For today’s lesson we’ll learn how to express our likes and dislikes.

First let’s take a look at this sentence:

わたしはいぬがすきです

(わたし = I. は = topic marking particle. いぬ = dogs. が = subject marking particle. すきです = like.)

In English, this sentence would mean, “I like dogs”.

これはわたしのすきないぬです

(これ = this. は = topic marking particle. わたしの = my. すきな = like. いぬ = dog. です = is.)

In English this sentence would mean, “This is my favorite dog”

You’ll notice that between the two sentences, the first one has the subject marking particle が while the second one doesn’t. Also, the second sentence has a な in すきな but the first sentence doesn’t, it just has すき. Moreover, between the two sentences, there’s a difference in meaning. In the first sentence, we don’t know whether the person likes dogs over other animals, just that the person likes dogs. In the second sentence, the person stated that out of all the dogs, a particular dog was his favorite.

Now take a look at this sentence:

わたしはいぬがだいすきです

(わたし = I. は = topic marking particle. いぬ = dogs. が = subject marking particle. だいすきです = like a lot. )

In English, this sentence would mean, “I like dogs a lot”. The だい in front of the すき intensifies the expression into “like a lot”.

You can also express your dislike by changing すき with きらい

So the following sentences would be :

わたしはいぬがきらいです (I dislike dogs.)

(わたし = I. は = topic marking particle. いぬ = dogs. が = subject marking particle. きらいです = dislike.)

わたしはいぬがだいきらいです (I dislike dogs a lot)

(わたし = I. は = topic marking particle. いぬ = dogs. が = subject marking particle. だいきらいです = dislike a lot.)

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