Transitive - Intransitive verbs

[monkeytunes]

So, I’m torn on how to attack the Transitive - Intransitive word pairs.

Genki just puts some verb pairs out there and doesn’t offer much else - sink or swim, jerko. The Tae Kim reading pretty much does the same thing - here are some pairs and a pointer on particles, good luck, brah.

Some of the readings offer ‘rules’ on how to create or identify intransitive versions from the transitives, but they’re a mixed bag. Bordering on the absurd is the Wasabi reading, were they present 8 (!!!) patterns, and a big ‘Other’ bucket. More manageable is Cure Dolly’s “3 Laws”.

Finally Aya over at the Tofugu mothership - after a thorough and informative explanation (including answering some questions that I myself had, e.g. is it just ‘passive voice?’ NOPE) - kicks the pins out from the pattern methods of remembering these things at the end of the article and recommends either learning the pairs, or learning them individually as you go. (Unsurprising, this seems to be how WaniKani introduces them, e.g. 回る early on and then later 回す, although they usually mention the pairings in the descriptions/mnemonics.)

So I ask you, my fellow faithful Bunpro sojourners - how do you keep transitive - intransitive straight? Do you just learn them as their own vocab? Do you find the pairings useful? Do you use any of the pattern methods?

I’m leaning towards just treating them as individual new verbs and loading up on self-study example sentences until the verbs just ‘feel’ right, but for the more advanced among you - how do you tackle these? Any pointers?

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[seanblue]

From my experience, there are only two patterns that really matter for verb pairs:

1. If it ends in す, it’s transitive (and the ～える verb in the pair is intransitive)
2. If it ends in ～ある, it’s intransitive (and the ～える verb in the pair is transitive)

None of the other groups actually provide much useful information.

Other than verb pairs falling into those useful two groups, I just learn them as I go. Most of the verb pairs I learned on WaniKani and don’t see when reading I can’t remember which is which (I always mix up 折る and 折れる for example). But some I know simply from repeated exposure (like 続く and 続ける for example). I can’t say if exposure is the right approach, but that’s my approach right now.

[Quemaqua]

My advice is USE them, and also do as you suggested, and self-study a lot of example sentences until they feel right. Both help a lot. For instance, you might build a sentence with 〜（よ）うとしても、〜ない, where the first one is the transitive verb that you’re trying and failing to do, and the latter is intransitive version that won’t happen, try as you might. （例えば:ドアを開けようとしても、開かない。）But beyond that, reading them over and over and using them over and over either in speech, writing, or both is probably the best thing you can do. Most of these don’t follow reliable rules that are quick to discern, and thus just becoming increasingly familiar with what sounds right seems to me the best way to attack them. I find with most of these that I actually know pretty well, my ear hears what sounds wrong well before I can puzzle it out by thinking.