Offtopic about words for love, colours and snow, and the definition of "word"

[undrentide]

Well, this confirms that Sabro and Leonmarino were wrong, and that undrentide and caster51 were also wrong to call "komorebi" as word :
Good explanation on the limitless way to form compound words in languages such as Eskimo and Japanese. For actual non-compounded words, Japanese is a fairly poor language in comparison to European languages, and especially comapred to English.

日本語 - Wikipedia

 

[Maciamo]

You are totally missing the point here.
I'm not saying that we have more words about the colours of horses.
What I've been saying is that these words are used specifically for horses.
Chestnut, fawn, dappled grey... these words are not specific for horses, they can be used for other animals, or things as well.

They are as specific to horses as in Japanese. I have never heard of a person, a dog or a cat with fawn-coloured hair" or "dappled grey hair"...

Those words I listed up cannot be used to describe other animals.
And ﾂ静や?禿 is not "blue hair". (I've never seen blue horses except those on carousel.)

ﾂ静 doesn't only translate as "blue" in English, but also "green" and "black". The Japanese seemed to have cared little about colours in the past, as they had to import words for orange and pink. I remember my first few Japanese lessons in Tokyo; I asked the Japanese teacher how to say "orange" and "pink", so she said ﾆ棚ﾆ椎槌停?愴淡 and ﾆ痴ﾆ停?愴誰. So I replied : "Yes, but what are the real Japanese words for that ? What are the kanji, even if they aren't used anymore, I want to know". She replied that there wasn't any. I couldn't believe her, because I didn't want to think that Japanese language could be so primitive as not to have words for so basic colours as orange and pink before importing them from English. So I thought she just didn't know and didn't want to admit it. I was up for quite a few more surprises in my study of Japanese language...

ﾂ静や?禿 is used for hoses whose body is deep black, also their mane and tail must be deep black.

I am not a specialist in horses, but that it seems that you are describing a black horse... Have you checked the link to see if there was another term for it ? Now how would you call, in the future, a genetically modified horse with blue or green hair ? Too bad you've already used the kanji ﾂ静? you must find something else.

Also those terms are not recent ones. They already existed at least in Edo era. Could be older, though I haven't checked it yet.

Could have been a translation from Dutch or Portuguese then ? I think that horse coats have similar translations in European languages. Anyway what is sure is that English language didn't copy the terms from Japanese, and it would be too much of a conincide to chhose exactly the same colour comparison as in Europe (why "chestnut" and "deer" and not another brown things or animals ?)

日本語 - Wikipedia

You still don't understand the meaning of "single word" in English. It only means 窶儕ﾂ照椎津ｪ.

 

[undrentide]

Japanese seemed to have cared little about colours in the past, as they had to import words for orange and pink. I remember my first few Japanese lessons in Tokyo; I asked the Japanese teacher how to say "orange" and "pink", so she said ﾆ棚ﾆ椎槌停?愴淡 and ﾆ痴ﾆ停?愴誰. So I replied : "Yes, but what are the real Japanese words for that ? What are the kanji, even if they aren't used anymore, I want to know". She replied that there wasn't any. I couldn't believe her, because I didn't want to think that Japanese language could be so primitive as not to have words for so basic colours as orange and pink before importing them from English. So I thought she just didn't know and didn't want to admit it. I was up for quite a few more surprises in my study of Japanese language...

ﾆ棚ﾆ椎槌停?愴淡 is ﾅｾﾃｲﾂ色, ﾆ痴ﾆ停?愴誰 is ﾂ静寂?處ﾂ色.

 

[undrentide]

You still don't understand the meaning of "single word" in English. It only means 窶儕ﾂ照椎津ｪ.

So "girlfriend" is not a single word in English?

 

[Maciamo]

ﾆ棚ﾆ椎槌停?愴淡 is ﾅｾﾃｲﾂ色, ﾆ痴ﾆ停?愴誰 is ﾂ静寂?處ﾂ色.

Thanks ! It seems that my teacher wasn't as knowledgeable as you. Do you think she should still be allowed to teach Japanese ? My dictionary also gave me 窶慊債色 for pink (peach colour), but I don't think that peaches are really pink (more yellow-orange, sometimes even red).

 

[Maciamo]

So "girlfriend" is not a single word in English?

That's a good point. But the many of the others I listed are : lover, mistress, darling, dearest, honey, date, gallant, beau, suitor, wooer... (the last 4 are somewhat old-fashioned)

 

[undrentide]

I am not a specialist in horses, but that it seems that you are describing a black horse... Have you checked the link to see if there was another term for it ? Now how would you call, in the future, a genetically modified horse with blue or green hair ? Too bad you've already used the kanji ﾂ静? you must find something else.

Well, it is not a word I created. You shoud go back to 窶愿樞?氾?ｽﾅｾ窶佚｣ to suggest it.

It's a definition given by a dictionary.

 

[undrentide]

Thanks ! It seems that my teacher wasn't as knowledgeable as you. Do you think she should still be allowed to teach Japanese ? My dictionary also gave me 窶慊債色 for pink (peach colour), but I don't think that peaches are really pink (more yellow-orange, sometimes even red).

