3.3. FORMALITY: HUMBLE/HONORIFIC SPEECH PATTERNS 145
increasing degree of humility and politeness:
(I/he/she/you/we/they) refuse(s). (plain)(I/he/she/you/we/they) refuse(s). (polite)(I/he/she/you/we/they) refuse(s). (using noun form +. polite,
but only marginally more humble than the previous variant)I refuse. (humble, but plain form. As this is humble form, the only
person this can apply to is first person, so ’I’ has become explicit)I refuse. (humble polite)I refuse. (more humble, but plain. This sounds a tad odd, as using
typically implies a need to be polite, too)I refuse. (more humble, polite)While the copulae have, strictly speaking, no humble counterpart,
there is a more polite copula that tends to be used in seĴing where hu-
mility is required: , used in the form. This copula
does exactly the same thing as , and , except its high level of
politeness makes it particularly suited for use in humble speech paĴerns:
”Kimura, second year student at the university of Tokyo.”Careful observation reveals that this sentence is actually not hum-
ble, merely very polite, and as such it could have been spoken by the stu-
dent in question, or by someone doing a formal introduction to someone
else, whose social position requires a humble, or at the very least properly
polite, form of speech.