Plural in Japanese and how to make words plural, explained

Is there any plural in Japanese?

Honestly, it’s very hard to answer this question. In most cases, Japanese people do not differentiate the plural from the singular. Or perhaps I should say, there is no clear border between the Japanese plural and singular. I think that it would be a bit surprising and also confusing to Japanese learners. Yet, this is the trait of the Japanese language.

In this blog post, I will explain some background of the Japanese plural. And also, I will explain how to make words plural in Japanese. Let’s get started!

Contents

• There is no clear border between the plural and the singular
  • How NOT clear it is
• Adverbs for plural in Japanese
  • Adverb, “ikutsuka”
• Suffixes to make words plural in Japanese
  • Suffix, “tachi”
  • “Tachi” after an inanimate thing
  • Suffix, “ra”
• Repeating the same noun
• Summary of plural in Japanese

There is no clear border between the plural and the singular

Again, but there is no clear border between the plural and the singular in Japanese. To understand it a bit more, let me explain it through the example below.

How NOT clear it is

The example below is quite simple, but sufficient to show the difference between English and Japanese on the plural.

Its translation would be either one of the followings.

Before going to detailed explanations of the plural, let me check new words used in the example sentence as follows.

• tsukue – 机 (つくえ) : a noun meaning ‘desk’ or ‘table’ in Japanese. It can also be used as a plural noun meaning ‘desks’ or ‘tables’.
• ga – が : a case particle put after a noun to make the subject word or the object word. In the example sentence, it’s put after the noun, “tsukue”, to make the subject word in the sentence.
• aru – ある : a verb meaning ‘to be’ or ‘to exist’ in Japanese. Basically, it expresses existence of inanimate things in Japanese.

The noun “tsukue” can be a plural noun depending on context. So, the Japanese example sentence can be translated as either of the English sentences above.

Other than “tsukue”, many Japanese nouns can be used as plural nouns. Basically, they never change their forms. So, we don’t have to worry about rules for making irregular plurals when we learn Japanese. Yet, this doesn’t mean that the Japanese plurals are easier than those in other languages. In fact, we cannot differentiate from the plural from the singular based on appearance or pronunciation. This could be a problem for those who are familiar with the border between the plural and the singular. Honestly, however, even Japanese native speakers sometimes get confused with plural nouns, so we don’t have to worry that much.

Adverbs for plural in Japanese

So far, I’ve explained that there is no clear border between the Japanese plural and singular. Yet, this doesn’t mean that there is no border. Actually, there is a subtle border between them.

Japanese native speakers often use adverbs to make words plural explicitly. They cannot change noun forms, so use other words instead. Let me explain how they make plural nouns with help of adverbs.

Adverb, “ikutsuka”

Below is a new word used in the example sentence.

• ikutsuka – いくつか : an adverb meaning ‘a few’, ‘several’ or ‘some’ in Japanese.

As you can see here, the adverb, “ikutsuka”, is definitely helpful to make words plural in Japanese. And also, it helps us to differentiate plural nouns from singular nouns. Thanks to its help, the Japanese example sentence above can be translated only as ‘here are some tables’.

Japanese native speakers quite often use this adverb to make words plural explicitly. Other than this, some adverbs can be used for the same purpose. Japanese native speakers often try use them when they have to avoid any confusion between the plural and the singular.

In addition, specifying a particular number is also very possible. This way definitely helps us to understand a correct number of things.

However, Japanese nouns still do not give us any information enables us to judge if they are singular or plural. In English, we have the magic character “s” or sometimes characters “es”. Doesn’t the Japanese language have such useful characters?

Suffixes to make words plural in Japanese

I’ve explained that basically Japanese nouns do not change their forms. Yet, this does not mean that they cannot be connected to a suffix. In Japanese, there are two useful suffixes to make words plural. In the next paragraphs, I will explain them through the examples.

Suffix, “tachi”

Below are new words used in the example sentence.

• watashi – 私 (わたし) : a pronoun meaning ‘I’ in Japanese.
• tachi – 達 (たち) : a suffix put after a noun to make its plural form. In the example, it’s put after the pronoun, “watashi”, to make its plural form, “watashi tachi”, which means ‘we’ in Japanese.
• wa – は : a binding particle working as a case marker or a topic marker. In the example, it’s put after the plural noun, “watashi tachi”, to make the subject word in the sentence.
• nihonjin – 日本人 (にほんじん) : a noun meaning ‘Japanese people’ or ‘the Japanese’. Learn more about “nihonjin”.
• desu – です : an auxiliary verb put after a noun or adjective to make it polite. In the example, it’s put after the noun, “nihonjin”, to make it sound polite.

