The Particle し
The particle し is an intriguing grammar point which serves two interrelated functions as is demonstrated by the following two sentences:
1. お金もあるし、時間もある。
I have the money and the time.
2. お金もあるし、時間もあるし、余裕でしょう。
I have the money and the time; that’s some leeway, no?
3. お金もあるし、行ってみよう。
I have the money (and what not), so why not go!
In Ex. 1, we see that し serves to list out scenarios for a particular effect quite unlike the particle て, whereas in Exs. 2-3, it serves to indicate reasoning, but in Ex. 3, we get a strong feeling that more reasons are implied for why the speaker feels motivated to act upon.
終止形 ＋ ～し
Firstly, while し is a conjunctive particle, it follows the 終止形 of conjugatable parts of speech. It may even follow the 終止形 of the politeness markers ～ます and (～)です, but this is normally only done in the spoken language.
| Part of Speech | Example |
| Verb | 買うし 買いますし |
| Adjective | 美しいし 美しいですし |
| Adjectival Noun | 簡単だし 簡単ですし |
| Noun-Predicate (w/ Copula) | 犬だし 犬ですし |
Listing Interrelated predicates
When used to list interrelated predicates, ～し lists things together for the purpose of detailing aspects regarding a particular situation, and there is a strong commonality/premise implied. Consider the following sentence.
4. テイラー君は、コーディングもできるし、自作パソコンも作れるし、ゲームも上手だ。
Taylor-kun can code, build his own PCs, and is even good at gaming.
Here, we see that there is a general commonality with all the skills that Taylor has, and it is this skillset, which is presumably also not limited to three exact things mentioned, that is at the forefront of the speaker’s mind.
5. 収入も少ないし、労働もつらい。
The income is low, and the labor is tough.
6. 今の彼氏は、タバコも吸いますし、お酒も水代わりのように飲んでいます。
My current boyfriend smokes and drinks alcohol (habitually) like it were a replacement to water.
7. お金もないし、車もない。
I don’t have money or even a car.
8. 彼女は顔も美しいし、背も高いし、性格もいい。
She has a beautiful face, she’s tall, and she has a good personality…
9. 畑中先生は熱心だし、指導には真面目だし、経験も豊富です。
Hatanaka Sensei is earnest, diligent in mentorship, and has a lot of experience.
10. 彼の体は大きいし、力も強い。
His body is large, and he is very strong.
11 田中さんもそう言いましたし、鈴木さんもそう言いました。
Mr. Tanaka said so, and Mr. Suzuki said so too.
It must be duly noted that a crucial difference between し and the particle て is that the former can never be used to indicate chronological order.
12a. セスさんは名古屋に行ったし、友達に会った。X
12b. セスさんは名古屋に行って、友達に会った。〇
Seth-san went to Nagoya and met a friend.
Indicating Reason by Association
As a reason marker, し is still very much tied to its basic understanding of hinting at a certain notion premise which leads into a main clause that indicates an action, decision, judgment call, or even a suggestion. The situations linked by し reinforce that result.
13. 天気はいいし、週末だし、遊びにでも行くか。
The weather’s nice, it’s the weekend… why not go out?
14. 転職の理由としては、給料が低いし、会社の業績も良くないし、仕事もつまらないし、残業も多いからです。
As for the reasons why (people) change jobs, it’s because salary is low, the company’s performance isn’t good, the job is tedious, there is a lot of overtime, and so forth.
Whether there is just one cause or effect or multiple given as the reason for the main clause, more factors are implied, but the one stated is the main one.
15. ちょっと用事がありますし、お先に帰らせていただきます。
I got some choirs, so I’ll be heading home first.
16. お金もあるし、プリウスでも買おうか。
I have money, so why not buy a Prius?
17. 駅から歩ける距離でもないし、不便なところだよ。
It’s not even a walkable distance from the train station, so it’s not a convenient place.
It goes without saying that factor(s) – whether stated or not – do not necessarily have to be one-of-the-same so long as the result is true because of their collective impact.
18. 歯は痛いし、歯医者には行きたくないし、困ったよ。
My teeth hurt and I don’t want to go to the doctor; I’m really in a rut!
19. 時間は迫っているし、仕事は捗（はかど）らないし、弱ったなあ。
Time is catching up (on me), and work isn’t coming along, so I’m in quite a mess.
20. 駅から遠いし、車でも来られないし、この店はとっても不便だよ。
This store is very inconvenient since it’s far from the train station and you can’t even get to it by car.
