I’m autistic and neurotic, so it’s quite difficult for me to understand this type of social situation – I’ve been getting closer to some Japanese friends to the point where they will drop the honorific when conversing (unexpected for me). We often share dialogue about grammar or words in eachother’s respective language.
I recently thanked one of my buddies with — **さま**は教えて**いただき**ありがとうございます as a lighthearted joke about how they really helped and how much I appreciate them. I do this every now and then. It just dawned on me that maybe they perceive this way differently than I do, so I asked them if it was correct (language-wise) or strange to say (socially). I’m worried they may not be brutally honest for courtesy of not offending me, so I want to ask reddit:
Do native Japanese generally get this type of hyperbole/sarcasm? I would love to be upfront and straight up ask people, but is that being rude in Japanese culture? Would people even let me know? Am I an idiot?
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Thanks tons in advance.
2 comments
The phrase itself is grammatically wrong, but we can understand what you mean, on the other hand, can mistake you even if you speak a perfect language. So, I would say that you can be audacious to get through with it.
In my experience, the reason sarcasm doesn’t ‘work’ in Japan is because people are very trusting and will take what you say at face value. Say something that isn’t true as a joke, or suddenly start addressing people with さま out of respect, and people will assume you’re being earnest before realising you were joking around, which make things a bit awkward. That’s not to say you can never be sarcastic in Japanese, but the situations in which it works are much more limited than in English.
I wouldn’t do the さま joke for that reason, although calling your friends 先生 if they know more than you about a topic is not that uncommon. Whether taken literally or as a joke, 先生 shows respect while also not putting as much distance between you as さま would.