じゃありませｎ vs. ではありません

[SceptileMaster]

Originally Posted by KyleGoetz

You are ignoring a simple fact: you learn a language to communicate with people, not textbook-correct grammatical robots. If people say "he don't," then you must learn it at some point.

Prescriptively, yes, "he don't" is incorrect. However, descriptively, it is correct.

Whatever "correct" means for you. If you think about it, the only way you judge correctness in a language is based on how people use it, not how some dictionary tells you to speak.

People stuck in your rigid mindset have the most problems learning languages. "Wait, my textbook says XXX, so why do people use YYY???" Simple: Your textbook or study materials are rigidly focused on teaching "essay language" and not "how people actually talk language."

In other words, your textbook be wrong, yo

On a side note: Even in Texas, "ain't" is taught as 100% wrong usage when in fact "ain't" is the correct contraction for "am not" (well, technically "an't" was the original, but you catch my drift). One example of people with too rigid grammatical rules ruining words.

Another stupid rule is "don't put prepositions at the end of a sentence." This rule was invented in only about 100 years ago or so when teachers were trying to import Latin grammatical rules into English.

Regardless, such a rule is one up with which I shall not put.

It's not rigid it's just called speaking the language correctly. Also 'am not' is only used in the first person perspective meaning ain't is incorrect as you would use I'm instead. Plus it's not about one text book saying one thing and another textbook saying something else I was asking about how common uses of the different thing. The difference between じゃありません / ではありません and he don't / he doesn't is that even if one isn't commonly used or sounds a little weird both じゃありません and ではありません make sense grammatically but 'he don't' doesn’t.

Also I don't have problems learning the language I just want to get it right first then I can worry about slang and dialects after I can speak it correctly. There is a difference between complete incoherent garbage and slang or casual speak.

[jesselt]

So I asked my teacher about the ではありません・じゃありません thing to get her opinion. After saying a few sentences using each, she said that ではありません "Sounds more polite." I told her that I was talking with a different Japanese person and they said that じゃありません isn't actually used/sounds weird but she didn't seem very surprised and said that it could be a regional thing because apparently it is fairly commonly heard when she is in Japan. She's originally from Kyoto.

=s

I suppose I'll just start using ではありません because I like the flow better and I guess it is better to sound more polite anyways.

Also, regarding the "He don't" thing... I very rarely hear anyone say something like "He/She don't" and if I did I would immediately regard them as undereducated in basic English skills. My stepsister often says things like "that there" and "funner" which are more commonly heard, but the same reaction still comes out. Native speakers frequently make mistakes in their own language, so if Japanese speakers are surprised to hear things like "he don't" after being told that it is wrong... They should be glad to know that they are better at speaking English than some native speakers.

[SceptileMaster]

This doesn't surprise me at all and is something a long the lines of what I thought since the book I'm using is written by people people from the Kansai region and it mentions じゃありません (and of course also ではありません).

[mandalina]

I just saw this じゃありません and didn't understand what it is. I can say it sounded strange to me. Can you first tell me what ではありません or じゃありません mean?

[Aether]

Originally Posted by mandalina

I just saw this じゃありません and didn't understand what it is. I can say it sounded strange to me. Can you first tell me what ではありません or じゃありません mean?

ではありません and じゃありません are used to negate a sentence. So if I wanted to say I am not a cat, I could say, 「僕は猫ではありません。」

じゃ is a like a contraction of the sounds of では.

[KyleGoetz]

Originally Posted by SceptileMaster

It's not rigid it's just called speaking the language correctly. Also 'am not' is only used in the first person perspective meaning ain't is incorrect as you would use I'm instead. Plus it's not about one text book saying one thing and another textbook saying something else I was asking about how common uses of the different thing. The difference between じゃありません / ではありません and he don't / he doesn't is that even if one isn't commonly used or sounds a little weird both じゃありません and ではありません make sense grammatically but 'he don't' doesn’t.

Also I don't have problems learning the language I just want to get it right first then I can worry about slang and dialects after I can speak it correctly. There is a difference between complete incoherent garbage and slang or casual speak.

That's precisely my point. Who decides what is "correct"? Society.

If society deems something correct, it is correct.

Rule #1 of any composition/language use is to use the language your target audience expects you to use. If you are lecturing high school students, you wouldn't "forthwith explain your inner monologue," no matter how "correct" this is.

Language exists for one purpose: communicating ideas. If your usage impedes this purpose, it is bad. If it facilitates, it is good. This is why you modify your speech to a target audience.

Believe it or not, there is no "natural rule book" for any language. There is only societal judgement.

Speaking of "judgement," note my spelling there. In the US, judges and lawyers would tell you that is wrong because we spell it "judgment" instead. However, other groups of society spell it with the "e," so I chose to use the "e."

This demonstrates why it's important to know your audience when writing.

[SceptileMaster]

Obviously communicating is main object of conversation but I often hear people go through multiple sentences without communicating any ideas at all.

[KyleGoetz]

Originally Posted by SceptileMaster

Obviously communicating is main object of conversation but I often hear people go through multiple sentences without communicating any ideas at all.

That has absolutely nothing to do with following your prescriptivist rules, though. It's a non sequitur—a valueless statement.

I'd also like to point out, preemptively, that I don't have a prejudice against using "correct" English because of some personal deficiency—I was an editor for an academic journal before I received my doctorate.

[IcewindDude]

This thread really reminds me back when I had to struggle through the "it's this way/it's that way" rules of Japanese. Back when I was thinking more rigidly and wanted to accept that there was a "right" way. When you think about it, our best language learners, children, have no concept of "right" and certainly have no rigid preconception of how language rules are followed.

I started off learning the safe textbook language, but then I followed suit and simply learned from listening.

Btw, I've heard of those examples (じゃありません / ではない) in anime before... But I learned very quickly that anime should not be a reference to normal conversation.

[SceptileMaster]

Think about it this way. It's a common thing (and it annoys me that people do this) for people to make fun of foreigners for nuances in their English speech even if the ones making the jokes aren't great speakers themselves. I don't want to become one of those people that others make fun of for some stupid grammar reason I didn't iron out.