That makes perfect sense. Thanks a lot!

You’ll generally find that when speaking, Japanese only use as many parts of the sentence as are necessary. Especially when you’re talking about the subject, but ESPECIALLY when the subject is the first or second person pronoun, the subject is almost always dropped once it’s clear that everyone knows who is being talked about. I’d go so far as to say that it’s not just a matter of informal situations - even if you were in a somewhat polite situations, if you started every sentence about yourself with “watashi wa” people would find it unnecessary and tiresome pretty fast. In informal situations / with friends, they would tolerate it even less. Particles also often get dropped in informal situations, and you’ll come across more examples of this as you listen to more podcasts.

Sorry, just took a second look at this examples. “Shusshin wa Nihon desu” means “my homeland is Japan”. However, “Nihon shusshin desu” means “I am a native of Japan”, with the implied subject “watashi wa”. “Nihon wa shusshin desu” would mean “Japan is the place of origin” and doesn’t really say what you mean. What WAS probably dropped is the particle “no” - “Nihon no shusshin desu.” The possessive is appropriate here because Japan is the larger group from which you’re specifying. It’s the same when you say who you work for - “Toyota no kaishain desu”.

In most of the scenarios, she uses the format “Nihon shussin desu.” In one scenario, however, she uses “Shusshin wa Nihon desu.” I understand the latter, but why is the first example lacking a “wa”? Shouldn’t it be “Nihon wa shusshin desu”, or “Watashi wa Nihon ga shusshin desu”?

Thanks! And just to slip it in, these podcasts are amazzzzzing.

Anyone interested in Portuguese, visit this site for a Portuguese translation of this lesson.

http://aprenderjapones.blogs.sapo.pt/2008/02/01/

Doomo Arigatoo

a lot of guys learn japanese from female teachers or maybe from a japanese girlfriend. you’ll see it on this site or face-to-face. in a lot of the newer lessons we’ve been pointing out the differences between male and female speech-patterns.

so if you’re learning from men, that’s good. you’re probably already forming some good habits.