Japanese 窶慊債色 is not equivalent to peach colour.
窶慊債色 is not the colour of the fruit but colour of the blossoms, which is dark pink in Japan.

 

[undrentide]

They are as specific to horses as in Japanese. I have never heard of a person, a dog or a cat with fawn-coloured hair" or "dappled grey hair"...

At least chestnat and fawn seem to be used not only for horses.

chestnut (adjective)
red-brown in colour:
her chestnut hair

fawn (adjective)
having a pale yellow-brown colour

My mistake is about dapple grey, which indeed is used for only horses.

dapple-grey British English ; dapple-gray American English [countable]
a horse that is grey with spots of darker grey

It is dapple-grey, not dappled grey by the way.

 

[Maciamo]

I had forgotten to reply to this.

We have different words for rice, raw one is called 窶｢ﾃ while cooked one is called 窶敕堕（窶堙坂?堙ｱ or 窶堙溪?堋ｵﾂ）. We have two different terms for water, hot water is 窶懌?? cold water is ﾂ絶?ｦ. (Most European languages just have one word - does that mean people don't care about water??)

I believe that it does mean that the Japanese have attached more importance to rice and hot water (e.g. onsen, to make tea, or for cooking rice...) than the Europeans.

Name of traditional colours in Japanese is interesting.
Many of them reflect the nature - plants, birds, animals, for instance.
日本の伝統色 和色大辞典 - Traditional Colors of Japan
http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~xn6t-ogr/colors/TradColors.txt.n.html

It is the same in European languages. Here is an example of well over 150 colour words in English, and most have names inspired by nature.

 

[Glenn]

Giraffes, rhinoceros, elephants, lions and tigers aren't native to Japan or Europe, and yet Japanese and European languages have unique words for them.

I have an answer now for the ones other than "giraffe."

rhinoceros -- ﾂ催陳（ﾆ探ﾆ辰ﾂ）
elephant -- ﾂ湘崢（ﾆ綻ﾆ脱ﾂ）
lion -- ﾅｽ窶塲ｽqﾂ（ﾆ歎ﾆ歎ﾂ）
tiger -- ﾅ津閉（窶堙??堙ｧﾂ）

While none of these animals are native to Japan, all of them except lions are found in either Korea, China, and India; China and India; or just India. Now, we also see that all of them except "tiger" have Sino-Japanese readings. We also know that China and India we in contact with each other very early in history, and that later China and Japan were in contact with each other, and that Sanskrit terms relating to Buddhism have made it into Chinese and Japanese. Therefore, I find it highly likely that Chinese people in India saw these creatures (except lions, which are native only to some African nations) and either borrowed Sanskrit words for them, or the made up their own words. Either way, it doesn't matter, because the Japanese borrowed them from Chinese as they were. You can also add 窶｢^ﾂ（ﾆ智ﾆ停?｡ﾆ脱ﾂ）to the list.

Now, what needs explaining is why there was a Chinese word for "lion," which isn't found in Asia, and why "tiger" has a Japanese reading. ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq was actually the name of an imaginary beast that was said to be the king of beasts (which the lion is often referred to as). When they came across actual lions, they just kept the name (referring to the Chinese). The Japanese also use ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq for lion, but they also have the more scientific term (in that it only deals with the animal, and has no cultural ties to imaginary creatures) borrowed from English: ﾆ停?ｰﾆ辰ﾆ棚ﾆ停??

Why does "tiger" have a Japanese reading and not a Chinese one (actually it does; it just isn't used commonly)? There are many theories on its etymology, ranging from just a borrowing from Korean to it being a fearsome beast that's uncatchable: ﾆ暖ﾆ停?ｰ(窶｢ﾃ?窶堙懌?堋ｦ窶堙ｧ窶堙ｪ窶堙?

All of these words appear in Japanese texts before the year 1000 AD. Compare this with ﾆ湛ﾆ谷ﾆ停?愴誰 and ﾆ蓄ﾆ停?愴誰, which are animals found either only in Europe and on the American continent, or only on the American continent, and didn't appear in texts until 1912 (ﾆ湛ﾆ谷ﾆ停?愴誰) and 1955 (ﾆ蓄ﾆ停?愴誰), both after the Meiji craze of translating concepts in to Japanese.

Now, leaving all that aside, having actually completely unique words for different things (no similar components, like 窶懌? and ﾂ絶?ｦ or "mouse" and "rat") I think only signifies that they were different things to the people who started calling them that. However, I haven't traced the etymologies, so the meanings could have changed over time (like "deer" once meant any animal, but now it has a more specific meaning).

About compound words, I don't think that "blackboard" is a board that is black, or that "chalkboard" is a board made of chalk. I think of both of these as one word, even though their components are transparent (as is the case with kanji). There are also many other compound words with roots in Latin and Greek whose parts aren't transparent (if you haven't studied ancient Latin or Greek, or any etymology), and I think that these words are more akin to Sino-Japanese words than are "outhouse" or "northbound." The ones whose components are more clear are probably more akin to native Japanese compound words, but even making this distinction is dangerous, because it isn't accurate and forces an Anglo-centric view on a language that has its roots in a very different culture, and operates in a very different way than English.

