Basic Japanese Grammar With Yoda

“Do or do not. There is no try.” - Yoda

“Hrrrmm. Learn Japanese, you will,” says Yoda to Luke.
“But I want to learn the ways of the force,” Luke whines back.

Maybe you don’t remember that particular scene, but chances are you’ve seen Star Wars and its little green Jedi dude, Yoda. Did you know that George Lucas (director / creator of Star Wars) was a big fan of Japanese film (and got the inspiration for Star Wars from Japanese director Akira Kurosawa’s “The Hidden Fortress?”). To show his Japan-love, he made Yoda speak kind of… strangely. But did you know that the way Yoda speaks mimics very basic Japanese grammar? It’s great for you, though, since we’re going to use it to make learning Japanese grammar so much easier for you English speakers out there.

*This is the last lesson with Japanese written in romaji. Please make sure you get comfortable with hiragana before moving on to the next chapter. Heck, maybe you should go study some hiragana right now before moving on, depending on where you’re at with it.

In this chapter we’ll start learning Japanese grammar in its most simple form. For most non-Japanese speakers, Japanese grammar is a bit of a challenge. Everything is, how should we say… flip flopped. Hopefully you have seen Star Wars and know how Yoda speaks. We’re going to mimic that (er… minus the grumbly voice). When it comes to basic Japanese grammar, Yoda is a perfect parallel of how everything works. When things get a little more complicated, though, we’ll have to ditch our little green friend for better things, but he’ll be a great foundation to work off of, plus you can skip a lot of the confusing issues that most Japanese learners end up going through. See, we make your life easier here!

Don’t know how Yoda talks or need a refresher? Watch a video or two to get into the groove of things.

Don’t even know who Yoda is? Let Weird Al teach you.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s take a look at some very simple sentences and “translate” them into Yoda-speak.

Speaking More Like Yoda #

“Size matters not … Look at me. Judge me by size, do you?” - Yoda

Yoda has a funny way of talking (but you already knew that). Let’s take a look at some very simple examples which will soon turn into learning some very simple Japanese grammar.

English: It is a pen.

Yoda: Pen, it is.

Whoa? See how your world just turned upside down?

English: It is a doctor.

Yoda: Doctor, it is.

English: It is a Dog.

Yoda: Dog, it is.

Now let’s have you try.

English: It is a monkey. Answer →

• Yoda: Monkey, it is.

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English: It is a hairpiece. Answer →

• Yoda: Hairpiece, it is.

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Great job! Now let’s see how this works in Japanese. We’ll make it easy on you and focus only on the grammar part though. All nouns (persons, places, or things) in the sentence will be in English, and the grammary parts will be in Japanese.

Desu (です) #

The very first thing we’re going to learn is “desu.” The really important thing about “desu” is that it’s not pronounced the way you’d think (that is, if you paid really good attention in the chapter on hiragana & pronunciation). To pronounce “desu” correctly, you have to drop the “u” on the end. It’s really pronounced more like “dess,” though as you get better at Japanese you’ll find appropriate ways to re-add it back in with certain situations. For now, though, we’ll always pronounce “desu” as “dess.”

“Desu,” for our intents and purposes, will mean “it is.” Although there is no real literal meaning for “desu” in English, “it is” will get us close enough until you can experience “desu” in more variety. “Desu” is also a sentence ender that comes after nouns that makes sentences more polite, but we’ll get into politeness in speech more later. For right now, just link the word “desu” in your brain with “it is.”

In our practice sentences with Yoda, do you remember how the grammar part worked?

English: It is a pen.

Yoda: Pen, it is.

Now, what does “desu” mean? Of course, for what we’re doing here in this lesson, we’re going to remember it to mean “it is.” In the phrases above, both use “it is” in the sentence. Now, let’s replace “it is” with “desu.” We only want to look at Yoda’s sentence, though, because that sentence mimics simple Japanese grammar (and this is definitely very simple).

Yoda: Pen, it is.

Japanese: Pen desu.

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Based off that, can you guess what “pen desu” means? You got it, “It is a pen.” Of course, with this knowledge, you can say anything, really. It is a bus. It is a cat. It is a dog. It is a monkey. It is a flamingo… The list goes on and on. All you need to do is replace the noun with another noun, and you can essentially say hundreds of thousands of different things… if you have a dictionary that is. Let’s practice.

Yoda: Monkey, it is.

Japanese: Monkey desu.

Yoda: Dog, it is.

Japanese: Dog desu.

Yoda: Cow, it is. Answer →

• Japanese: Cow desu

That should be simple enough, but let’s practice using some extra vocabulary, listed below. The important thing isn’t to focus on the vocabulary. Instead, focus on the grammar that you’re learning. You can always learn vocabulary, but if you don’t understand the grammar around it, you won’t be able to communicate much of anything at all.

