〜てみせる · 文法 · 本物の日本語

Formation: V-て form + みせる (usually in kana, sometimes written 見せる)

Means doing something so that others can see it: demonstrating an action, or putting on a display of an attitude. With a first-person future action it expresses firm resolve, as in "I'll do it, just you watch." It differs from 〜てみる, which means trying something out, with no audience implied.

Examples

In real texts 1 occurrence(s)

じぶんへの戒めとして、書いておく（笑） · 2026年11月7日

ただ、それだとなんにもできないし、じぶんが他の人のやることに対して、なにかと脅かしたり戒めたりする人間になりたくなかったので、「世の中甘いか酸っぱいか、舐めて見なくちゃわからない」などと軽口を叩いて見せたりもしながら生きてきた。

However, that way you can't get anything done, and I didn't want to become the kind of person who is always scaring or admonishing others over what they do, so I have gone through life also making a show of joking lightly, saying things like "Whether the world is sweet or sour, you can't tell until you've had a lick."

Attached to 軽口を叩いて, it means the jokes were partly a performance: he displayed a lightness that did not fully match his cautious inner self, as p2s2 shows. Plain 軽口を叩いたり would only say he joked. The trap is the same sentence's 舐めて見なくちゃ, which is てみる ("try licking"), also written with the kanji 見. The determined sense, "I'll do it, just watch," does not apply here.