Today’s particle is の. Here are your sentences.

1) MisterMさんの猿です。

a. What’s the meaning of this sentence?

2) ソニーの田中さんです。

a. Meaning?

b. Who’s saying this? Tanaka or someone else?

3) 面白いのを買った

a. Meaning?

4) 買ったのを使った

a. Meaning?

b. How do you know what was bought? (assuming this is part of a conversation)

5) Missingさんのが欲しい。。。

a. Meaning?

b. What is the の doing in the last three sentences?

6) 漢字を習うのは難しいです。

a. Meaning?

7) Winterさんが寿司を食べるのを見た

a. Meaning?

b. What is the の doing to the previous two sentences?

8) どうして食べているの？

a. Meaning?

b. What do you know about the person speaking based off the の?

c. What does the の do to this sentence?

—

Alright – we’ll see how much you get through / questions you have between now and tomorrow to see if I put up another tomorrow or wait until the next day. Hopefully it’ll be good to see the different ways particals can be used outside the basic uses.

Enjoy!

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2. Tanaka of Sony. (like an employee, I’m guessing)
Someone else saying it.

3. I bought something interesting. (I thought 物 was for “a thing” while の was for “an event”,
though…)

4. I used the thing that I bought.

5. I want Missing’s [item].
の is used as a substitute for the noun in question – you could call の a… “generic noun”, I think?

6. Learning kanji is hard. (Pffffffft!! It’s a piece of cake :P)

7. I saw/noticed Winter eating sushi.
の is used here to turn verb-phrases into nouns. There’s a name for it that I can’t quite remember.
“I saw **the act of Winter eating sushi**.

8. Why are you eating sushi?
Could be any type of person saying this. の used at the end of a sentence is feminine… unless it’s
a question, I believe: then it would be neutral.
Makes it a question.

A handful of these are most likely wrong, but I gave it a go, just since I was first :)

a. it is MisterM’s monkey

2) ソニーの田中さんです。

a. Tanaka of Sony

b. someone else is saying it. Only little children use 3rd person to refer to themselves

3) 面白いのを買った

a. I want to buy an interesting ??? (not quite sure on this one)

4) 買ったのを使った

a. I used what I bought

b. I suppose の refers to the item

5) Missingさんのが欲しい。。。

a. I want Missing’s(emphasis on Missing)

b. Missing -> Missing’s. indicates posetion?

6) 漢字を習うのは難しいです。

a. Kanji is diffcult to learn

7) Winterさんが寿司を食べるのを見た

a. I saw you eating sushi Winter

b. ?
8) どうして食べているの？

a. Why are you eating sushi?

b. ?

c. ?

Thanks for waiting xD
These are still pretty hard, but after getting some of the particels down it has gotten easier :)

a. It is MisterM’s monkey

2) ソニーの田中さんです。

a. Tanaka of Sony (i.e. It’s Tanaka who works at Sony… Japanese like to associate themselves with groups).

b. Someone else, because さん is being used and you don’t use さん on yourself.

3) 面白いのを買った

a. (I) bought the interesting one

4) 買ったのを使った

a. (I) used the one I bought

b. How do you know what was bought? (assuming this is part of a conversation)

5) Missingさんのが欲しい。。。

a. I want the one Missing (has)
(maybe Missing had a marker you wanted and so you’re saying you want to use that marker, the one Missing is using).

b. It’s assuming that you both know what thing you’re talking about, and it’s dropping the noun that’d normally come after the の. So, those sentences could have been something like “I want the marker Missing has” rather than “I want (the one) that Missing has” – since everyone knows what “the one” is, you can just say の without anything else.

@Mister – Might also be a generic noun (so bad at grammar terms) but I believe this is called “dependent indefinite pronoun” (had to look that up just now, no idea what that means still… I just understand the grammar in my mind :(

6) 漢字を習うのは難しいです。
a. Learning kanji is difficult / the act of learning kanji is difficult

7) Winterさんが寿司を食べるのを見た
a. I saw Winter eat sushi / I saw the act of Winter eating sushi

b. The の is “nominalizing” a sentence. It makes the part that comes before it “the act of ___________.” So, if you add a のを to a verb (for example すしを食べるのを) you’re saying you’re doing something to the act of doing something else.

8) どうして食べているの？
a. Why are you eating?

b. Probably a female speaker or a child

c. This sentence ender particle (ね or よ are both sentence ender particles if you don’t know what I’m talking about) either indicates it’s an explanation or adds some emotion to the sentence. This grammar comes from のだ or のです. This use of の is going to be considered casual.