Home › Forums › The Japanese Language › HAZU Rule for Nouns (past tense) Season 5

This topic contains 2 replies, has 2 voices, and was last updated by  Koala_chan 11 years, 6 months ago.

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  • October 21, 2012 at 12:53 pm #36605

    Koala_chan
    Member

    I am a little confused with the rule about HAZU (expectation) applied with nouns (past tense):

    I kind quite make the difference between the two meanings mentioned below. could someone help me on that one.

    here is what is quoted in the lesson:

    For past tense nouns,The pattern goes like this:

    noun + だった + はずです (supposed to have been something)

    Now, this shouldn’t be confused with noun + の + はずだった, which means “was expected to be something.”

     

    I am actually CONFUSED. a little hard for me to understand the difference between the two. could anyone give me an example.

    Cheers

     

    October 21, 2012 at 2:19 pm #36607

    hopkinsth
    Member

    Here’s how I would think of it. The difference comes in what part of the sentence is in past tense. Anyone with more experience, please feel free to correct me.

    箱（はこ）のはずだった。– This is like “(I) expected it is a box.” (Probably better as “It was expected to be a box.” Past tense is attached to はず.)

    箱（はこ）だったはずです。– This is like “(I) expect it was a box.” (You’re attaching the past tense to 箱.)

    Like I said, please correct me if this is wrong, but that’s how I’ve thought of it. The difference between the two is when the expectation or supposition happened. It’s a fairly subtle distinction.

    • This reply was modified 11 years, 6 months ago by  hopkinsth.
    October 31, 2012 at 5:58 am #37052

    Koala_chan
    Member

    Many thanks for the explanation!

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