21. 台風は来るし、仕事はあるし、本当に困ったよ。
The typhoon’s coming, I (still) got my job; (and so,) I’m really at a loss.
22. 新しい洋服はほしいし、お金はないし、学生の懐は寂しいなあ。
I want to buy new clothes, I have no money; a student’s finances sure are tough.
Often when し is used to indicate reason, it will often be utilized in ～し～（し）で and ～し～から・ので, and these are precisely the sort of sentences that can help show how these reason markers differ and interact with each other. The key point about し is that it establishes causality from the very beginning and maintains that until the result of that causality is rendered.
23. 今日は日曜（日）だし天気がいいから、散歩に行きましょう。
Today’s Sunday and the weather is fine, so let’s go out for a walk.
24. 職は失うし、妻とは別れるし（で）、彼はひどく元気がない。
With losing his job and splitting up with his wife, he is really depressed.
25. 気分が悪いし忙しいから出かけられませんね。
Since I’m sick and busy, so I can’t go out, OK?
26. 駅からは遠いしバスもないしで大変です。
It’s terrible that we’re too far from the train station and that there aren’t any buses.
It is also possible to see し after ～のだ・んだ. In this scenario, ～のだ・んだ highlights the factor as the primary reason.
27. 彼はまだ若いんだし、いくらでもやり直せるね。
He’s still young, you know, so he has as many times as he wants to redo things, yeah?
It is also possible for し to follow modality1 endings in general like だろう (probably) or ～かもしれない (might).
28. 仕事が忙しいだろうし、毎日来なくても大丈夫だよ。
You’re probably busy with work and all, so it’s OK not to come every day.
29. 新しいキャラが出るかもしれないし、同じキャラが連続で出るかもしれない。
You might roll a new character, or you might roll the same character in a row.
Understanding 因果 w/ し
Having gone over how し generally functions, we will study it from another angle with the help of the term 因果, which means “cause and effect/causality.” It just so happens that while し does generally indicate the cause/reason for the main clause and/or general premise, there are sentence structures in which either “causes” or “effects” are being listed, and the key to understanding how this works is looking out for where “reason” is being primarily marked.
■When Listing 因 = Causes
So far, the sentences we have seen involve factors that are listed with し which are then followed by the result. Yet, it is also possible for the result to come first.
30. 車の中で眠ってしまった。昨夜碌（ろく）に眠っていなかったし、それに長時間の列車乗り継ぎで疲れが出ていた。
I ended up sleeping in my car. I hadn’t slept much at all last night, plus I was fatigued from many hours of transiting between trains.
In Ex. 30, [車の中で眠ってしまった] is the situation (result), and what follows in the next sentence are the reasons for why that happened.
Of course, the situation(s) described may be the reason for the result that follows. In this scenario, you may see the judgment/assertion appear in the next sentence or as the main clause in one sentence.
31. 弟の家には赤ん坊が生まれてなにかとごたついているし、会社のほうも忙しいらしいから、今年は家族で飲み会をやるのをやめることにした。
With my brother’s baby being born and all the chaos (from it) going on in his household, and with it apparently being hectic at the office too, (we) decided to cancel having a drinking party as a family this year.
32. お酒もいっぱい飲んだし、いろんな人と話せてよかったよ。だから、明日のことは忘れようと思う。
I got to drink a lot, and it was great to be able to talk to all sorts of people. So, I wanna forget about tomorrow.
There are also situations in which a scenario is mentioned, and then し lists a bunch of scenarios which sound like paraphrases of the first statement in an attempt by the speaker to provide evidence for what is going on.
33. その夜、江藤は眠れなかった。眠れないのは彼の良心の苦悩であった。しかし良心とは、良心に過ぎない。良心は立身出世の役に立つものでもなかったし、生存競争の場に在って彼を有利にするものでもなかった。むしろ良心をどうやって閉じこめてしまうか。その事実の方が大事だった。
That day, Eto could not sleep. His inability to sleep lied in his mental anguish over his conscience. However, his conscience was just that: his conscience. His conscience was not at all useful to his success in life, nor was it something he could use to his advantage in the struggle to survive. If anything, how to lock up his conscience, and that reality itself was what was important.
From 『青春の蹉跌』by 石川達三.
In all these scenarios, the 因 can also be viewed as proof (根拠) for the situation (事態) at hand.
■When Listing 果
There are also scenarios in which し lists results, and when this happens, it is preceded by だから (because) or some other reason indicator, but just as is the case when listing 因, it is also perceivable for the results to embedded in the reasoning, but in this situation から・ので will precede the clause(s) with し.
