is just the preference or knowledge of kanji on the part of the writer. children for example, learn the days of the week a few years before they get to the kanji that write's day. if you want. you can even write fujisan in full hiragana.





ふじさん





this is liguistically also correct. although a japanese person might find this 'childish.'
Reply:Question one - what you are looking at there is two simple sentences combined into one slightly more complex sentence. The first sentence ends with the verb "aru" (ari), "to be", then continues into the next part to elaborate on the question - the second part has no verb and thus, the combined sentance does not end with one.





Also, like in English, though possibly not to quite such an extreme extent, sentance structures in Japanese can be rearranged occassionally in accordance to the preferance of the speaker.





Question two - I'm not quite sure what you're talking about here, but I presume you're drescribing the use of chinese pronunciation of a character when used in compounds as opposed to Japanese.








From my experience, there are three ways to read kanji compounds. One means reading one or both characters with the chinese pronunciation. Another is to leave the second part of the compound how it would normally be read, and change only the first syllable with the use of tenten or maru - 'za', 'da', 'ba', 'pa'. This is the case in your example word, sebone. The third option, is to leave both characters how they would be read alone, with Japanese pronunciation, refraining from altering them at all.





There seems to be no set rule as to when to use the chinese pronunciation, with most people learning to feel out the characters and find the reading which seems to work the best, though even then, it's possible to get it wrong. Even many people born, raised and educated in Japan stumble when faced with the pronunciation of an unfamiliar compound. That is why furigana, characters written above, below or alongside the characters to indicate how they should be read, are often used with compounds the expected reading audience might be unfamiliar with.





Therefore, all I can really say in regards to reading kanji compounds is, good luck!