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Does Japanese Really Need Kanji?

Is the kanji system necessary to the Japanese language?


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Thank you for that and especially for having the courage to step up to the plate and actually tackle my challenges. I will take the time when I have time to give your posts the careful attention they deserve.
You're welcome. unfortunately, I'll be quite busy again soon and won't have time for the forum for a while. :(

At least Maciamo had the smarts admit when he was wrong.
Why did you just not say "Trolling" instead the political correct 'adding some "spice" to the forum'. Sounds like you have been away from Japan too long! ;-)
You may be right! Can you believe it's already four years? :D
Actually, I've always kind of liked the "difficult" members, because they give you a reason to come back. Imagine a movie that's all about flowers and sunshine, and everyone is happy and gets along. By the end of the movie, you'd be asleep from pure boredom. We like a certain degree of conflict to keep us entertained. It's just human nature.
That being said, if every member was like Maciamo or Strongvoicesforward or McTojo or whatever, I'd leave in a hearbeat and stay away. A little conflict is a good thing, but constant argument for argument's sake is too much for me. I come here to relax, after all.
Also, Mark of Zorro does not come across to me as a troll, because he genuinely seems to hold the opinions that he's posting.

As per usual I am going to be completely up front and admit that I have not read that whole post. Why? Pay careful attention to this: because the writer is not following the thread.

I have already admitted I hate kanji. I have already admitted I have this bias. So what does that mean? It means I am well aware of my own bias and so I know to compensate. No one here has admitted to their kanji fetish. Indeed, no one here has admitted to being a kanji masochist, so, are they dealing with their own bias? No. They aren't. Fact is that everybody is biased in some manner. Only a man who is well aware of it can come close to compensating. Who admits it? Me.
...
And I am not a person to be defeated by my right brained biases either. I leave that to right brained emotional people.
Please realize that this type of post will alienate a lot of people. That may not be your intention, but no one likes to be accused of having a fetish or being a masochist. Also, when you create a dichotomy and then make one side seem inherently wrong, people don't respond well to being put in that category. I really think it is counterproductive.

Everyone gets upset and frustrated from time to time, and whenever people congregate there is bound to be some friction. I am certainly no exception. But I've always been of the opinion that you catch more flies with sugar...or honey...or however that saying goes. :p
 
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But when debating about kanji and its usefulness in Japanese language, how valid is your statement? I do wonder how you can make a fair judgement whether something is necessary or not when you do not know much about it, especially when you do not like it? Emotion could make people biased.
BTW, I think this is a very good point and should be addressed.
 
Why did you go to Japan and study in such a crappy university? Can't find it's ranking on QS et al.

Any above mediocre American college would be many times better. IMO.

It was a good opportunity at the time. I'm not too concerned about the "name" of an institution, although I know a lot of people do.

I learned a lot, and that to me makes it a good university. 😌
 
It doesn't matter whether Japan really needs (ie whether it is the most pragmatic solution to maximising happiness or whatever else). Languages change with prevalent deviations from standard use. Frequent deviations signal that the language is ripe for some changes and it is a system which effects them automatically, so that linguists may, later, codify and consolidate those changes. A swift departure that would render the predecessor and offspring languages not mutually intelligible is clearly a bad move. Sure, if the changes span a long period, you can change the language however you want. Switching to kana altogether would (I'm just quoting much more proficient members who have spoken before me) make the written language difficult to understand for native speakers and it would turn the acquisition of Japanese as a second language a - pardon my word choice but emphasis is very necessary and warranted - f*cking nightmare.
 
Please realize that this type of post will alienate a lot of people.

I know it will alienate people who cannot admit the truth of what is happening here. My only other explanations are a lot less flattering, to the point that pinning it on masochism was actually complementary.
 
Of course I am aware that you are probably trying to set anyone who really does respond to this for a fall. But why not? For the sake of discussion:
Miwa (I knew a lady with this family name.)
Koyama (I had a boss with this name once.)
Takashi or Yutaka (I've known both.)

Yup. Setting you up for a fall, but only to prove a point. 美羽 is Miu, and she is annoyed that you read her name wrong.