There will be a series of images (including the word in Japanese), and I’d like you to follow the directions provided with each image.

Budou (grapes)

1. Write “budou” in hiragana. Answer →

2. How would Yoda say “It is a grape”?　Answer →

3. How do you say “it is” in Japanese? Answer →

4. Replace “it is” from Yoda’s sentence with the Japanese word for “it is.” Answer:

5. Now replace the word “Grape” with the Japanese word for grape. How do you say “it is a grape” in Japanese? Answer:

Great job, now for another picture.

Banana (Banana)

As you can see, the Japanese word for banana is… “banana.” This means that the Japanese word for “banana” is really just a foreign word in disguise. Do you know what “Japanese Alphabet” you would use to write “banana” in, since it’s a foreign word? Look it up if you can’t figure it out on your own. Answer →

1. Using your katakana chart, figure out how to write Banana in katakana. Remember how hiragana and katakana share the same sounds? Find Ba, na, and na, and write them in katakana. Answer →

2. Now that you have “banana” in katakana, how would you write “it is a banana” in Japanese? Use your hiragana chart if you need to. Answer →

3. Did you notice how in the previous answer there were no spaces between バナナ (banana) and です (desu)? When it comes to written Japanese, there are actually no spaces, which is another reason why kanji is so important! It’s used to separate words from each other, otherwise it all gets mushed together. I’ll be separating words out for a little while in this text, though, as it will make things easier to read while we don’t have any kanji to break things up for us.

4. Say “banana desu” out loud. Don’t pronounce “banana” like you normally would in English, this is incorrect! Use the sounds we learned in the hiragana chapter.

Now we’ll take a look at a series of pictures and I want you to tell me what they are. For example, if I show you a picture of a monkey, you should be able to say “it is a monkey” in Japanese. Remember Jisho.org? Go ahead and use that to find words that you don’t know already.

It is a monkey. Answer →

Now write it out 5 times in hiragana (use your sheet if you have to) Answer →

It is a Strawberry. Answer →

Write the answer in hiragana Answer →

It is a pumpkin. Answer →

Write the answer in hiragana and then say it out loud. Remember how if you combine a small や, ゆ, or よ to a kana in the い column it modifies it? ち (chi) + small や (ya) = ちゃ (cha). Here’s the pronunciation for pumpkin in case you’re unsure:

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How are you feeling about the lesson so far? Although this concept is pretty simple, here are some worksheets you can go through in order to practice this. Remember, just think “how would yoda say it?” and you should be fine!

Using Your Passion List For The First Time

Remember that list vocab you created for your “passion” in the previous chapter? Go ahead and pull that out, we’re going to use it to practice this grammar lesson.

• Using your “Passion Vocab,” write “it is a ______” in Japanese for each one of them. As you are going through, picture that thing in your head. For example, “Baseball” in Japanese is やきゅう (yakyuu). I would picture the concept of baseball in my head as I said and wrote やきゅうです (yakyuu desu). I would also try to smell the air and hear the crowds as I did this. The more senses you try to use, the better of a memory you’ll develop!
• You’re only going to be doing this with the nouns on your list (people, places, things). Verbs won’t work at all, and I want you to hold off on adjectives until later.
• Make sure you write all of these by hand! Do you know the vocab from your passion list? Be sure to study them if you don’t, because these vocab will be used later on as well.

Not particularly the most interesting way to use your new vocab lists, but it’ll get better as we learn more grammar. That being said, it’s time to move on! Congratulations, you are now officially able to speak some real, (somewhat) dynamic, Japanese. This is a big step, and there will be many more where that came from!

Basic です Worksheet

I’ve also created a basic worksheet to help you solidify your knowledge of this simple grammar point. Go through the worksheet and become a master at です.

• です Practice + Hiragana Practice Worksheet

It will also be a great opportunity to finish prepping your hiragana for the coming chapters. By now you should know your hiragana fairly well (it’s okay if you have to look them up sometimes, you’ll get better). Starting next chapter we’ll be going 100% hiragana, so study it hard before you move on. I’ll see you on the other side!

P.S. If you aren’t a member of TextFugu, now’s probably the time to make the decision. If you’ve made it this far, you’re doing really really well. Consider making that big decision, and start learning Japanese now.

Chapter Content:

• です practice & hiragana practice

Before Moving on :

• Know Hiragana pretty well (how to read, write, and pronounce)
• Understand the meaning of “desu.”
• Understand the pronunciation of desu (it’s “dess” not “desoo”)
• How to say “It is a ______” no matter what ______ is.
• Be able to pronounce “banana” in Japanese.
• Have all the worksheets completed
• Go through your “Passion List” and practice です with them
• Become a full TextFugu member before you move on.

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Answering All of Your Questions →