SUKI AND KIRAI (好き / 嫌い)

SUKI (好き) and KIRAI (嫌い) are used respectively to express appreciation and depreciation of something or someone. Those two な adjectives are preceded by the particle GA が, sometimes は WA (more details at the end of the document).

SUKI

好き means “appreciated,” “likable,” etc. It can be used to translate “I like…”. With a noun, we should literally understand “noun + is appreciated.”

Literally: in my case, music is appreciated.

If it's a verb, it must be nominalized by adding KOTO (こと) or NO (の) after its plain form (dictionary form). We can then say, “to like + verb.”

Literally: In my case, the fact of playing drums is appreciated.

To say “to love someone,” の こと is added after the person’s name to highlight the information.

KIRAI

KIRAI (嫌い) means “dislikable.” It's used to say, “I don’t like…”. Be careful, despite its appearance, it’s not an い adjective, but a な adjective.

As we did for 好き, we nominalize a verb by adding the particle こと or の to its plain form. We can then say, “don’t like + verb.”

To say “don't love someone,” you can also add のこと after the person’s name to emphasize the information.

Difference between WA (は) and GA (が) in the structure

To explain the difference between the particles は and が, let’s compare two sentences.

The difference is subtle. With が, we insist on the subject of the appreciation. We like fish (and nothing else). Whereas with は, the fish becomes the topic of the sentence, and the information that follows is highlighted. In a context where we were talking about meat, vegetable and fish for example, は puts a stress on fish as the element we like “compared to others.”

DAI (大) before SUKI and KIRAI

It's also possible to add 大 before 好き and 嫌い. It reinforces the feeling of appreciation or depreciation (大好き = to love, to enjoy a lot, etc. /  大嫌い  = to hate, etc.) The kanji 大 means “large / big.”

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Posted on Apr 29, 2012, 4:46:50 PM	#3
Clinch ありがとうございます

Posted on Apr 28, 2012, 4:52:24 AM	#2
Element なんだ is from　なのだ form to emphasize a information. Look at carefully the grammatical point のだ/のです http://www.japan-activator.com/en/lessons/grammar/article/id/90 I hope it will help you. 嫌い <大嫌い To dislike < to hate

Posted on Apr 27, 2012, 8:45:49 PM	#1
Clinch What does "なん" mean in the sentence "足が遅いから走るのが嫌いなんだ"? I know it means "what," but that doesn't make sense here. お願いします Also, in the last example, the sentence "彼は納豆が大嫌いだよ" translates to "He hates nattou!"

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