はい、みなさんこんにちは。Welcome to Sakura Neko’s Japanese Study Room, where you can learn Japanese from anime quotes! Today’s topic is Spirited Away (千と千尋の神隠し Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi, ‘Sen and Chihiro’s Spirited Away‘).
Today’s quote is
ここで働かせてください！
kokode hatarakasete kudasai
Let me work here!
If you read this article
✅ You will understand how to use the causative form in Japanese (Let me …)
Vocabulary in this quote
ここ: here
で: a particle to mark ‘location’ where the subject’s action takes place
働きます・働く: to work
働かせる: let [subject] work
[verb て form] ください: Please [verb]
Causative form: 働く[to work] VS 働かせる [to let work]
In this quote, you can find the verb 働かせて, which is the て form of the causative form of 働く.
In order to change a verb into its causative form, you follow these patterns:
Godan verbs: From a dictionary form verb, take off the last vowel and add ‘a せる’.
E.g.
飲む (to drink)→飲ませる (to let drink)
泳ぐ (to swim)→泳がせます (to let swim)
読む (to read)→読ませる (to let read)
Ichidan verbs: From a dictionary form verb, remove the 「る」 and add 「せる」
E.g.
見る (to see)→見せる (to let see / to show)
着る (to wear)→着せる (to let wear / to dress someone)
寝る (to sleep)→寝せる (to let sleep)
Irregular verbs: する→させる 来る→来させる
When you use a causative verb you can use this sentence pattern:
Subject は/が Doer に Object を Causative Form Verb。
Subject lets Doer Verb Object.
So, if Chihiro only said 「働かせる。」that would mean ‘I let (someone) work’, which doesn’t quite make sense.
To understand today’s quote, you will have to understand another grammar point, てください: you can make a request by adding 「ください」to a て form verb (as in ‘Please do…‘).
In order to make a て form of any causative verb, simply replace 「る」with 「て」, then add「ください」.
To day Chihiro’s phrase in full, that would be
(あなたは 私を ここで) 働かせてください。
Please (you) let me work here.
Summary – まとめ
In summary, we talked about how to make a causative form verb in Japanese, and looked at a breakdown of Chihiro’s phrase.I hope you found this helpful! If you liked this post, make sure you check out other articles as well! You can also find more phrases from my twitter account.
じゃあ、みなさんさようなら！
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