EP 5: What is "ne" (ね）and what does it mean?

Japanese speakers often say 'ne' at the end of sentence. What does it mean?

This is going to be a quick one. Have you ever wondered why do Japanese people often use ‘ne’ (ね）at the end of some sentences?

Before I knew any Japanese (I still don’t know much), I thought people use ‘ne’ to sound cute - LOL (Sorry, I was very ignorant…).

Example:

Kawaii Desu ne!

Atsuii Desu ne!

Sou desu ne!

So what the heck is this “ne” …..Didn’t we just learned desu…..

Japanese End Topic Markers

Japanese particularly like short words for the ends of phrases (final particles). This final particle lend a sense of closure to the sentence and a sense of tone. In english our voice rises towards end of questions and drop towards the end of statements.

In Japanese the tone stays relatively flat so they require some kind of sentence enders to indicate whether they are asking a question (Ka), stating a fact (desu) or confirming something (ne).

so thats right, the particle “ne” is used when the speaker says something and wants the listener to confirm it.

So In english, we say — “It’s really hot today, isn’t it?”. So the person on the other end will say “yes, it is!”

So in Japanese the “isn’t it?” can be replaced by “ne”.

So let me give 3 examples:

Atsui desu ne! (Its hot, isn’t it?)

暑いですね。

Atsui desu ka? (Is it hot?)

暑いですか。

Atsui desu (It’s hot!)

暑いです。

I hope this helps!

P.s i still think ね is kind of cute :)