Gengo Girls #86: Like… Or Like Like?

Like... Or Like Like?

“suki” is a semi-common word in Japanese media. The romantic version of “suki” obviously shows up in just about every romantic drama or comedy in existence. But the non-romantic version gets plenty of use too and even in non-romance works it’s pretty common to hear children “suki” their parents or for people to talk about all the hobbies they “suki”.

Vocabulary

好き = すき = liked, loved (pronounced “ski”, not “su-ki”)

Transcript

言語ガールズ #86

Like… Or Like Like?

Blue: In some cases you can use and together to create one sentence with two different but related topics.

Blue: For example, the sentence pattern for “I like X” is 私はXが好きです.

Yellow: So “I like books” must be 私は本が好きです

Blue: The “私は” lets us know that the main theme of the sentence is “me”.

Blue: The “本が” tells us that there is a link between topic #1, me, and topic #2, books.

Yellow: And the “好きです” tells us that the link is that you like them!

Blue: But be careful! Using 好き to talk about other people can be interpreted as a romantic “I love them” instead of a friendly “I like them”.

Yellow: Romantic comedy misunderstandings here we come!