小山さん, or Mr. Oyama, is irked.

隆, Takato, is rather unhappy that you chose two names and neither was right.


Or Emily vs Emilee vs Emillee
or Cory vs Corey
or Stephanie vs Stefani
or...

But you will pretty much say them right every time, unlike the kanji examples. Not that I support the needless spelling variations, but the difficulties are far less severe.


大輔
雅隆

Nope. 真琴 is a girl and is really mad that you gave her a boy's name. 大介 rolled his eyes. And 正孝 sighed heavily.

Writing names in kanji is easy. The difficulty is whether they're the correct kanji for the particular person. But I don't think that's a compelling reason to eliminate kanji, so we have an easier time writing people's names.

People's names are one of the most basic, everyday and fundamental points of communication going. Names are hardly an exception or odd case. They are at the core of communication.

I have already admitted my own lack of kanji knowledge. Yet I have little trouble finding these extreme variations. Its wild and bizarre. Its a hindrance to communication.

Anyway, hats off to you again for having the courage to take the Pepsi challenge.
 
I still would like to know why kanji is OK for China, but not for Japan?

The readings of the kanji do not vary in Chinese. They fit the spoken language perfectly. One kanji, one sound, one meaning, although there are homonyms I believe. I will still decry the inefficiency of pictograms in general, but for Chinese, that is the end of the inefficiency and problems. In Japanese, its just the beginning. Even the adaptations beget adaptations. The inefficiency of kanji in Japanese is much more like what the Koreans experienced. Both Koreas had the sense to ditch Chinese characters. Even the drive to bring back Hanja education is merely as an optional elective, and that is all. Korea is not going back.
 
"The only figure of the student to choose the reference book on the bookstore of Korea, and rarely seen kind of society people." ....

Ugh, I have no idea what this ungrammatical mess means. Please don't link through google translate (or any other web translator) - we're all able to read Japanese or learning to be able to read Japanese. I'm going back to my struggle to get to the original article now, though I think it's going to involve mousing over the link and then typing the original URL by hand in another window.

Edit: Figured out where to copy and paste the original URL from. 韓国人 40%が本読まず25%大学生が「大韓民国」を漢字 で書けない | マイナビニュース
The original sentence that I complained about actually says something like, "In Korean bookstores there are only students looking for reference works, working-age adults are almost never present."
 
Can some Japanese texts be written in all kana and be understandable?
Yes, as is clear by the existence of some all-kana texts, particularly those aimed at children or which were used on early computer/gaming systems where technology limitations.

Can all Japanese text be convertible to kana (spaced kana, romaji, or whatever phonetic system you con) without losing meaning/accidentally introducing ambiguity?
No - kango-heavy, kanji-dense texts (such as many newspaper articles) may not be able to be converted directly. This is not merely my opinion but also backed up by the webpage of the カナモジカイ in their section on コトバえらび (remember, these are native Japanese speakers who support the removal of kanji):

カナで文章を書くには、意味の取り違えられやすい同音語や、漢字を見なければ意味のわからないコトバは避けなければなりません。

Is it possible there is a more overly optimal system for writing Japanese language than is currently in use? Yes, just as there is undoubtedly a better way of writing English than the current, orthographic-depth-is-over-9000 system. However, I don't think it's clear-cut that any of the current phonetic options - mixed hiragana/katakana, カナモジカイ's system which is katakana-based, any of the romaji schemes, and so on - are in fact that optimal system, even ignoring the logistics of switching over.

Personally, I feel that many of the issues with kanji can be mitigated with technology. We already see this in practice - people use more kanji when writing using computer input, use the henkan on their phones to doublecheck kanji when handwriting, etc. In terms of furigana, HTML 5 brings in better ruby support, and SE Japanese has a built in furigana engine which is fantastic - and I hope similar things will spread because it seems like heavier use of furigana (including optional/pop-up furigana) gives us the best of both worlds.

Plus, while I could do without people who over-use obscure kanji just because their henkan makes it easy to do so, I would miss all the possible wordplay/puns kanji gives access to (迷場面・鯖落ち etc.)
 
