Another は and に question for 「わたしゃキモチ悪くて見れないんだよ」


> 「わたしゃキモチ悪くて見れないんだよ」  
>  It's disgusting and I can't look.

Sometimes は still confuses me. I assume I should parse this as
わたしゃ(キモチ悪くて見れないんだよ) with an implied subject for 気持ち悪い i.e. 'it'.

I started reading as "I'm disgusting and ...". So the question is, is:

> 私は気持ち悪い

ambigous as a standalone statement ? Can it mean both "I am disgusting" and
"It's disgusting for me"?

Can I disambiguate it by adding particle に:

> 私には気持ち悪い

?




Yes,

> 私は気持ち悪い

has an inherent ambiguity whether it describes the subject's quality or
feeling. Some words in English also have the problem, for example:

> I'm cold

could be both "I feel cold" or "I am cold-hearted". Thankfully Japanese has
different word for each (寒い and 冷たい) so that we don't end up in confusion :)

But you could usually make use of context:

> 道路に動物の死体みたいなものがあるんだけど――わたしゃキモチ悪くて見れないんだよ  
>  → _I feel disgusted and cannot look at it_
>
> 鈴木くんが目を見て話してくれないんだけど――わたしゃキモチ悪くて見れないんだよ  
>  → (I think) _I am disgusting and he cannot look at me_

and so on.

> _Can I disambiguate it by adding particle に:_
>

>> _私には気持ち悪い_

Yes, but it's more like rewording because it changes the meaning a bit.
Typically it means "too disgusting for me".

It may be a dirty hack, but if you say 私は気持ち **が** 悪い it'll be understood
almost solely as "I'm disgusted/sick".




Yes and yes. Divorced of all context, yes 私は気持ち悪い is indeed ambiguous and yes
you can help disambiguate it with に like you did. Fundamentally Japanese is a
more context-dependent language than English, so this situation arises
frequently.