“Tachi” is a suffix used to make words plural explicitly. In the example above, it’s used after the pronoun, “watashi”, to make its plural form. Unfortunately, however, it is not a magic word to make words plural in Japanese. In principle, it can be used only with nouns for living things like “watashi”. If we put “tachi” after a noun for an inanimate thing, it sounds very weird.

“Tachi” after an inanimate thing

Its translation could be like this.

I’m not 100% sure if you feel weird with this Japanese sentence, but it sounds weird to native speakers. Normally, the suffix “tachi” cannot be used together with nouns for inanimate things. Only if personification is used as a metaphor, it can be put after a noun for an inanimate thing. So, we need to be a bit careful with the use of “tachi”.

Suffix, “ra”

The other suffix is “ra”. Below is the example using it.

Below are new words used in the example sentence.

• kare – 彼 (かれ) : a pronoun meaning ‘he’ in Japanese.
• ra – 等 (ら) : a suffix put after a noun to make its plural form. In the example, it’s put after the pronoun, “kare”, to make its plural form, “kare ra”, which means ‘they’ in Japanese.
• no – の : a case particle put after a noun to make its possessive case. In the example, it’s put after the plural noun, “kare ra”, to make its possessive case, “kare ra no”, which means ‘their’ in Japanese. Learn more about “no” through “watashi no”.

The suffix “ra” is used in a quite similar way that “tachi” is. It can be put after a noun to make its plural form. Basically, however, the use of “ra” is limited to nouns for persons. So, it’s less flexible than “tachi” explained above.

The most widely used combinations are; “kare ra”, “kanojo ra”, “kore ra” and “sore ra”. They mean ‘they (for men)’, ‘they (for women)’, ‘these’ and ‘those’ respectively.

Repeating the same noun

Speaking of suffixes, I need to explain another suffix-like word as well. It’s not a suffix really, but put after a noun to make its plural form. It is the noun itself. What I am saying here is that repeating the same noun twice can be a way to make words plural in Japanese. Below is the example.

• hibi – 日日 (ひび) : a noun meaning ‘days’ in Japanese.

The word, “hi 日 (ひ)”, means a day in Japanese. When it’s repeated twice, it can become its plural form as shown above. For the sake of simplicity, in other words, in order to avoid writing the same kanji two times, the second kanji is often replaced with “々”. Most probably, Japanese learners can easily find it in Japanese articles, novels and so on. It is just there on behalf of the original kanji. Only one thing we need to be careful with is its pronunciation. Basically its pronunciation is the same as that of the original noun. Depending on the original noun, however, a voiced sound is used instead like the example above shows.

As usual, we need to be aware that this method does not always work well. Below is one exception.

• tokidoki – 時々 (ときどき) : an adverb meaning ‘sometimes’, ‘at times’ or ‘occasionally’ in Japanese. It can also mean ‘times’, but its use is quite limited.

While “toki 時 (とき)” basically means ‘time’ or ‘moment’, in most cases “tokidoki” doesn’t mean ‘times’ or ‘moments’.

Definitely, “々” helps us to make plural nouns. Unfortunately, however, we need to know which noun can be replaced with it before using it. So, in a way, its use presupposes knowledge of Japanese vocabulary.

Summary of plural in Japanese

In this blog post, I’ve explained plural in Japanese and how to make words plural. Let me summarize them as follows.

• Basically Japanese native speakers don’t differentiate the plural from the singular.
• Some adverbs help us to differentiate the plural from the singular.”Ikutsuka” is one of them, helping us to make words plural explicitly.
• The suffix, “tachi”, helps us to change Japanese nouns to their plural forms, but it can be used only with nouns for living things.
• The suffix, “ra”, is put just after a noun to make its plural form. Basically, it can be used only with nouns for persons.
• Repeating the same noun twice can be one solution to make words plural in Japanese, but it presupposes knowledge of Japanese vocabulary.

Hope my explanations are understandable and helpful for Japanese learners.