No - kango-heavy, kanji-dense texts (such as many newspaper articles) may not be able to be converted directly. This is not merely my opinion but also backed up by the webpage of the カナモジカイ in their section on コトバえらび (remember, these are native Japanese speakers who support the removal of kanji):

I do not think so.
"to be able to read and understand like listening the radio "from newspaper could write it down by hiragana
however if sentence is short like only one word, it would be impossible



カナモジカイ is harder than 仮名文字会
 
I do not think so.
"to be able to read and understand like listening the radio "from newspaper could write it down by hiragana
however if sentence is short like only one word, it would be impossible

It's bare.

What does it mean?

Fact is nobody would write such a short sentence out of context.



カナモジカイ is harder than 仮名文字会

No its not. In many ways, its easier. About the only thing I can see to be confused about is the "kai" part. But they could call it group or club since Japanese imported those words anyway. Or just add "の" before the " 会".

It seems to me the pro-kanji people have given up the possibilities before even trying.
 
Yup. Setting you up for a fall, but only to prove a point. 美羽 is Miu, and she is annoyed that you read her name wrong.

小山さん, or Mr. Oyama, is irked.

隆, Takato, is rather unhappy that you chose two names and neither was right.




But you will pretty much say them right every time, unlike the kanji examples. Not that I support the needless spelling variations, but the difficulties are far less severe.



Nope. 真琴 is a girl and is really mad that you gave her a boy's name. 大介 rolled his eyes. And 正孝 sighed heavily.



People's names are one of the most basic, everyday and fundamental points of communication going. Names are hardly an exception or odd case. They are at the core of communication.

I have already admitted my own lack of kanji knowledge. Yet I have little trouble finding these extreme variations. Its wild and bizarre. Its a hindrance to communication.

Anyway, hats off to you again for having the courage to take the Pepsi challenge.

The example you gave using names was interesting. Have you ever asked your friends why they were given the names Miu, Makoto, Daisuke and Masataka and then why those particular kanji were chosen by their parents? Also, do they currently write their respective names in kana, kanji, some combination of the two, or in romaji?

I'm not trying to derail this thread; I'm just curious.

PS: The Kanamojikai site was interesting. Never knew such a group existed. Some of their arguments do make some sense to me; however, for a group that is seemingly advocating the dropping of kanji for a strictly kana based system, they sure use a lot of kanji on their website. Am I the only one who finds that kind of strange? By using kanji, they are unintentionally weakening their own position. :rolleyes:
 
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however, for a group that is seemingly advocating the dropping of kanji for a strictly kana based system, they sure use a lot of kanji on their website. Am I the only one who finds that kind of strange? By using kanji, they are unintentionally weakening their own position.

A similar thing was said about celebrities in America who are anti-gun but have armed body guards. My reply is that no matter your dream of the future, you better deal with the reality of today.

I do believe they have plenty of all kana documents at the site. It does not need to be all kanji to get the point across any more than my advocacy of my own alphabet would be best done in my alphabet because you simply would not be able to read it without learning my alphabet first. And while the readers of their site may know kana, they have not actually learned to read all kana in fact. All kana is daunting to anyone not used to it, as with anything. And as I keep saying, adjustments and reforms are necessary.

The example you gave using names was interesting.

Thanks. I am glad you found that important point interesting. I also find it interesting, in a morbid sort of way. For me, its like viewing a car accident; you want to look away....but you can't.

Have you ever asked your friends why they were given the names Miu, Makoto, Daisuke and Masataka and then why those particular kanji were chosen by their parents? Also, do they currently write their respective names in kana, kanji, some combination of the two, or in romaji?

I have no friends by those names. I looked for such names to prove a point, and examples are common enough.

I have had friends who loved their kanji and some who hated them and insisted on writing their names in kana. I know none who write their names in romaji, but some Japanese celebrities do, at least their stage names as they appear on TV and in the media, and I have also seen shops named after the owner (apparently) in romaji.

By the way, welcome to JREF clphill!
 
A similar thing was said about celebrities in America who are anti-gun but have armed body guards. My reply is that no matter your dream of the future, you better deal with the reality of today.

