は・が in 犬が死んだ and 犬は死んだ


> 犬が死んだ
>
> 犬は死んだ

は is typically used to mark something already in context as the topic. Would
that be equivalent to "The dog died" since "The" typically marks something
know?

が is a bit more confusing for me. Would it be more accurate to translate this
to "A dog died"? I've also heard が is used to speak about things you currently
witness. So I feel like in this regard it can also mean "The dog died".

Can anyone clarify how to translate sentences like the above where only the
particle differs?




Unfortunately, you cannot simply think "は is _the_ and が is _a(n)_ ". This may
sound confusing, but "The dog died" has to be translated into Japanese either
as 犬は死んだ or 犬が死んだ depending on the context, even in a situation where everyone
knows which dog " _the_ dog" refers to.

For example, let's say you and your family recently bought a dog from a pet
store but have not yet given it a name. If that dog suddenly died today, you
have to call your family at work and say "犬が死んだ!" using が. If you used は in
this situation, you would sound awfully unnatural. For the reason, please read
the following questions.

  * [Why is this sentence ungrammatical? 「お寺が公園のとなりです。」](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/68923/5010)
  * [Why does 「電話は切れた」 sound more adversarial than 「電話が切れた」?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/38639/5010)
  * [In this dialogue, why is は used in the question, but が in the answer?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/43213/5010)

が has another usage known as exhaustive-listing, so "It's the dog (but not
that cat) that died" is one of the possible interpretatins of 犬が死んだ. But
opportunities to say something like this would be very limited, of course.

