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A noun particle is any morpheme that denotes or marks the presence of a noun. They are a common feature of languages such as Japanese and Korean.

Korean particles

Korean noun particles are postpositional, following the word they mark, as opposed to prepositions which precede the marked word.

Korean noun particles include the subject particle i/ga (이/가), the object-marking particle eul/reul (을/를), and the topic-marking particle eun/neun (은/는), all of which show allomorphy.

Japanese particles

Like Korean, Japanese noun particles follow the noun being marked, and can serve any of several functions in a given sentence.

昨日

Kinō

スーパー

sūpā

へ

e

行きました。

ikimashita.

昨日 スーパー へ 行きました。

Kinō sūpā e ikimashita.

Yesterday, I went to the supermarket.

In this example, "e" is the noun particle for "sūpā" ("supermarket"). This particular noun particle denotes direction towards a place, being "supermarket."

昼ごはん

Hirugohan

は

wa

私

watashi

が

ga

ピザ

piza

を

o

食べた。

tabeta.

昼ごはん は 私 が ピザ を 食べた。

Hirugohan wa watashi ga piza o tabeta.

I ate pizza for lunch. lit. As for lunch, I ate pizza.

The three noun particles ("wa," "ga," and "o") all serve different functions:

• "wa" - topic marker ("hirugohan" - lunch)
• "ga" - subject marker ("watashi" - I)
• "o" - object marker ("piza" - pizza)

References

1. Frellesvig, Bjarke (2001). "A Common Korean and Japanese Copula". Journal of East Asian Linguistics. 10 (1): 1–35. doi:10.1023/A:1026512817255. ISSN 0925-8558. JSTOR 20100791. S2CID 118327652.
2. Hamilton-Levi, William (2013). "Noun Particle Phenomena in Korean". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)

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