Do you say 海が見たい。or 海を見たい。?

Question

I remember that I learned at university 海が見たい。But in a recent answer of somebody I read 海を見たい。So I wonder which is correct; or: which is more common.

Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

yer yer deffo the first one!!!!!

Answer 2

I believe I would tend to use "o" but I think "ga" could also be correct.  Perhaps it's a difference based on emphasis?  "Umi ga mitai" places the emphasis on the sea, while "Umi o mitai" places the emphasis on wanting to see it?  Pure speculation, that.

Answer 3

The sea wants to look 海が見たい

I want to watch the sea 海を見たい

Answer 4

I'm a Japanese speaker.

You can say either way, but I feel "海が見たい" more natural.

When you express your wish, you attach "～たい" after a verb: 見たい, 飲みたい, ...

Indicating the object of the verb, "が" is used originally: 海が見たい, 水が飲みたい, ...

However, nowadays Japanese people tend to use "を" as well as "が" when they express their wish: 海を見たい, 水を飲みたい, ...

Answer 5

I think that you can say both 海が見たい and 海を見たい. This is because the tai-form is more like an auxiliary adjectival form than a verb form. (tai-forms are conjugated like i-adjectives and not like verbs).

Even with a transtive verb like "miru", both を and が are OK to use regardless of whether 海 is a direct object or not.

You could say something like 本が読みたい ("hon ga yomitai") or お寿司が食べたい ("osushi ga tabetai") and you would be correct.

The difference between using が and を　is quite subtle and has to do with the degree of desire. But, most of the time they are interchangeable in meaning. So, most people only learn one or the other. I personally use "ga" because it sounds more natural to me.

You can find a little more about this on this Wikipedia page (Scroll down to the "ga" and "o" section).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_pa...

You can also find an example of this at this page(Scroll all the way down to the Exercises and Answers section).

http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly...

However, you have to be a little careful because usually you are only supposed to use these tai-forms when "you" are the speaker and you are talking about yoursel. You're not really supposed to use then when describing what others "want".

Hope that helps.

PS:

If you want to say "I want this" then you can say "kore ga hoshii", but it's a little direct. You might be better saying something like "kore wo onegaishimasu" or "kore de onegaishimasu" just to soften the statement a little". "Kore ga hoshii" might make you sound like a little kid."

PPS:

Just a little more about the difference between "ga" and "wo". As I said, there is a subtle difference that depends on the degree of desire of the speaker. Generally, "ga" implies a slightly higher degree of desire than "wo". Say, for example, you had just drove 100 hundred miles just because you want to see the ocean. In that case, "ga" would sound better than "wo" because you obviously really want to see the ocean because you just drove so far.

However, there are some cases where you can't use "ga" like when there are other clauses or pfrases between the object and the transitive verb. For example, in "watashi wa fujisan ga* amerika ni kaeru ni mitai", you can really use "ga" because there is another clause between the object and the transitive verb. You would either have to switch the position of "amerika ni kaeru mae ni" or use "wo".

Also, if the word being marked by "ga" is not the direct object of the verb then you can't use "ga". For example, "koen ga arukitai" is incorrect. You have to use "wo" because "koen" is not the direct object of "aruku".