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I'm with Neil, whatever calendars and mums might say.

There does also seem to be a very real divide between people who, once a certain day of the week has passed, will refer to the next day of the same name as "this coming [x]day" or "next [x]day" leading the most common question whenever someone says "next [x]day" to be: "Do you mean next [x]day or do you mean this [x]day?" and people either become confused or defensive about it.

We really need to do something to stop this. It's like "first floor".
 
As @D1tchd1gger points out, it's a cultural/religious thing that varies from place to place. In chiefly Jewish countries like Israel, they celebrate the Sabbath (the Jewish day of rest) on a Saturday, so their week starts on a Sunday. Whereas to Christians, their day of rest is a Sunday, so the week starts on a Monday. Depends where you are and how you're raised, basically.

In the UK, given our predominant religion, I believe the first day of the week is nearly always Monday. (I'd be fascinated to hear about any exceptions, though.)
 
Very true, the next xday thing is so very frustrating! I get around it by saying for example the 19th, just to avoid that situation. Then of course though I get asked which day that is. Sigh.
 
Phobos said:
Is there no language which is not confusing like this?!?
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Japanese iirc doesn't have words to mean a past, or future tense. Instead they work based on the context of the sentence they are used in instead.

They say Japanese is one of the hardest languages to learn as a English native, and vice versa.
 
Lambadelta said:
Japanese iirc doesn't have words to mean a past, or future tense. Instead they work based on the context of the sentence they are used in instead.

They say Japanese is one of the hardest languages to learn as a English native, and vice versa.
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I guess that shows how much Japanese I understand. Seems like it could definitely get quite confusing.
 
Lambadelta said:
Japanese iirc doesn't have words to mean a past, or future tense. Instead they work based on the context of the sentence they are used in instead.
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Hmm... as someone who's self-taught up to the modest stage I'm at, there's definitely a past tense, but present and future tense have some context-based overlap.
 
Neil.T said:
It's easier than French! Well, I think so, anyway, but then I was terrible at that.
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On that note I also was terrible at French, ended up with it in year 7, was meant to swap to Spanish in year 8 then choose thereafter. As it turned out I was in the naughty set so we get far enough behind to only get the French part. On a side note, the top set was the naughty set, the sets below ended up being more advanced in the end.
 
Lambadelta said:
Japanese iirc doesn't have words to mean a past, or future tense. Instead they work based on the context of the sentence they are used in instead.
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Yeah, in regards to time, Japanese has two tenses: present and... not-present. Context determines whether the latter would be past or future. Japanese (and some other asian languages and cultures) tend to be very high-context in general. Japanese grammar allows you to omit a lot of stuff (such as the grammatical subject) from sentences if they can be inferred through context.
 
Chinese is a lot more context-dependent than Japanese IMO. Both Japanese and English are as bad as one another, just in weirdly different ways.

ayase said:
We really need to do something to stop this. It's like "first floor".
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I swear this one is going to feature in my future divorce hearing one day. It drives me crazy.

R
 
Neil.T said:
Isn't it more present and future that overlaps in Japanese, though? Past tense seems to be pretty clear-cut to me.
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I definitely feel like I've come across statements before in anime that were intended to be future tense, but used the past-tense form and let context sort the rest out, but maybe that was some fever dream. It's not like I actually know the language at a level more than "absolute-casual-beginner-who-will-never-properly-study-it". :p

But yeah, having a little look, seems like you're right. The present (or base) form verb conjugations seem to be what you'd use to express future tense. My bad.
 
Joe said:
Japanese (and some other asian languages and cultures) tend to be very high-context in general. Japanese grammar allows you to omit a lot of stuff (such as the grammatical subject) from sentences if they can be inferred through context.
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This is the bit that gets me every time, though. Especially in things like song lyrics, I might understand each individual element separately but still not be able to piece together the overall sense of it. :confused:

It's frustrating!

Must study more. Benkyou, benkyou...
 
Good shout @ayase about the 'this x' or 'next x' thing. It's a real bamboozler, I'm not even entirely consistent in my usage of it myself. It's depends how close the day in question is I suppose. It does indeed cause me to often specify the date. If it's within the week commenced I always say 'this' though.
Still shocked I'm the only one here who considers Sunday the first day of the week! I'm sure it used to be more a thing.

Also, when did 'hello' become the right spelling, in my youth it was 'hallo'! Sorry that was just a joke, but it is funny how old novels spell it in that way. I might try and bring that one back, it's kind of cute!
 
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