Nuance Index

[DIO-Berry]

What is nuance?

a subtle difference in or shade of meaning, expression, or sound.

Purpose

Like all the threads on nuance before this, this thread is intended to make learning about the nuances between words easier.

Why now?

The last nuance collection thread was closed due to inactivity and I’d also like to propose a different means of organization.

Content

Japanese words that have the same or very similar translations into English, like 冷(つめ)たい and 寒(さむ)い both mean “cold.” Please use this post just for Eng-Jpn. The second post in this thread will be a devoted wiki for other languages.

Organization

This thread will be made a wiki, so anyone can add their contributions. This post should only contain a short (ideally less than 1-2 lines) description of the nuance. Detailed descriptions should be posted as replies and linked. The order of words should be by English alphabetical order. Please use the first words posted as a guideline (bad at, cold, and good at).

English	Japanese	Nuance (short explanation)	Link
to burn	燃(も)える・燃(も)やす	to burn up in flames, to be set ablaze	Post 27
to burn	焦(こ)げる・焦(こ)がす	to char, to burn to a crisp	Post 27
bad at	苦手(にがて)	bad at something and also dislike it	Post 4
bad at	下手(へた)	bad at something, no emotions attached though	Post 4
blood	血(ち)	blood in the general sense, can also refer to family	—
blood	血液(けつえき)	blood in just the physical, liquid sense; specifically the living blood in veins	SyncroPC
to climb	上(のぼ)る	to climb stairs or other relatively small structures	—
to climb	登(のぼ)る	to climb large structures like mountains or other laborious climbing	—
to climb	昇(のぼ)る	to climb in the sky, celestial bodies rising/ascending	—
cold	寒(さむ)い	used for the weather/air	—
cold	冷(つめ)たい	cold to the touch, things like drinks especially; also emotionally distant	—
difficult to	～にくい	takes great effort to do	Ask a Japanese Teacher
difficult to	～がたい	is nearly impossible to do	Ask a Japanese Teacher
difficult to	～づらい	is so uncomfortable to do that it becomes difficult to do	Ask a Japanese Teacher
dislike	嫌(きら)い	don’t like, fairly strong emotionally	—
dislike	苦手(にがて)	don’t like, also can be bad at/with	—
frozen	凍結(とうけつ)	as in roads, the ground	—
frozen	冷凍(れいとう)	as in food	—
to give	あげる	to give (neutral)	Post 26
to give	さしあげる	to give to a social better	Post 26
to give	やる	to give to a social lesser/in-group or animal	Post 26
good at	上手(じょうず)	good at, has a complimentary tone	Post 4
good at	得意(とくい)	good at with a more neutral tone	Post 4
hard to		see “difficult to” above	—
to hear	聞く	To hear intentionally	Hinative
to hear	聞こえる	to be able to hear	Hinative
invite	招待(しょうたい)	(invitation) the noun	Kyle’s thread
invite	招(まね)く	to invite someone to come to you	Kyle’s thread
invite	誘(さそ)う	to invite someone to come along	Kyle’s thread
to listen	聞く	To listen intentionally	Hinative
to listen	聞ける	To be able to listen	Hinative
to speak	話す、喋る	喋る is used when you want to refer to and emphasize the act of speaking	youtube video
to occur	起(お)こる	to occur, to happen	—
to occur	起(お)きる	to occur, usually of unfavorable incidents	—
next to	隣(となり)	next to but with an undefined amount of space between	Post 64
next to	側(そば)	next to as in physically close in proximity	Post 64
noise	雑音(ざつおん)	small noises that irritate you, pet peeve type noises	jprspereira’s thread
noise	騒音(そうおん)	loud annoying noises, noise pollution type noises	jprspereira’s thread
to receive	もらう	to receive from a social equal or lesser/in-group	Post 26
to receive	いただく	to receive from a social better	Post 26
resignation	辞職(じしょく)	resigning from a job	here
resignation	諦観(ていか)	resigning to one’s fate, accepting when things happen	here
smell	匂(にお)い	a smell	Post 36
smell	臭(にお)い・臭(くさ)い	a bad smell	Post 36
smell	香(かお)り	a good smell	Post 36
spring	泉(いずみ)	water coming up from the ground
spring	春(はる)	the season
sound	音(おと)	any kind of sound	jprspereira’s thread
sound	物音(ものおと)	sounds you don’t know the origin of	jprspereira’s thread

[DIO-Berry]

In Other Languages

Please use the table format and copy and edit it for your own ease.

(Language)	Japanese	Nuance (short explanation)	Link

[DIO-Berry]

The posts that came before!
I’ll try to copy their contents over, but feel free to do it yourself if you think I’m taking too long

The Nuance Thread

Good morning everybody, Thought we could do with a “words that mean the same but have an annoying nuance or which are not well explained” thread around these parts. I have always found that the words for invite are never explained particularly well in English. Talking about 招待、招く、誘う. 招待 = the actual “invite” itself, this is the noun. 招く = this is when you invite someone to come to you. If you are hosting a party or something, or you are already at a place 彼女をパティに招いた < Your girlfriend will b…

The Nuance Thread

This thread’s goal is to finally help you figure out the differences between all those words meaning action, district and consent. In other words, think of it as the bible of nuances, where you’ll be able to come here and figure out the nuances of similar words/synonyms. Why am I making this? It’s very cool to be able to read and know the general meaning of a word. However, when it comes to actually use it, it makes me feel almost as helpless as if I didn’t know the word in the first place. I…

