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Does it mean "Hino-san's idiot" (indicating possession) or "Hino-san is an idiot"?

If it's the latter, why shouldn't it be "Hino-san は baka"?

chocolate
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kammy
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3 Answers3

6

The の is appositive (同格). The Wiktionary entry for の may help:

の
助詞
格助詞
5. 上の語と下の語が同格であることを表す。

  • 部長の山田さん。
  • 妹の薫さんが来てたよ。 (...)
    1. 悪態をつくときに用いられる表現。
      • お兄ちゃんのバカ。
      • 部長のわからず屋が。

The appositive の has been explained multiple times in this site:

Common/familiar examples:

『羊のショーン』 Shaun the Sheep
『おさるのジョージ』
『セロ弾きのゴーシュ』 Gauche the Cellist
「妹のメイです。」
「魔女のキキです。こっちは黒猫のジジ。」

The Wiktionary page says one of the usages of the appositive の is 悪態をつくときに用いられる.

This has also been asked in this site:

Common examples:

「メイのばか！もう知らない！」「お姉ちゃんのバカー！」
「ばあばのケチ。もうやめなよ。」
「クララの弱虫！」
「ペーターの意地悪。」
「おばさんの嘘つき！」

chocolate
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    そういえば「馬鹿の太郎がまたミスった」「太郎の馬鹿がまたミスった」は両方言えますね。「太郎の天才が」とは言えないし「太郎の後輩が」だと意味が変わるので、罵る時だけ同格用法の語順が変わりうるんですかね… – naruto Nov 08 '22 at 01:10
  • ああー、ホントだ！なるへそですねー！！　（Community wiki にしたので、よかったら加筆してください。最近、落ち着いてSEに向かえてなくて・・） – chocolate Nov 08 '22 at 01:17
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    うーんでも「のび太さんのエッチ！」は単純な同格では説明つかない気もしてきました（名詞用法の「エッチ」は人そのものを表さないはず）…。「主格の格助詞的なもの」と考えても「同格」と考えても完全には説明しづらいですね… – naruto Nov 08 '22 at 02:43
  • あ～確かに形容動詞っぽいですね。「スケベ」なら名詞だったけど。「人+の+名詞or形容動詞」の形で、形容詞は入らないんですね、何でしょうねこれ。。 – chocolate Nov 08 '22 at 15:53
4

There are various opinions, but my conclusion is "this construction is hard to explain perfectly based on simpler grammar rules". I can say the following sentences are all valid:

  1. 太郎のバカ！
  2. 太郎のエッチ！
  3. 太郎のバカがまた失敗した。That idiot Taro failed again.

の in Sentence 3 is clearly not a substitution of the subject marker が/は; the subject of this sentence is undoubtedly 太郎のバカ as a whole. However, の in Sentence 2 doesn't seem to be an apposition marker to me. Unlike バカ ("idiot") which is a noun that can represent a person, エッチ is a na-adjective and cannot represent a person. We can say バカが3人いる but not エッチが3人いる.

Therefore, I think it's best to regard this as a special construction that can be used only in the context of abusing someone, like English "You idiot!". "太郎の天才!" is understandable but sounds like a joke to me.

naruto
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3

Possession is just one of the many meanings of の, and does not apply in this case.「ひのさんのバカ」 here means ひのさんがバカ, i.e. "Hino is an idiot" (as you suspected).

See: How does the の work in 「日本人の知らない日本語」?

While this substitution mostly applies to relative clauses or double-subject constructions (unless there is a direct object marked with を), the subject particle が can be replaced with の in many cases.

Refer also to the Jisho definition for の

1. indicates possessive​ (...)

2. nominalizes verbs and adjectives​ (...)

3. substitutes for "ga" in subordinate phrases​. (See also が): １００人近くの人がいたが、ほとんど会ったことのない人たちだった。There were almost 100 people, few of whom I had seen before. (...)

serencog
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    I agree with this as I think this is the best interpretation in general. There is also another possible way of looking at things, though: This could also be read as "the idiot who is Hino-san" (Japanese does often have these slight ambiguities in interpretation (which are sometimes deliberately used to add subtle nuances or double-meanings in things like titles, etc, though in this case the ultimate meaning isn't that different, I think)) – Foogod Nov 06 '22 at 17:40
  • Jisho.org ( https://jisho.org/search/%E3%81%AE ) って、「同格の『の』」が載ってない！ 「羊のショーン」(Shaun the Sheep)「おさるのジョージ」「イワンの馬鹿」とかの「の」。 – chocolate Nov 07 '22 at 13:34