34. 感情はとてもエネルギーに溢れている。だからそれだけでもつらいし、無視するのはムリがある。
(One’s) emotions are brimming with lots of energy. That’s why that alone is so tough and impossible to ignore.
35. そもそも警察機関が昔のようにまともに機能していないから、窃盗も増えているし、捕まっていない泥棒も多いし、誰がいつ被害者になってもおかしくない。
First and foremost, since the police institutions aren’t functioning properly as they did in the past, crime is on the rise, there are so many thieves who haven’t been caught, and it isn’t strange for anyone to become a victim at any time.
し vs ～ば
While the particle ～ば creates an “if” condition in which the main clause occurs as a consequence of X, this is often confused by users with し because of how し indicates the reasons for why the main clause is so. However, there is no “hypothetical” element to し, as the speaker is very well blaming what it lists as the cause and effect and that the scenarios are already true.
36. 金もなければ暇もない。
If one has no money, then one has no free time.
37. 頭も良ければ、スポーツも出来る。
If you are smart, you can also do sports.
38. 頭のいい人もいれば、（頭の）悪い人もいる。
If there are smart people, there are also dumb people.
39. 歩いても歩いても緑もなければ、獲物もいない。
No matter how (far) you walk and walk, if there are no greens, there is no prey.
40. 晴れの日もあれば、雨の日もあれば、曇りの日もありますよ。
Whether there are clear days, or whether there are rainy days, there will also be cloudy days.
し as a Final Particle
Regardless of how し may list out scenarios/factors (which may lead into reasoning), it may be rendered as a final particle in colloquial speech, which is believed to have arisen by ellipsing (deleting) what would otherwise follow, leaving the full reasoning for the listener to consider.
In this way, it can be also viewed as a tone softener for when there are several factors on the mind, but there is no desire to have them all weigh down on the listener. The final particles ね・な・さ often follow. It must be noted, however, that wantonly using し without any pretext is unnatural, as it is simply a different rendition of the grammar behind it.
41. 今日は天気も悪いしね。
And today, the weather’s bad and all.
42. お医者さんだって風邪も引きますし・・・。
Even doctors will get a cold…
43. どうせ暇ですし
At any rate, I’m free, so…
44. 風邪も引くし、熱も出るしね。
You’ll catch a cold, run a fever, y’know?
45. 「あなたはいつアメリカに帰りますか」「今のところ、帰るつもりはないんです。帰っても景気が悪い（です）しね」
“When will you go back to America?” “At this point, I don’t plan on going back. Even if I were to go home, the economy is bad and all.”
46. 俺の両親も反対してるしさ。
My parents are also against it and all.
～｛では・でも・じゃ｝あるまいし2
～｛では・でも・じゃ｝あるまいし expresses a light sense of contempt meaning “it’s not as if…” The difference between は and も here is a subtle one. Whereas は would downplay the scenario as not being so in light of what it could be, も would more so lighten the tone. The use of じゃ, meanwhile, is more colloquial and forgoes this nuancing.
The auxiliary verb ～まい used in this expression is an old-fashioned negative supposition/volition ending, but in this structure, it has held on even in the spoken language. Even so, it is still possible to hear ～まい replaced with ～ない.
47. 彼は、プロの選手になれるわけじゃ｛ない・あるまい｝し、 何が将来につながるかなんてわからないよ。
It’s not like he can become a pro athlete, so I have no idea what (about this) will play a part in his future.
48. 他人じゃ｛ない・あるまい｝し、水臭いじゃん？ （砕けた言い方）
It’s not as if he’s a stranger, so what’s with the standoffishness?
参照
現代日本語における接続助詞「し」の意味・用法
接続助詞「し」の意味用法とその由来
- “Modality” (モダリティ) structures pertain to how something is likely, desirable, or permissible. ↩︎
- This pattern is actually responsible for the birth of the particle し. When it first appeared in the 17th century, it did so in conjunction with the auxiliary ～まい; however, the し itself was a reinterpretation of a corrupted 終止形, as at the time, ～まい was rendered as ～まじい, but when speakers at the time subsequently would revert back to proper 終止形 containing /shi/ as opposed to /i/ mid-sentence through a literary device known as 不十分終止形 (acting as though a sentence is over, but only to go on and make another equally important statement much in the same way the semi-colon is used in Japanese), the form ～まじし came about in conjunction with ～まいし. By the 18th century, し had extended its domain to all the usages that it has in Modern Japanese. ↩︎