So it's time for another little fact file! (Not in the least part because I haven't taken the right photos to continue my life update posts) Today, about the Japanese language!
Most people just see Japanese and immediately think 'omg too complicated' or 'oooo looks like Chinese'. But in reality it's too complicated... and looks a lot like Chinese.
A few facts about Japanese for you:
The written language has 3 methods of writing: Kanji, these are Chinese characters, they look big and liney and the number of these character reaches into the thousands. The other 2 methods are the Japanese 'alphabets' called Hiragana and Katakana, consisting of 48 characters each.
As you can see the two alphabets are differently shaped, one is curvy and the other spiky, they are also normally used alongside one another (and kanji of course) in everyday text. An interesting fact about these symbol is however; in ancient times Katakana were used only by men and Hiragana only by women! In fact some of Japans most famous literature is written solely in one style or the other.
Oddly, these characters development at all was actually partly due to laziness! Much official / political business in olden days Japan was conducted in Chinese. However for the Japanese men using the full symbol every single time was too stressful on their dainty velvet hands, and as such they started to use only parts of each character to express the meaning of its much more complicated base. Voila! Katakana! Hiragana on the other hand came into existence due to Japanese women's use of the brush pen and ink. The difficulty of drawing many separate and straight lines using one of these brushes meant that many parts of one character became curved or joined. This calligraphic beautification eventually gave rise to a new symbol hardly resembled the original one at all. The hiragana. Or, when I use my barely existent brush pen skills to write combined with my aptitude for laziness I form an entirely new type of character, the 'ungainly sploge' U-splo for short. I'm sure it'll catch on soon.
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| Right to left development. |
Kanji problems!
Although Japanese pronunciation is simple, most words however have two ways of saying them; a Chinese root and a Japanese root. So when learning a kanji it is almost like learning the vocabulary of 2 separate languages. (or in my case, just taking a stab in the dark, 1/46 chance of correctness isn't so bad)
All of the 8 Kanji characters above are pronounced "shin" and all 8 of them are totally unrelated to each other in meaning! With meanings ranging from "heart" to "new", there is massive amounts of mistake making potential just waiting to spring out and show me up.... To add salt to the wound there are also many more Kanji (maybe even hundreds) that are pronounced shin! [-____-] However despite all this, 'shin' is not the most common reading of a kanji by a long shot. It is usurped by the sound 'kou', and with apparently over 1/3 of all Japanese characters having that reading it becomes the most logical sound to make in a conversation where you have no idea what is going on.
Recently due to my arrival in Japan, i've been trying to cram vanloads nay truckloads of words into my head so I can communicate on a normal adult level with people here. This is why I decided to drag my favourite poster all the way from England to here in Japan. (it wasn't just to make my room look like a nerd-den, scaring away potential new friends, that was just a biproduct)
This is my poster:
It shows over 2000 of the most commonly used characters in Japanese along with their readings. As such, it is huge and takes up a massive proportion of my wall. BUT ITS SO HELPFUL. I often like to gaze upon its large sheetyness and attempt to spot kanji I know low down on the poster (this means they are classed as more difficult, and it makes me feel clever) :)
SHAMELESS PLUG TIME!!!
I have also taken some really cool (in my opinion) photos of Japan, I put them in this album *link below* . Check it out :)
Japan is Prettyね
BYE BYE!!!
Interesting stuff! I'm enjoying your blog a lot.
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