I do believe they have plenty of all kana documents at the site. It does not need to be all kanji to get the point across any more than my advocacy of my own alphabet would be best done in my alphabet because you simply would not be able to read it without learning my alphabet first. And while the readers of their site may know kana, they have not actually learned to read all kana in fact. All kana is daunting to anyone not used to it, as with anything. And as I keep saying, adjustments and reforms are necessary.

I guess, but even so I am wondering why they choose to use kanji on their site, especially for pretty easy words such as 'Nihongo', 'undou', 'moji' etc. Those aren't very different words to understand when written in kana. I think they could've written everything on their top page in kana without losing any meaning. Maybe they just used kanji to show how difficult and inconvenient it was to use. Not sure.


Thanks. I am glad you found that important point interesting. I also find it interesting, in a morbid sort of way. For me, its like viewing a car accident; you want to look away....but you can't.

My interest, I guess, is not so morbid. I just think the names are interesting that's all, especially how a name with the same reading can actually be written using different kanji. I was named after both my grandfathers which is kind of cool (at least it is to me), even though there are many many many people in the world who share my first name, the reasons why I was given my names are still kind of cool to me. It seems like lots of Japanese parents also put lots of thought into the kanji or readings they choose for their children's names, many even pick a particular character (or combination of characters) based not only on it's meaning, but also on number of strokes it takes to write it. I knew a woman who had twin boys. She named them Kenji and Kouji. She used the characters from the word "Kenkou" for the first character of each son's name. I thought that was kind of cool. So when I see a name in kanji, especially if the reading is not very common, I just find the choice of the particular characters interesting.

I have no friends by those names. I looked for such names to prove a point, and examples are common enough.

My mistake. The way you wrote 'so and so' were upset because you got their names wrong gave me the impression that you actually knew the people you were talking about. I guess if somebody had said "Miu" for 美羽 then you probably would have said "美羽 is 'Miwa' and she is upset you got her name wrong," or if for Makoto they wrote 真琴 then you would have said, "Nope 誠 is a boy and he is really mad that you used a girl's name." I guess you could keep going back and forth like that forever and ever with whatever name you can think of if you wanted; sort of like going around in circles and never getting anywhere. Mind you this is just my opinion.

I have had friends who loved their kanji and some who hated them and insisted on writing their names in kana. I know none who write their names in romaji, but some Japanese celebrities do, at least their stage names as they appear on TV and in the media, and I have also seen shops named after the owner (apparently) in romaji.

I guess for professional reasons some Japanese people do choose to write their name in romaji. Some may even change their name all together. Doesn't seem too different (other that the kanji obviously) from similar things being done in the West. Some people change the spelling of their name or even their name itself for professional reasons. For certain people, their name is their brand and selling their brand is what they are in the business of doing. For other people, perhaps a less ethnic sounding name or a more traditional spelling is something they feel is necessary in order to be more readily accepted in their society.

I also met some Japanese people who weren't particularly fond of their kanji. I've also met some Japanese people who really didn't like their name at all too much as well. :D I guess that to is really not something totally unique to Japan. My nephew is not really too happy to be named after his dad (He hates being called Jr. by everyone). I guess naming is one way some parents try to get even with their kids in advance for all trouble they are going to cause as they grow up. ;)

By the way, welcome to JREF clphill!

Thank you.

PS: Why did you use kanji when you posted that insult in Japanese a few posts back? Why not just write it in kana with spaces, etc.? Did you just use kanji for effect, for more impact? Did you feel that using kanji made it easier for others to read? Not trying to be a jerk so please don't take it that way. Just a little curious.
 
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This thread has been reported numerous times; I am closing it for a variety of reasons, some of which are digression from the original topic as well instances of abusive language. I strongly encourage anyone interested in the topic to start a new thread dealing with specific questions relating to the kanji issue.

Also, there are countless existing threads on the same topic, for instance this one:

Should Japan Abolish Kanji? | Japan Forum


Thread reopened.
 
