だけ - Grammar Discussion

only・just

Structure

  • Verb + だけ
  • いAdjective + だけ
  • Noun + だけ
  • なAdjective・ + だけ

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@celophi

Hey and welcome on community forums :grin:

Yes, you are right. It is OK to use が・は・を after だけ、though it is incredibly uncommon nowadays.

Example:
誰が行きますか?
私だけ(が)行きます。
Who will go?
Only I will go.

Though in this specific case it would be much more natural to use で、私だけで行きます。

PS
The avatar is super cute, where is it from? :star_struck:

The structure section mentions that だけ can also be used with verbs, but none of the examples do that. Would be nice to have some of those!

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In this exercise:

彼女は綺麗 ____ 。
She is just beautiful.

Why is なだけ correct, but なだけだ isn’t?

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@Melanthe

They are both correct :bowing_man: I have added alternative answer!
Sorry for the inconvenience, :bowing_man:

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It doesn’t seem to work yet for me?

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It should be working now! :bowing_man:

I am super sorry, I made a typo when writing alternative answer and added だだけだ instead of なだけだ!

Sorry for the inconvenience!

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Ahhh, that explains it, thanks for fixing it!

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は,が and を after だけ is uncommon but it should it still be a valid answer, right? Tae Kim ( a resource you follow for だけ) also says it’s valid. a few Japanese people / studiers I know say it could be emphasis/nuance related. Just bugs me it would be marked as wrong.

Hi there, quick question.

彼女は綺麗な だけ

She is just beautiful.

Would this be used like the English “just” as an intensifier, or is it stating that her only quality is being beautiful?

Thank you.

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@Hollani23 Thank you for your question! 綺麗なだけ is used to state that her only quality is beauty. Cheers!

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Why is there a な here? Isn’t 怠け者 a noun?

I was just about to post this again lol.

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I came here with the same doubt. :stuck_out_tongue:

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Hello,

Whilst reading a short story, I came upon のみ as a literary version of だけ. Could this be added as a fun fact to this grammar point?

Thank you very much for your consideration. よい週末を

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Hello,

What would be the difference between the two sentences:
彼女は綺麗なだけ
彼女は綺麗だけ

Thank You

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Hi!

I take this chance to reiterate this request, i.e. to add のみ as a fun fact to this grammar point. In fact, のみ appears indirectly in this grammar point: のみならず.

Thank you very much for your consideration.

よい週末を

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You may already have an answer for this, but my understanding is as follows:

  1. 彼女は綺麗なだけだ。

  2. 彼女は綺麗だけだ。

  3. is grammatically correct. 2) is grammatically incorrect.
    I suspect that in a negative sentence, omitting the “な” is probably grammatically incorrect, but has become common usage, and therefore most Japanese people wouldn’t think of it as incorrect.

I’m kinda late to the party, but interpreting 彼女は綺麗な だけ だ。as “she is only beautiful” would help avoid that “intensifying” nuance in English.