Page 244 - Easy Japanese - Learn to Speak Japanese Quickly! (TUTTLE)

nē.
(I recently discovered this
about her.)

Use this pattern to quote anything, such as sounds, noises or foreign words.

“Thank you” to i’imashita. He said, “Thank you.”

Aka-chan ga mā to itta. The baby said, “Mā.”

When X in /X to iu/ or its formal version /X to i’imasu/ stands for the name of
something or someone, it means “it is called X”.
Kono ryōri wa nan to iu n What is this dish called?
desu ka.

Kore wa Eigo de nan to What do you call this in
i’imasu ka. English?

Similarly, /X to iu Y/ means “Y called X”.

J-Net to iu kaisha a company called J-Net
Oda-san to iu hito kara denwa It’s a phone call from a person
desu. called Oda.

Nan to iu eki de oriru n desu So, which station (a station
ka. called what) should we get off
at?

You can ask what something means by saying:
Dō iu imi desu ka. What does it mean?

When you want to clarify something, you can ask:

X tte, dō iu imi desu ka. As for what is called X… what
does it mean?

The verb i’imasu has two polite versions. Osshaimasu (ossharu, a Special
Polite verb) is the honorific version (putting the person in a higher position) and
mōshimasu (mōsu, a U-verb) is the humble version (where the speaker is

putting him/herself in a lower position relative to the addressee). The honorific
form refers to someone above you and the humble form refers to yourself and
your group. These expressions are very common in introductions.