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We're already using Kanji (logograms/ideograms).
Here are some:
upload_2017-3-16_19-42-38-png.24539


Can we write Japanese without Kanji? Yes we can, not even with kana and spaces but with romaji such as:
arigato gozaimashita minna-san

Shall we? Definitely not, those who prefer ABCD to Kanji should prefer MS-DOS to Graphical User Interface. Which one do you prefer? Ctrl+X, type down cut and enter or see this ✂️?

We use Kanji a lot (I ❤️ NY).

One said learning 2000+ kanji is burden for kids and delays their encyclopedia discoveries. Why underestimate the impact of learning kanji on children's brain? Why you call it fetish? It is exercise for mind. Words have common radicals, 心 is heart and appears in many characters related to emotion: 悲怒虑忌惫
This is tree 木 and appears in 朲 朳 朴 朵 朶 朷 朸 朹 机 朻 朼

Instead of removing Kanji, I purpose we use it in English as well: I❤️


And one said Kanji fits Chinese like gloves but fits Japanese like oven mittens. Chinese is a tonal language and very difficult to articulate and comprehend. They say ming, zhang, ling all day long. Their homonyms are too many. Japanese is better. Also Japanese has Hiragana in addition to Kanji. Kanji only has straight strokes with few curves whereas Hiragana has many curves and makes your mind even more creative. I advocate Japanese learners are naturally better artists than Chinese for direct impact of the variety Hiragana provides as input to their young growing brains.

Hell English, go revitalize ancient scripts. ABCD is simple enough for cows to sing.
 

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Words have common radicals, 心 is heart and appears in many characters related to emotion: 悲怒虑忌惫
It also appears in 息, 忘, 総, 急 and 憲, none of which have anything to do with emotion.

This is tree 木 and appears in 朲 朳 朴 朵 朶 朷 朸 朹 机 朻 朼
Also in 呆, 相, 集, 査, 権, 裸 and 殺, none of which have anything to do with trees or wood.

Meanwhile, 婿 (groom) contains 女 (woman) and 柔 (soft) contains 矛 (halberd), while 殴 (punch) and 叩 (hit) do not contain 手 (hand). To me at least, the composition of the majority of kanji appears to be completely and utterly random.

Hell English, go revitalize ancient scripts.
Sure, as soon as Japanese stops altering words to use 交ぜ書き.

ABCD is simple enough for cows to sing.
I'd like to see a cow that knows the past participle of "lie down" or the correct usage of "who" vs "whom" :). There's more to a language than the writing system.
 
Delirious is the argument for Hiragana and learning based on curves. Rather than a frog's cyclopean eye-view from the bottom of a well, romaji opens up the world to learning, while simultaneously reflecting a basic, although not precise, sound of languages other than Japanese. There is also an orthographic dilemma inherent to the Chinese language. Here is an example of action in the personal psychoacoustic space of the reader:

Sam akt rozhdeniia novykh znani "vypadaet"
iz potoka vremeni.
The very act of the birth of new knowledge "drops out" of time.

This can be done with Arabic as well, though we suggest the reader learn that alphabet with the use of transparencies or a mirror so that it can be transcribed from right to left.
 
The Chinese used a red heart symbol to mean "love"? That's very interesting!

I mean we use logograms, icons. 心 is like a muscle with three veins.

It also appears in 息, 忘, 総, 急 and 憲, none of which have anything to do with emotion.
息 means breath (heart pumps oxygen, 自 means oneself so 息 keeps you alive, breathing keeps your heart beating)
忘 means forget, 亡 is death. When someone is dead in your heart, you forget him. People used to think we remember things by heart.

集 is gather, 隹 is a bird. Birds are gathered at the top of the tree
殺 kill, 几 (many) ㄨ(marks) and hitting 又 (again) with 木 (wood) to kill him.
査 (investigate) = 且 (further) investigation in needed around that 木 / also eyes are 目 which makes sense because we use eyes to check/investigate
Meanwhile, 婿 (groom) contains 女 (woman) and 柔 (soft) contains 矛 (halberd), while 殴 (punch) and 叩 (hit) do not contain 手 (hand). To me at least, the composition of the majority of kanji appears to be completely and utterly random.
婿 (groom) needs a wife! 月 (moon) 正 (correct): A husband corrects her wife's periods!
 
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