Can you use the word いい in the same respect as “good” or is used more in words. Can you describe something as いい or is it mostly in words and is it polite or casual. Thank you, cheers, and good health.
Yeah, from my experience, it seems like you can use it in any context you would say “good”.
But it is used in some other ways as well.
Like if you are asking if it is okay for you to listen to music, you would say “ongaku wo kiite mo ii desu ka?”
And it is sometimes used as part of a word. Like the way to say someone is intelligent: “atama ga ii”
But I am sure someone else here can give a more in depth explanation. I haven’t really formally studied Japanese, but I did live there for a year in highschool. My written Japanese is terrible, though.
Apologies for the romaji; I don’t have the IME installed on my work comp (and I only really use reddit at work)
Yes, it can be used more or less the same way, though it has some other meanings that are different. For instance, it can also mean something like “no thanks, I don’t need that,” or it appears in phrases like いいから which basically means “whatever” (e.g., いいから早くしろ！ is something like “whatever, just do it already!”). Or you could set off an explanation with someone who’s being a bit dense or not following what you’re saying with いい？ or いいですか. Or many other things. Common words like these tend to have a ton of meanings.
There is no ‘general rules’ about whether a certain word is proper for a certain situation, especially in learning expressions of a foreign language. You have to learn one by one.
That said, you may want to know sometimes いい can be used to show that you are okay without something. For example, When someone asks you なにか食べますか？, if you say いいです it will usually mean “I’m good (without food)”. On the other hand, if you say いいですね that will mean something like “that’s a good idea!”.
Could be confusing for novice learners, but no worries, you will eventually be able to naturally tell apart the two meanings.
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Yeah, from my experience, it seems like you can use it in any context you would say “good”.
But it is used in some other ways as well.
Like if you are asking if it is okay for you to listen to music, you would say “ongaku wo kiite mo ii desu ka?”
And it is sometimes used as part of a word. Like the way to say someone is intelligent: “atama ga ii”
But I am sure someone else here can give a more in depth explanation.
I haven’t really formally studied Japanese, but I did live there for a year in highschool.
My written Japanese is terrible, though.
Apologies for the romaji; I don’t have the IME installed on my work comp (and I only really use reddit at work)
Yes, it can be used more or less the same way, though it has some other meanings that are different. For instance, it can also mean something like “no thanks, I don’t need that,” or it appears in phrases like いいから which basically means “whatever” (e.g., いいから早くしろ！ is something like “whatever, just do it already!”). Or you could set off an explanation with someone who’s being a bit dense or not following what you’re saying with いい？ or いいですか. Or many other things. Common words like these tend to have a ton of meanings.
There is no ‘general rules’ about whether a certain word is proper for a certain situation, especially in learning expressions of a foreign language. You have to learn one by one.
That said, you may want to know sometimes いい can be used to show that you are okay without something. For example, When someone asks you なにか食べますか？, if you say いいです it will usually mean “I’m good (without food)”. On the other hand, if you say いいですね that will mean something like “that’s a good idea!”.
Could be confusing for novice learners, but no worries, you will eventually be able to naturally tell apart the two meanings.