Please help me to understand two parts of this sentence... 「冬に北海道に行ってみればどんなに寒いかということがわかるだろう。」 The website that I got this example sentence from translates this sentence as: "If you go to Hokkaido in

Jonathan Giovanna

Please help me to understand two parts of this sentence... 「冬に北海道に行ってみればどんなに寒いかということがわかるだろう。」 The website that I got this example sentence from translates this sentence as: "If you go to Hokkaido in the winter, you will see how cold it is there."It also gives another way of saying the second half of the sentence: 「どんなに寒いかがわかるだろう。」 My questions are thus: 1. How does ということ affect the meaning of this sentence? What does ということ even mean? The website does not explain this very well, unfortunately, and I can't seem to find a website that does give a good explanation of ということ, either. 2. Why is there a か particle in the middle of the sentence? I've seen か used like this before, but no website ever explains how か is used in the middle of sentences. The only resources I ever find are just beginner's ones which only cover か at the end of a sentence, which I already know about. Help with either of these questions would be much appreciated! Thanks in advance! =)

Mar 12, 2014 12:10 AM

Answers · 11

ということ does not affect the meaning of the sentence, but it is required in Japanese because the construction is Xがわかる, where X is a "nominal phrase." Note that the particleが requires a noun before it. To make the whole phrase "how cold it is" into a nominal phrase, you add ということ. Using the question particle か in the middle of a sentence is quite common in Japanese when there is a question word in the middle. For example: How cold is it? Why do you like it? are questions: Now put them into another sentence: Tell me how cold is it --> tell me how cold it is (English grammar imposes an inversion of "it" and "is" here) Tell me why do you like it --> Tell me why you like it. In Japanese, the counterparts are どんなに寒いですか？どうして好きですか？ Now add "tell me…" in Japanese: どんなに寒いか説明してくださいどうして好きなのか説明してください I hope this answered your questions! :)

March 12, 2014

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