I few minutes ago on NHK news 「注目」 I've heard/saw the phrase 「やるっきゃない」. I have no idea what it means.. And what grammar rules are here?
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Ernestas Gruodis
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13rd result on Google explains where the phrase comes from: http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1212799662 (It's a contraction of `やるしかない`: to have "no choice but to (just) do it". ) – Will Sep 30 '14 at 04:51
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This word become obsolete. – Yuuichi Tam Sep 30 '14 at 05:58
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1But it was used today on national TV.. – Ernestas Gruodis Sep 30 '14 at 06:01
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3Because the woman who first made this word famous died today. She is 85 years old. This word became popular about 30 years ago. – Yuuichi Tam Sep 30 '14 at 06:13
1 Answers
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っきゃ is an informal spoken contraction of しか, a particle. やるっきゃない means やるしかない.
The particle しか is always followed by a negative of some sort, either an explicit negative like ない or a predicate that is semantically negative such as だめだ or あるもんか.
Taken together, しか＋ない means something like "only; nothing but". It commonly follows nouns, but it can follow other sorts of constituents as well. When it follows a verb, it means that the verb must be done or will unavoidably happen (= "there is no alternative to 〜"). Your example やるっきゃない means something like "have to do [it]".
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6Just want to add to this good answer that っきゃない is predominantly a Kantoism, meaning over 2/3 of the country would not use it much in natural settings. – Sep 30 '14 at 05:33