The Synonyms Thread

There are lots of synonyms in WK that make it difficult if you start learning in the other direction (English → Japanese). This situation is made even worse because we as learners do not yet have the same feel for the language as native speakers do. So we can’t always make a good judgement whether two things are synonymous or not. For example, English learners may not be 100% sure whether to buy and to purchase are synonyms or not. They are used in different contexts, but are practically synon…

and for kanji

The Nuance Thread : Kanji Edition

Based on @jprspereira great Nuance Thread template. This thread’s goal is to finally help you figure out why sometimes the same word can be written with alternate kanji and the nuances it entails (think 作る vs 造る vs 創る, all meaning roughly “to make” but with different nuances) Why am I making this? Thanks to Wanikani, your Kanji game is getting strong, vocab too, and it’s time to dive into native materials… But Japanese will throw another curve at you ! Most of the basic vocabulary is sometim…

Homophone Dictionary

The Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs put out a dictionary-like list of homophones (already a while ago, but I just learned about it and haven’t found it posted here before). It’s something I had been looking for and was close to building myself. At the same time, it’s a pretty nice beginners’ J-J dictionary for the words included with example sentences. Here’s a sample screenshot, in case you were wondering what it looked like: [ijidokun_140221_pdf]

[DIO-Berry]

In depth explanations and examples of 上手(じょうず)・得意(とくい)・下手(へた)・苦手(にがて)

「上手」VS「得意」Understanding Japanese! (Ft. 下手 VS 苦手)

[TheCodingFox]

I’m not sure “bad at” is a good translation for 苦手. The one that’s bad is actually not the speaker, but the thing they’re speaking about, like 辛い食べ物は苦手です meaning “I don’t like spicy food” or more literally “In relation to me, spicy food does poorly.”

[DIO-Berry]

It’s just a different way of expressing it. I think English is unnecessarily complicated compared to Japanese for this example.

@TheCodingFox

辛い食べ物は苦手です

I think it’d be just as easily said as “I’m bad with spicy food.”

I find when talking about likes and dislikes, Japanese speakers rarely understand the first time when I try to explain something like “I like spicy food, but my stomach does not/doesn’t digest it well.”

I wanted to use a short phrase as “bad” is too short, but “bad at” covers a lot of usage.

[Leebo]

“bad at” does sound strange when talking about the usage related to foods, but in this definition:

得意でないこと。また、そのさま。不得手。

It’s just fine.

[TheCodingFox]

You could phrase it that way.
What I was meaning to say is that 苦手 doesn’t usually have to do with skill. I feel like translating it as “bad at and dislike” actually doesn’t cover most common usages of the word since it’s often not talking about skill at all.

[Leebo]

I hear people use 苦手 to mean they are bad at stuff fairly often, it’s not that uncommon.

[TheCodingFox]

I just was reading your previous post, I see I wasn’t correct. I certainly haven’t had as much exposure to the language as you.

[DIO-Berry]

The purpose here isn’t to decide what is and isn’t common usage, but just to explain what the difference is in a concise and easy-to-understand way when words are translated the same way into English. I tried to say in the first added words only the necessary parts and ignore irrelevant aspects. Like 寒(さむ)い can also mean “boring” according to jisho, but because cold and boring are pretty separate in English, I didn’t bother to add it.

There are plenty of words on WK that have varying amounts of real world usage, but we’re presented with the same English word for them. These words repeatedly come up, so it’d be helpful to have them in one place.

I’ll add dislike with 嫌(きら)い and 苦手(にがて) though so that there’s more coverage on that aspect.

[polv]

The more explanation, the better; but I am worried about another thing.

このトピックは最後の返信から1年後にクローズされます。

Is it possible to make it 10 years? Of course, all linked threads are closed.

I think the title “Nuance Index” is not very understanding to me.

I would also want to make the first post (OP) a wiki.

[DIO-Berry]

The first post is a wiki, is it not possible for you to edit? Or if you edit, does it not save the edit?

I think explanations are good, but can make things cluttered, so having more detailed explanations in the replies is a happy compromise I hope.

Would you prefer a name like “The Nuance Thread” or something else? It’s easy for me to change it and I’m happy to take suggestions.

@Mods would you consider increasing the last post time limit to prevent the need for a new thread again if this one doesn’t get updated in time?

[polv]

Actually, I can edit.

Should I combine from previous threads, and make use of [details="title"]?

[DIO-Berry]

Oh good. I’ve had problems with wikis I’ve made before, so I was worried.

Please add more words I’m not sure what you mean by [details="title"] though. Like the names I gave the links? If that’s what you mean, I just wanted to give them short names to keep the table neat.

[polv]

I have just noticed that 2 of the 3 nuance threads’ OP are also Wiki, but no one can comment. Try editing it and you will understand.

Also, I think a table, a short explanation, and linking to the comments below is a good idea. You don’t have to put everything directly in the Wiki.

[DIO-Berry]

Yes, the threads expired, otherwise I would have just posted in them instead of making my own.

[polv]

Looking at Arzar33’s post, it reminds me of The Japanese Agency for Cultural Affair’s list of homophones.

jprspereira’s is more advanced. Perhaps something like Goo’s 類語辞書.

Of course, both of these are just native speakers’ view (who might as well be linguists). English speakers or English-as-a-second-language will see things differently.

[DIO-Berry]

Nice! I’ll add it to the third post.

[MisterMizu]

This is a very useful post, I’ll keep an eye on it and hopefully add some entries.