Re: Verbal Inflection for Formality

> (1) Outline in detail for me the exact system Japanese has in verba
> inflection for formality
How much detail are you looking for?

Basically, Japanese has a few systems going.

1. Multiple verbs for multiple levels (to/from) of status - e.g. be,
do, eat, etc have special verbs; all other verbs have particular forms
that are used (e.g. ~ ni naru)

2. Ingroup / outgroup verbiage (e.g. give, receive, etc)

3. Several levels of inflection, from formal and long to informal and
short; partially correlates to status and respect, partially to
familiarity, partially to situation or listeners. Somewhat similar to
usage in English; formal gets more passive, more indirect, adds extra
helping verbs, etc; informal eschews those and also starts chopping
off bits of the word.

Three (extreme) examples for "eat this" (apologies if I'm inaccurate
or excessive):
To your teacher:
Sumimasen, sensei, tsumaranai mono desu ga, kono o-senbei wo
meshiagatte kudasaimasen ka?
I'm sorry, teacher, though it's an insignificant thing, would you not
please to [honorable-] eat this [honorable] cookie?

To your friend:
Oi, Beitesu-san, kono o-senbei wo tabetain~?
Hey, Mr. Bates, wanna eat this [honorable] cookie?

Harsh and borderline-gangsta:
Senbei kue zo!
Eat the cookie! (In this case, "kue" is the rude command form of
"kuu", which is itself a vulgar word for "eat". 'Zo' is a sort of
forceful masculine way to end a phrase.)

4. Lots of pronouns... though those are rarely used vs designation by
name or by occupation (e.g. department-head-san would be a normal form
of address), and pronouns tend to be towards the impolite end of
things...

That help?

 - Sai

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