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Updated on
20 Sep 2021
- English (US)
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Japanese
Question about Japanese
What is the difference between 前 and 先 ?Feel free to just provide example sentences.
What is the difference between 前 and 先 ?Feel free to just provide example sentences.
From the definitions I've seen, these look like synonyms. Are they interchangeable in 熟語? For the term "last month" are "先月" and "前月" both valid?
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20 Sep 2021
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- Japanese
It depends on what kind of 熟語、but 先月 and 前月 are both valid. However, 前月 can mean the previous month in the past as in 昨年9月の売り上げは前月と比べて5%上昇した。
The sales of the September last month increased 5% from the previous month. (last August.)
先月 doesn't work in this case.
In the case of 日, 前日 means the previous day, but 先日 means the other day, not yesterday.
前年 means the previous year, but we don't so often use 先年, we use 昨年 or 去年
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- Japanese
It depends on what kind of 熟語、but 先月 and 前月 are both valid. However, 前月 can mean the previous month in the past as in 昨年9月の売り上げは前月と比べて5%上昇した。
The sales of the September last month increased 5% from the previous month. (last August.)
先月 doesn't work in this case.
In the case of 日, 前日 means the previous day, but 先日 means the other day, not yesterday.
前年 means the previous year, but we don't so often use 先年, we use 昨年 or 去年
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- English (US)
@tatsuca Is ｢前｣ a more literal "previous?" For instance, it would NOT be used to say "last spring" because spring isn't always the previous season?
- Japanese
@zecuse Hm, I misunderstood more literal "previous" part, but for "last spring" we sometimes use 昨春 but we more often use 去年/昨年の春 spring last year, or 今年の春 spring this year; we say neither 前春 nor 先春.
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