“Which fruit do you want?” In English, you can differentiate between “this apple”
and “that banana,” the apple in front of you or in your hand and the banana across
the table or in another person’s hand. In Japanese, there’s one more differentiation:
“that orange [way over there],” an orange across the room that no one is next to—or
maybe even an orange already eaten and no longer tangible!
What is sometimes referred to as the Ko-so-a-do System in Japanese encompasses the
four basic ways to refer to items, living beings, and places. Ko- refers to “this”—the
thing nearby—so- refers to “that”—the thing not close but not quite far away—a-
refers to “that [way over there]”—the thing some distance away—and do- is the question-asker,
the “which” that begs to know which thing is being discussed. Ko-, so-, a-, and
do- are prefixes that require different suffixes depending on what you’re referring
to.
Things
When referring to things—items, animals, people, and even intangible concepts—you
use one of two suffixes: -no and -re. -No is used before a noun and
-re is used without nouns; -re should never be used with a noun and -no should never
be used without a noun.
Let’s use the fruit as an example. When talking about things and using nouns, use
the suffix –no:
which fruit? = dono kajitsu?
this apple = kono ringo
that banana = sono banana
that orange [way over there] = ano orenji*
When talking about things and not using nouns (because the context makes the things
clear), use the suffix –re:
which [one]? = dore?
this [one] = kore
that [one] = sore
that [one way over there] = are*
In what kind of situations would you use the suffix –re? Let’s say that for example,
two friends are shopping and are looking for new sweaters.
Standing in front of a display of sweaters, A asks B: Dore ga suki ka? (“Which
[one] do you like?”)
B: Wakaranai… (“I’m not sure.”)
A holds up one of the sweaters while pointing to another one closer to B and asks:
Sore yori kore ga suki ka? (“Do you like this [one] better than that [one]?”)
B nods and looks around, spotting the perfect sweater on display across the aisle
and says: Sou dakedo are ga ichiban suki na no da yo. (“Yeah, I do, but I
like that [one way over there] the most!”)
*The a- prefix is also used for things and concepts that are intangible and/or far
removed from the context. For example, ano kangai (“that idea [we talked
about a while ago]”), ano hito (“that person [who’s not here right now]”),
etc.