だがBut, Still, However, Nevertheless

Most Recent Replies (18 in total)

• 

  Jake

  but・still, however, nevertheless

  Structure

  • Sentence1 + だが + Sentence2, > *Verb + (の)だが + Sentence

  View on Bunpro

• 

  veryslowlearner

  Why isn’t それでも acceptabe as an alternative?
  あれは、温泉（おんせん）です。 だが 、今（いま）はお湯（ゆ）がない。

  That is an onsen (hot spring). Nevertheless there is no hot water.

  そのカップルがずっと喧嘩（けんか）している。 それでも 、よく旅行（りょこう）に行（い）く。

  That couple is always fighting. Nevertheless they often go on trips together.

• 

  mrnoone

  Nice catch!

  I have added bunch of alternative answers

• 

  mattbacon

  One of the examples for this goes as such: 本当は私はしなければならない。 だが 、君にしてほしい。
  Why is 君 succeeded by に? If I was writing this sentence, I would have used は or が, but I’m sure there’s a reason. I haven’t learned in detail the nuances between particles, and it didn’t hinder the sentence’s legibility.

• 

  mrnoone

  Hey

  This is the てほしい construction, which is used when the speaker wants someone (who has the same or lower social status. NEVER higher) to do something, that person is marked with particle に.

  That is why は or が are not used there.

  Cheers

• 

  mattbacon

  Thanks! I was also wondering about how to make the distinction more obvious for someone trying to figure out which to use. We could put “[older man speaking]” or something like that in the lore subtext. There are quite a few “but” words.

• 

  Omun

  I’m probably overlooking something obvious, but:

  The BunPro lesson for だが cites “だが / ですが” to be correct answers in the structure explanation. Yet ですが doesn’t seem to be accepted in the sentences I encountered so far for this point.

  In the sentence 「布団 [blank]、ベッドみたい」 the [blank] is specifically marked as “formal,” so I thought that might be an appropriate time to use “ですが,” but it was marked as incorrect.

  What nuance am I unaware of here?

• 

  mrnoone

  Hey!

  Generally, if the last clause (布団だが、ベッドのようだ。) is not polite, then you should not make other clauses in the sentence polite.

  So:
  布団ですが、ベッドのようだ。

  But, if the last clause is polite, then you can make other clauses polite(but don’t have to, and in most cases with few exceptions like が, you should just keep the last clause polite and it will be enough).

  So:
  布団だが、ベッドのようです。
  布団ですが、ベッドのようです。

  Cheers!

• 

  Omun

  Ah, of course - I had failed to take that into account. Thank you so much!

• 

  MissDagger

  Could someone explain why we need が and だが grammar points? There are obviously some differences in structure, and だが seems to have additional meanings. But I keep wondering. I guess it just have to do with usage? That だが exists with its quirks and is used by some subset of people (older men if I understood/remember it right?) and therefor it is on BP?

• 

  max99x

  I have to agree. I still don’t understand the difference between this and が. That one also uses だ for nouns and な-adjectives, as well as です for everything but verbs.

• 

  mattbacon

  Why is だが used in situations where everything else is informal? For example, “毎日まいにち運動うんどうをした。 だが 、痩やせていない。” This sentence uses した and いない, so why is the formal だが used here?

• 

  mrnoone

  @mattbacon

  Hey

  You are right, “だが” (when used at the beginning of a sentence) is generally not used in conversations, and it is more of a word used in writing. The sentence would be most natural as:

  “毎日運動をしました。ですが 痩せていません。”
  “毎日運動をしたけれど、 痩せていない。”
  “毎日運動をしたのに、 痩せていない。”
  or something like that.

  If you want to split phrase to “Sentence1。Conjuction + Sentence2。”, then ですが、だがね (this one is mostly used by older people now and characters in anime)、だけど and so on are more common in speech.

  Just a reminder - short forms are not only used in casual speech, but also in Japanese formal writing(together with である or だ). So lack of polite です/ます doesn’t always mean it is casual style. You have to pay attention to context and abbreviations.

  I will fix the sentence, thank you ...

• 

  mrnoone

  @MissDagger @max99x @mattbacon

  I know its super late, but I have revamped this grammar point, so it is about the だが and ですが that appears in the initial position of the sentence. Hopefully, this should no longer cause any confusion.

• 

  MeTheHamster

  本当ほんとうは私わたしがしなくてはならない。 だがね 、君きみにしてほしい。

  As someone else mentioned, could there be a hint as to who is speaking?

  Lessons says:
  [だがね can be used in speech but it is rarely used nowadays and mostly limited to the older generation]
  So it wasn’t obvious to me I had to use this one

• 

  semanticman

  I agree that this is confusing. The lesson says:

  “To make だが sound a little bit softer, sometimes ね is added. However, this is not so common in modern-day Japanese, and is more limited to the older generation.”

  But in response to supplying ”だが” as the answer, this hint appears:

  “ だが is used in formal written language, could you use a form that can be used in conversation? Hint: Just add something at the end.”

  This appears to be a contradiction.

• 

  Yumari-1

  Aaand here I’m chiming in to see that the exact thing I wanted to write was already here. Sorry for the thread necro, but I really think that it’s confusing the way the lesson states it’s just an old relic, but you suddenly have to write it down in response to this one:

  本当は私がしなくてはならない。だがね、君にしてほしい。
  

  If the lesson traches you だが／ですが, then why require a different form? Should we use it or not after all? And in what circumstances if so?

• 

  Liras348

  I’ve answered with ですが and Bunpro tells me “Can you try a grammar point that is often used in books?”. How was I supposed to know that だが is often used in books and ですが isn’t? The grammar point doesn’t mention this fact.

• 

  pimlu

  I might just be missing something obvious but what’s wrong about this answer? I seem to get all the contrastive cards wrong repeatedly.