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The whole sentence is: “笑える! コタってつまんない男だと思ってたけど案外 冗談 通じんじゃん。” I checked on the internet and found “冗談が通じる” which means He or she gets the joke. But in the sentence “冗談 通じんじゃん”. the word “じゃん” is the colloquial contraction of “じゃない” and sometimes it means “actually”. I‘m confused what is the exact meaning of “冗談 通じんじゃん”. whether it means “Kotaro does not get the joke” or “Kotaro gets the joke” by the way, the space between 冗談 and 通じんじゃん is the same as in conversation.

Eiríkr Útlendi
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farhad gharleghi
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2 Answers2

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As you pointed out じゃん is colloquial contraction of じゃない and here I would say that it's more in line with meaning "right?" or seeking some kind of confirmation from somewhere in English.

Since you mentioned it, I also wouldn't focus too hard on the space between 冗談 and 通じん. I understand you found "冗談が通じる", but I wouldn't say there is a space because there is no が or something like that. The が is just being dropped / omitted because the casualness of the conversation. This space is more of just a pacing or pausing effect for the reader more than any other significant meaning from my standpoint.

So "案外 冗談 通じんじゃん" seems to mean "surprisingly they got the joke, right?"

With the whole sentence and assume it's directed towards Kota, we get something like:

笑える! コタってつまんない男だと思ってたけど案外 冗談 通じんじゃん。

They can laugh! I was thinking Kota is a boring guy but surprisingly they got the joke, right?

Tylersanzura
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This 通じん is a contracted 通じる, and じゃん is "huh?". So the sentence is a slangy version of 冗談が通じるね, or literally, "jokes get through (to you), huh?"

You may know 通じん is a form of 通じぬ, too (Conjugation of negative auxiliary 〜ぬ and Is verb ending ない shortened to ん?), but in your sentence, 通じん by itself does not have a negative sense at all. In slangy (Tokyo?) speech, る may become ん before ね or な according to this rule, but the same thing happens sometimes before じゃん and よ, too. For example, よく食べんね means "You eat a lot", 知ってんじゃん means "So you (already) know it!", and やんよ means "We'll do it" or "Let's do it".

naruto
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    In Kansai this contractions seems to exist but be limited to before ～ねん – Angelos Mar 09 '23 at 23:49
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    @Angelos The negative-ん is also common among young speakers there, so よう食べんねん can mean both "I eat a lot" and "I can't eat it" :) – naruto Mar 10 '23 at 00:13
  • Thank you very much – farhad gharleghi Mar 10 '23 at 07:51
  • @naruto アクセプトされた回答の英訳、間違ってるよね・・　「笑える」"They can laugh!" と 「冗談通じる」"they got the joke" って – chocolate Mar 19 '23 at 03:14
  • @Chocolate 一応微妙に対応しました… they got the joke はまあ意訳としては間違いではないのかなと – naruto Mar 21 '23 at 01:39
  • あ、なんか、すみません、代わりにコメント頼んじゃったみたいで。ドラマでは女の子が「私は奥方様にでもしていただこうかしら」と冗談を言うと小太郎が「あいにく、わしには契りを交わしたおなごがおる。側室なら構わぬが。」と返事をしたから、女の子が「笑える！コタって、つまんない男だと思ってたけど、案外冗談通じんじゃん。」で、字幕は "You're a scream! Kota, I thought you were kinda dull, but you're actually pretty funny!" になってますが、もうちょっと意訳してない訳を、なるとさんの回答に入れてくれたらいいな、と思って。 – chocolate Mar 21 '23 at 05:28