できる・～ことができる: More on Potential Form
apprentice #21
~ 5 Minutes
Introduction
"I can dance. I can dance. I can dance. Okay. I got this."
As it turns out, just telling yourself that you can dance doesn't decrease your chances of making a fool out of yourself at the club. Today you'll learn another way to say "I can dance," in Japanese. Maybe that will help!
Yet another way to say "able to"!
Structure
Dictionary form verbことができる
Example:
→ 運転することができない。
"I'm unable to drive.”
A few lessons ago, you learned all about the potential form, and today we're going to dive even deeper with another way to form a potential verb using できる, which is (as you likely recall) the potential form of する!
This time, instead of conjugating the verb itself, we'll be taking a dictionary form
not conjugated; the form of a word as you would find it in a dictionary (e.g. 食べる, おいしい).
verb and nominalizing it using こと and then adding ができる to signify potential.
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Homework (Grammar SRS)
Completing this lesson will add these Grammar SRS items to your main Grammar Study List