Please tell me the proper uses of “は” and “が”.

Please tell me the proper uses of “は” and “が”.

We carry out the proper uses of “は” and “が” without being especially aware of them every day. But these proper uses of “は” and “が” carries complex problems that look like they are controversial even among experts if they have to explain all of them. Nevertheless, the fundamental way to use them is not a very difficult thing. At this point, I will try to examine the most fundamental differences between “は” and “が” without referring to the detailed problems.

There are broadly “nominal sentences” that treated nouns as predicates, “adjectival sentences” that treated adjectives (I-adjectives) and adjectival verbs (NA-adjectives) as predicates and “verbal sentences” that treated verbs as predicates for sentences. Concretely, they are as follows.

佐藤さんは社長だ. (Noun sentence) [1] 佐藤さんはやさしい. (Adjectival sentence) [2] 佐藤さんが来た. (Verbal sentence) [3]

Now, in these sentences, every subject is “Mx. Satou”, but you will notice that the subject is indicated by “は” for nominal sentences and adjectival sentences, whereas the subject is indicated by “が” in verbal sentences. In this way, there is the difference that “は” usually represents the subject of nominal sentences and adjectival sentences and “が” represents the subject of verbal sentences.

Moreover, you will even be able to switch “は” and “が” for the previous examples, but in that case, it will continue to reach the point where the interpretation varies, and has a special meaning.

佐藤さんが社長だ. (Noun sentence) [4] 佐藤さんがやさしい. (Adjectival sentence) [5] 佐藤さんは来た. (Verbal sentence) [6]

If you append “が” to the subject of nominal sentences and adjectival sentences, it will result in answers to questions such as “Who is to be the company president?” “Which person is to be kind?” and an interpretation that “Precisely Mx. Satou and no one else” is “the company president” or “kind”. In other words, in this case, it will result in an interpretation that looks like it excludes other people and specifies a certain person. On the other hand, in the case where you appended “は” to the subject of verbal sentences, it will result in an interpretation that looks like it excludes other people similar to “Other people didn’t come, but Mx. Satou came”.

The examples that I gave in here are one part of the proper use of “は” and “が”, and there are also exceptions depending on the scenes where they are used, but the differences in here are summarized as follows.

1) Usually, the subject of nominal sentences/adjectival sentences is indicated by “は”, and the subject of verbal sentences is indicated by “が”. 2) If you indicate the subject of nominal sentences/adjectival sentences with “が”, and the subject of verbal sentences with “は”, it will result in an interpretation that looks like it excludes others and specifies the person in question.

[1] “Mx. Satou is the company president.” [2] “Mx. Satou is kind.” [3] “Mx. Satou came.” [4] “Mx. Satou is the company president (and no one else).” [5] “Mx. Satou is kind (and no one else).” [6] “Mx. Satou came (and no one else).”

Source

 * https://www.alc.co.jp/jpn/article/faq/03/19.html

Other Language

 * 「は」と「が」の使い分けを教えてください.