(Like) (seems like) (looks like) confusement

Japanese
#1

After having done N4, the thing I’m struggling the most with is all the seems like / looks like points.
I read all the Bunpro explanations multiple times, watched some Youtube videos but it keeps confusing me bigtime.

In N4 we have…
みたい Like, Similar to, Resembling
みたいに Like, Similar to, Resembling
様だ It seems that, It appears that, It looks like
そう Look like, Appear, Seem, Have a feeling that
そういう Like that, Kind of
そうに Seem, Look like, Sound
の様に Like (Noun), Similar to (Noun)
らしい Seems like, Apparently, I heard
様+ に・な As・like, Just like

Did anyone else struggle with this and maybe found a guide that explains all these differences in a comprehensible way?

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#2

These are tricky. It’s totally normal to struggle with these. I know you already watched some videos but I watched this maybe ten times to help it sink in:

日本語の森 みたい、らしい、そうだ

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#3

At least happy to hear it’s not just me :smiley: Thanks for the videos, will check them out now. They’re fully in Japanese though, not sure if I can handle that already but I’ll give it a try :smiley:

(actually started doing listening practice with the Migii JLPT app since a week or 2 and the first days it was pretty frustrating, but I notice it’s quickly getting more easy to do so. Something I really need to focus on and practice a ton more - so much harder than reading for me)

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#4

The only thing I know really is that らしい is basically you heard something and you’re kinda paraphrasing/putting in your perspective, where as そうだ is more of a literal phrasing of what’s been said/heard

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#5

Not sure if you have access to it, but I believe it’s in Quartet II in the supplementals section, there’s a great breakdown of all of these with explicit examples and practice. Might be worth googling for a copy to take a look.

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#6

I was in the same boat and I think these lessons, among others (conditional cough) should be pushed a bit further in Bunpro.

What helped was mostly exposition and trying to analyze context and usage whenever I encountered any of those in the wild.
I accepted I had only basic understanding and went with it. Way more helpful than any thorough grammatical explanation I found. As for me, of course.

みたい and そう are used all the time in series or anime so once you spot them it doesn’t take long to get their meanings and nuances.

よう is trickier cause it’s part of many constructions. If I’m not mistaken it’s a formal みたい in this case. With the focused usage of describing a method/manner/way of doing something rather than an appearance. In daily conversation I think you can use みたい in both situations.
It can also be used like そう, but has a much higher degree of certainty. To me, it’s sounds like something is really obvious.

Please someone correct me if I’m wrong.

Those could help :

@Brux Aren’t you talking about the other N3 usage of そうだ ? :upside_down_face:

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#7

Despairs

When is it gonna end robbie

But serious answer: I don’t know. It’s just something that I brought up to my private tutor yesterday (same day as the reply) and they said the above what I referenced. Considering I’m focusing on N3 for N3 in December, they may have approached it from an N3 perspective in their reply :slight_smile:

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#8

Great video, thanks for that - probably the first time I’ve felt I could keep up with a solely Japanese teaching video.

@Brux Arsenal fan by any chance?

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#9

Yep those videos were superhelpfull. But for me it will probably take a lot of reading an practice to really master all these differences.

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