Tue, 11/03/2009 - 20:30
Specifically, I was wondering about the difference between やさしい and しんせつ. But about synonyms in general, are the only ways to learn the differences through repeated context or asking a fluent speaker? Or are there any translation dictionaries that you know of that give more than a few English word equivalents?
Stephen
Probably the easiest way to start to get a grip on the differences is to use Eijiro on the Web to compare the entries for 親切（しんせつ） and 優（やさ）しい. There is obviously some overlap, but you might want to think of やさしい as being "kind" and
しんせつ as being something like "genteel". In this particular case, I would recommend that you default to やさしい, and use しんせつ in specific cases where you hear other people use it. One frequent case of the latter is the phrase ご親切に, which means "how kind of you". Beyond that, though, my rule of thumb is that once you've heard a particular word used in a particular way three times, then you're given free license to follow suit.
It's often really difficult to use English words to capture the nuances of Japanese ones, so maximizing your exposure and copying what you hear will generally be your best strategy for starting to sound like a native.