20879
Consider the two sentences:

>   1. うちに犬がいます。  
>  uchi-ni inu-ga imasu
>   2. 犬がうちにいます。  
>  inu-ga uchi-ni imasu
>

Is it correct to translate these as

>   1. "There is a dog at home"
>   2. "The dog is at home"
>

respectively?

To me, the first sentence feels like a statement of fact, and the second feels
like an answer to the question "Where is the dog?". Is this interpretation
correct? If not, how does the order of subject and place affect the meaning?

Furthermore, how do either of these differ from the following sentence?

>   3. 犬はうちにです。  
>  inu-wa uchi-ni desu
>
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2014-12-13T18:20:34.130
20877
2014-12-15T01:10:57.480
2014-12-15T01:10:57.480
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question
grammar
How does the order of place and subject affect the meaning of a sentence using the verb iru
uchi-ni inu-ga imasu (家に犬がいます) and inu-ga uchi-ni imasu (犬が家にいます) sounds, to
me at least, the same. It's very commonly the case in Japanese that you can
rearrange words and construct virtually the same sentence. Personally, I would
say "uchi ni inu ga imasu". They both seem like statements of facts. If you
were asked directly, "Where is the dog?" (犬はどこ？) you would probably just say
"uchi ni imasu (家にいます)" and omit the subject, dog, completely because it's
obvious from the context.

There is a difference between inu-wa uchi-ni desu (犬は家にです) and the the other
two sentences, however. You don't actually need ni before desu. ni arimasu and
ni imasu can be abbreviated to just desu. For example "uchi ni imasu (家にいます)"
is the same as "uchi desu (家です)." However, when you're using this form it
sounds more to me like, "The dog is home" as opposed to the statement of fact
that "the dog resides in the house." Nevertheless, depending on the context,
in this case if you were asked directly, "Where is the dog?" they would both
sound the same to me.
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2014-12-14T00:24:28.127
20879
2014-12-14T00:24:28.127
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answer