# Rhetorical questions



## zefee

I was having a conversation with a Japanese friend of mine, and we where talking about the "credit crunch" and I said "tell me about it" in a rhetorical sence, but he couldn't grasp the concept of a rhetorical question, I tried to explain what exactly it was, but he was finding it hard to understand.
I was wondering if there where any rhetorical questions in Japanese, and if anyone could give me some examples and also try to translate "tell me about it" in that way into Japanese so that I could help out my friend.

many thanks

zef


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## wathavy

Hi.
I am rather interested in what do you want to ask by saying 'rhetorical'.
I looked up dictionary and I simply could not translate it into Japanese.
Would you elaborate it?

If I grasp your concept I don't think I cannot.

Sorry, I am learning as well.


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## Starfrown

Well, "tell me about it" is a rhetorical statement, not a question.

In any case, "rhetorical" means that the statement or question is made simply for effect--it does not require a response, and in fact, no response is expected.

The phrase "tell me about it" also has a bit of irony in it.  The speaker is asking the addressee to tell him about something, but the intended meaning is exactly the opposite, i.e. that he doesn't need to be told about it because he already is quite familiar with the issue.


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## wathavy

I assume it were as follow.


> A *rhetorical question* is a figure of speech in the form of a question posed for its persuasive effect without the expectation of a reply (ex: "Why me, Lord?")



Then 'What about it?' is going to be, 'Sore ha donna koto?'
Or 'Sorette nani?' 
Or 'Sore ga doushitano?'  is near straight translation.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetorical_question#cite_note-rhetorical_question_definition-0


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## wathavy

Sorry, I could not see your answer before I replied.
But anyway.
I would say 'Sou' after the other end is talking about could be too much, because, 'Sou' imply you know about it.
But 'Sorette ?' is somewhat rhetorical, I bet.

I am kind of a person not to ask that way. So it is rather tough to imagine what would be best for your question.

Someone perhaps.


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## Flaminius

zefee said:


> I was wondering if there were any rhetorical questions in Japanese [....]


There are many.

死にたいのか? [Do you want to die?]
A driver may shout at a jaywalker who crossed the road 3 metres before him.

まだいたの? [Are you still there?]
For someone one wants to be out of the place.

なにやってんだ? [What are you doing?]
Of course the addressee is doing something stupid or outrageous.

I might add, however, that the notion "rhetorical question" is not very well-understood in Japan.  This is also true for other figures of speech such as metaphor, simile, parallelism.



> [A]nd if anyone could give me some examples and also try to translate "tell me about it" in that way into Japanese so that I could help out my friend.


What few rhetorical sentences I can think of now are set phrases.  In other words, I cannot use the same construction to translate the English "Tell me about it."  In fact, the most common utterances for this context are simple declarative sentences:
知ってるよ (I know)。
言われなくても分かってる (I don't have to be told to understand that)。

For a future reference, here are typical Japanese rhetorical sentences:
嘘をつけ。
"Tell a lie" is of course the opposite.  It's "Don't tell a lie" or "You are telling a lie."

ざまを見ろ。
Similar to "Look at you," it is more like "Serves you right."

バカを言え。
Same as "Tell a lie."

It is interesting to note that they are all imperatives.  Some of them may be better understood as subjunctives, for which, as I remember, there is a small thread.


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## MariposaChou

In English, we use expressions like "Tell me about it" or "You can say that again" to let other people know that we have the same opinion or feeling that they do.  

In Korean, I know for sure that the expression for this is 동감이다.  The word 동감 is written as 同感 (same feeling) in Chinese characters.  I bet that it's the same in Japanese.  Can't you say something like 同感だ when you agree or sympathize with the statement someone just said?  I think this might be a better translation that just 知ってるよ, which does not imply any shared feelings.  I'll wait for a native speaker to confirm or dismiss this idea of mine.


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## Flaminius

It really depends on the context as "Tell me about it" can have many different nuances, but yes, 同感だ or 同感だよ is used to imply shared feelings.


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## Wishfull

Hi,all.
I think I now understand "retorical questions" to see Flam's post(#6.)
I don't know "retorical sense" or "retorical statement" not yet.
Are they have the same meaning?

"Retorical" means having another meaning from original, direct meaning.
Am I correct?


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## zefee

Thanks for the replies guys, ill talk to him today see if I can get him to understand a bit better.

zef


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## Starfrown

Wishfull said:


> "Rhetorical" means having another meaning from original, direct meaning.
> Am I correct?


 
Not necessarily. What you're describing is _irony_. _Rhetorical_ simply means that something is said _for effect_; irony may be involved, but then again it may not. For instance, I might say:

"How much better off would the world be now if Hitler had never been born?"

Obviously, it's not really a question that requires an answer. It is intended only to produce a certain effect.



Flaminius said:


> I might add, however, that the notion "rhetorical question" is not very well-understood in Japan. This is also true for other figures of speech such as metaphor, simile, parallelism.


 
Really?  Why?


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## Flaminius

I meant that figures of speech are more educated concepts than in English.  Why, I don't know.  Perhaps because students are not instructed to use them in composition classes.  A case in point, the Japanese counterpart of rhetorical question, 修辞疑問文, is primarily the translation of the Western idea and seldom turns up in Japanese textbooks.


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## lammn

Flaminius said:


> I might add, however, that the notion "rhetorical question" is not very well-understood in Japan. This is also true for other figures of speech such as metaphor, simile, parallelism.


 
It is interesting that Japanese _lyrics_ use *a lot of* rhetorical questions, metaphor, simile and parallelism, though. 

An example of Japanese lyrics using rhetorical question can be found in the last 2 lines of the 4th stanza of this song.


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## wathavy

But, eh, I am afraid, I and my wife could not understand the whole song.
It seems like the song is made for imaginable singer who appear in that animation story, if we were not wrong, then it make some sort of sense that the singer is trying to talk about a mythical existence which support fighter in it... maybe, maybe not.... we don't know.


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## Mr Punch

It would seem to me that in masculine speech anyway, many rhetorical questions would end something like ～だろ(う)な！ but would often end up being talking to yourself, e.g. muttered under the breath.

e.g. 俺なっんやってんだろな？　What the hell am I doing?!

A more conversational example would be something like:

Ａ：意味分からない！
Ｂ：なんだろうな！

Where the answer, lit. "What the hell, eh?" would be roughly equivalent to "Tell me about it!", no?

In fact, at their most basic a lot of inflexions for agreement (don't think this is the correct technical term, but bear with me...) would seem to be rhetorical statements or questions:

e.g.
Ａ：ブッシュは何てひどい大統領だよ！
Ｂ：だよぅな！/そうだよ！

It's a little borderline if you take it literally, but especially in cases where whether it IS rhetorical is borderline (e.g. the Hitler question above... could well be a subject of discussion in a pub or a subject in a history essay requiring answers!) several of these constructions would seem to serve the same purpose as the rhetorical.


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