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In my JLPT practise book, there is a section demonstrating the difference between なぐる, たたく, 打{う}つ, and ぶつ. If I understand them, they are all variants of "hit", with subtle nuances to differentiate them.

I have this example explaining the use of ぶつ:

いたずらをした子供{こども}は、母親{ははおや}にお尻{しり}をぶたれた。

And then I have this question:

なまけ者{もの}の弟{おとうと}は人{ひと}から尻{しり}を_____ないと、なかなか仕事{しごと}をしない。

A　ぶたれ 　B　たたかれ 　C　打{う}たれ 　D　なぐられ

I chose A, which means I fell unto the usual JLPT trap where they deliberately mislead with similar contexts. D'oh!

Still, in any case, I can't see why B is a better answer.　In fact, the subtleties of difference make me unsure why any of them are not appropriate.

What makes B the right answer, and the rest wrong?

Questioner
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    I don't think it's necessary to specify **JLPT(N1)** in your titles. In fact, it's potentially turning away viewers and additional responses from people who aren't at that level. – istrasci Nov 21 '11 at 15:26
  • @istrasci: Okay, I can agree to that. – Questioner Nov 22 '11 at 03:25

2 Answers2

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尻をたたく is an idiom, sort of like English "kick in the pants". Consider:

My lazy little brother never does any work until someone gives him a good kick in the pants.

You wouldn't interpret this as literal brutality, just forceful reminding/urging. Same goes for 尻をたたく, at least in this case, and you can tell because of context: it just seems really unlikely that modern-day training materials for a nice upper-middle-class test like JLPT(N1) would present stories of someone's brother getting literally beaten by unnamed third parties simply for being lazy.

I also think that when talking about someone else's butt in the context of literal butt-spanking (i.e. not using a set idiom like 尻をたたく) you would tend to use お尻, not just 尻.

Matt
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  • Just wanted to mention that this was a very helpful answer. The only reason I marked @cypher's answer as the correct one instead was because the way he broke down the different meanings helped me more in the context of answering a JLPT question. – Questioner Nov 22 '11 at 16:38
  • Great answer Matt. Your answer had a lot of aspects which I just didn't see and made me realize mistakes in my own answer. – cypher Nov 23 '11 at 00:18
  • Thanks for the explanation, @DaveMG (no hard feelings, of course!), and comment, cypher. Glad I was able to help out. – Matt Nov 24 '11 at 00:31
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  • 尻をぶつ:

    Means to spank someone as punishment for something which has been done (in the first case because of naughtiness.)

  • 尻をたたく:

    Means to give someone a good hiding without those connotations (in that case because of laziness.)

  • 打つ:

    Doesn't work because ぶつ is used for people and 打つ for inanimate things.

  • 殴る:

    Doesn't work because it's more for violently hitting/continuous beating of someone with a stick/fist etc.

なまけ者 means "lazy person" and なかなか仕事をしない means "the (younger brother) stays lazy" in this context I believe, so the sentence would translate to "unless the lazy younger brother is given a good hiding, he stays lazy."

cypher
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  • `Means to give someone a **good hiding**`. That seems a bit awkward. Is this UK English for spanking? – dotnetN00b Jul 22 '12 at 16:18
  • @dotnetN00b Very late reply but yes, I believe it is. My parents used to threaten to give me a 'good 'idin' if I kept misbehaving (and never made good on these threats) – Angelos Aug 25 '22 at 17:08