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Are first, second, and third person nominals in Japanese used in the same way
as in English? What should English speakers keep in mind when considering the
three persons in Japanese?

Particularly for the second person, English _you_ is used to directly address
someone, but in Japanese, we are taught to address someone by their name,
which is third person. Does this make any sense? Does it affect grammar in
anyway?

Also, supposing we're talking to Mr. Yamada, and we want to ask him what he
wants to do. Which of the following would be correct?

> [山田]{やまだ}さんは何{なに}がしたいですか？  
>  山田さんは何をしたがっていますか？
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2011-06-04T23:50:13.543
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pronouns
Are first, second, and third person in Japanese all the same as in English?
I would argue that there is a correspondence between the two languages with
all three viewpoints. There are pronouns that are commonly used for the first,
second, and third person just like in English; however, there is a bit of a
cultural difference on when it is appropriate to address someone by name or a
more informal second-person pronoun like "you".

Addressing someone by name doesn't necessarily mean you are talking in the
third person. For example, "Mr. Yamada, what would you like to do?" isn't a
third person question, you're just being polite by addressing them by name.

Of your two examples, I think the first one is closer.

> 山田さんは何をしたいですか。

山田さん knows what he wants to do, so したい is appropriate. The second sentence
reads more as if you are asking someone else what 山田さん wants to do.
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2011-06-05T00:09:03.657
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I think you need to divorce the concept of _"third person grammar"_ and
_pronouns/addressing people_. The _third person_ concept simply does not have
the same relevance in Japanese grammar.

> [person] は何がしたいんですか？

`[person]` here can be many things, which depends on the formality, intimacy
and other context. It has no direct bearing on the grammar of the rest of the
sentence.

> あなたは何がしたいんですか？  
>  君は何がしたいんですか？  
>  山田さんは何がしたいんですか？  
>  太郎株式会社は何がしたいんですか？

The exact expression of `は何がしたいんですか？` would only change depending on what
exactly you want to express in which formality level. Only in that sense are
the person and the rest of the sentence connected; you problably wouldn't say
`てめえは何がしたいんですか？` or `お客様は何がしたいんですか？`, you'd use other formality levels for the
second part. The reason for changing the second part here is _not_ connected
to the concept of first/second/third person though. Even though the meaning
would be weird in most situations, grammatically there's no problem in saying
私は何がしたいんですか？
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