This article will give you all of the knowledge you need on the Japanese word dare, including its Japanese definition and translation, example sentences, related expressions and more!
Contents
What does dare mean?
The Japanese word dare ( 誰、だれ) means who. As is true in English, this is a really useful word that you can use in all kinds of questions. Also note that dare no stands for whose, while dare mo can mean either nobody or everybody (don’t worry, it’s not as hard as it sounds!).
Think of the pronunciation as da-le, with the “le” a bit like the beginning of “lemon” (despite what the romaji might suggest, there is no true “r” sound in Japanese outside of yakuza movies).
Below, we take a look at some examples of how to use dare in Japanese.
To make it easier for you, I have written each sentence in full Japanese kanji on the first line, followed by roman letters (romaji), and hiragana, with the English meaning coming last.
Example sentences using the Japanese word dare
誰ですか？
Dare desu ka?
だれですか？
Who is it?
誰が一番強いの？
Dare ga ichiban tsuyoi no?
だれがいちばんつよいの？
Who is the strongest?
その女は誰？
Sono onna wa dare?
そのおんなはだれ？
Who is that woman?
あのオジサンは誰だろう？
Ano ojisan wa dare darou?
あのおじさんはだれだろう？
I wonder who that (older) guy is?
Dare no = Whose
Dare + the possessive -no particle forms dare no (誰の), which translates as whose.
すみません。誰の車ですか？
Sumimasen. Dare no kuruma desu ka?
すみません。だれのくるまですか？
Excuse me. Whose car is this?
じゃあ、誰のせいなの？
Jyaa, dare no sei na no?
じゃあ、だれのせいなの？
Whose fault is it then?
Dare mo = Nobody
Dare mo can mean either nobody or everybody (but not at the same time 😉 ). Distinguishing which meaning is easy from the context. When the verb is negative, dare mo means nobody. When it’s positive, it means everybody. Easy as beans, right?
誰もやりたくない仕事
Dare mo yaritakunai shigoto
だれもやりたくないしごと
Work that nobody wants to do
誰も新しいことを始めるのが怖い。
Dare mo atarashii koto wo hajimeru no ga kowai.
だれもあたらしいことをはじめるのがこわい。
Everybody is scared of starting something new.
なんでそんなことをしたのか、だれも分かりません。
Nande sonna koto wo shita no ka, dare mo wakarimasen.
なんでそんなことをしたのか、だれもわかりません。
Nobody knows why he did that kind of thing.
Rohan's favorite resource for learning Japanese is JapanesePod101, one of the best tools for getting started with the language. Sign up for a free lifetime account here.
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