65487
I am doing japaneese N5 lessons for second time and I get REALLY confused. As
far as I know there are 3 categories of verbs:

  * Irregular verbs
  * Ichidan verbs
  * Godan verbs

But the sensei tells us that there are the following categories:

  * Irregular ones
  * U-verbs
  * RU-verbs

And I got pretty much confused on this issue: which is the appropriate one
classification, are U-verbs just godan ones or not?
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2019-02-14T02:02:43.913
65485
2019-02-15T09:46:33.600
2019-02-15T09:46:33.600
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question
verbs terminology
Confused on verb conjuation U-verbs ru-verbs or godan ones?
The terminology generally used to teach Japanese grammar to foreign language
students is different from the terminology used to teach Japanese grammar to
students in Japanese public school.

While the concept of "U-verbs", "RU-verbs", etc. are commonly taught to
foreign language students, Japanese public school students only learn Godan,
Ichidan, etc.

Broadly speaking:

  * **U-verbs** are Godan Verbs（五段活用動詞{ごだんかつようどうし}）
  * **RU-verbs** are Ichidan Verbs（下一段{しもいちだん}活用動詞、上一段{かみいちだん}活用動詞）
  * **Irregular Verbs** are like "suru"（サ行変格{ぎょうへんかく}活用動詞）、"kuru"（カ行変格活用動詞）、etc.
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2019-02-14T02:37:56.273
65487
2019-02-14T05:05:02.720
2019-02-14T05:05:02.720
7055
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65485
answer
It is a difference of behavior between the ます-form and the dictionary form.
Compare two verbs with きる as dictionary form: 着る yields 着ます and 切る gives 切ります.
In the former case what's conserved is _ki_ -, with the latter what is common
between the two forms is _kir_ -. One stem ends on a vowel, the other on a
consonant (to which five possible vowels can be added, hence _godan_ ).

I personally loathe the term 'type-1 verbs', since it is used for those verbs
that are _not_ 'ichidan' -- now that's not a clever choice of name.

Note that while there are only two official irregular verbs (来る and する), some
other verbs have at least one irregular form (the negation of ある is ない, and 行く
has 行て as a て-form).
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-02-15T08:49:52.617
65509
2019-02-15T08:49:52.617
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answer