As to the Japanese distinguishing "mouse" from "rat" by using words that are grouped under the same hypernym, I really don't see how that shows that they don't love nature. Drawing that conclusion seems to me a huge leap in logic, because even though the words may resemble each other, they are still different and unique words and they still do distinguish between the different creatures. As I said before, it strikes me as more organized. In English we also have "pack rat," "sewer rat," and lots more "X rats," that I'm sure I don't know about, but does this in and of itself mean that we don't love rats, because we put modifiers before some of them? I don't think it does.

Getting back to cultural differences, your definition of "word" is highly Eurocentric, as it mostly only applies to European languages. For example, indigenous peoples of the Americas don't have words the way English does, in that one word can be a whole sentence that conveys ideas as complex as "I went to the store to get some potatoes." Also, Chinese, since it uses hanzi exclusively (well, officially, anyway), may appear to be "childish" to a speaker of a European language because they just stick characters together to make words, but I think that taking such a stance really understates the ability of the language to function like any other. There are still words that, while they may be transparent in meaning due to the characters (e.g., 窶牢窶ｹ窶ｦ窶ｰﾂｻ), are actually fairly complex abstract ideas. This exists in all languages, no matter their strategies for word formation.

 

[Maciamo]

I have an answer now for the ones other than "giraffe."

rhinoceros -- ﾂ催陳（ﾆ探ﾆ辰ﾂ）
elephant -- ﾂ湘崢（ﾆ綻ﾆ脱ﾂ）
lion -- ﾅｽ窶塲ｽqﾂ（ﾆ歎ﾆ歎ﾂ）
tiger -- ﾅ津閉（窶堙??堙ｧﾂ）

While none of these animals are native to Japan, all of them except lions are found in either Korea, China, and India; China and India; or just India. Now, we also see that all of them except "tiger" have Sino-Japanese readings.

There are lions in India (the last Asian lions are confined to Sasan Gir National Park, which I visited), and there were erstwhile common in most of Eurasia and North Africa. You might remember that the Romans used lions in the Coloseum, and that well before them our Cro-Magnon ancestors were sometimes killed by lions, even in Northern Europe. This explains why the lion has been a potent symbol in heraldy in medieval Europe (despite them already being extinct in Europe at the time) and in Chinese statues (well, if you can call that a lion).

Now, what needs explaining is why there was a Chinese word for "lion," which isn't found in Asia, and why "tiger" has a Japanese reading. ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq was actually the name of an imaginary beast that was said to be the king of beasts (which the lion is often referred to as). When they came across actual lions, they just kept the name (referring to the Chinese). The Japanese also use ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq for lion, but they also have the more scientific term (in that it only deals with the animal, and has no cultural ties to imaginary creatures) borrowed from English: ﾆ停?ｰﾆ辰ﾆ棚ﾆ停??

Nice explanation, but I prefer mine about Asiatic lions. I believe that the lions were extinct in East Asia before the rise of civilisations, which is probably why their appearance has been disformed over time.

Compare this with ﾆ湛ﾆ谷ﾆ停?愴誰 and ﾆ蓄ﾆ停?愴誰, which are animals found either only in Europe and on the American continent, or only on the American continent, and didn't appear in texts until 1912 (ﾆ湛ﾆ谷ﾆ停?愴誰) and 1955 (ﾆ蓄ﾆ停?愴誰), both after the Meiji craze of translating concepts in to Japanese.

Minks are only native to the cold climates of Northern Europe, Russia and North America, yet the Italians and Spaniards have a word for it (visone, visón). Skunk are only native to the American continent and South-East Asia, but Europeans all have a unique name for it (puzzola in Italian, mofeta in Spanish, mephitidae in Portuguese, mouffette in French, stinkdieren in Dutch...).

All this still doesn't explain why the Japanese have no unique words for many of their (and China's) native mamal species like ferrets, shrews, voles, apodemus, etc. It explains even less why there is no gender, young's name and cry name for animals in Japanese.

About compound words, I don't think that "blackboard" is a board that is black, or that "chalkboard" is a board made of chalk.

Yet blackboards used to be black, and chalkboards are made for writing with chalk... It only shows that the words the environment has changed and not the words.

 

[Glenn]

All this still doesn't explain why the Japanese have no unique words for many of their (and China's) native mamal species like ferrets, shrews, voles, apodemus, etc. It explains even less why there is no gender, young's name and cry name for animals in Japanese.

I believe we disagree on what "unique words" are. To me ﾆ地ﾆ団ﾆ谷ﾆ値ﾆ炭ﾆ蓄 and ﾆ暖ﾆ置ﾆ値ﾆ炭ﾆ蓄 are unique words, in that they aren't they same and they name two different things.

I'm actually interested in what the explanation for European languages having a non-organized vocabulary for these animals is. It seems to me that one could conversely argue that the Europeans couldn't even see the similarities in these animals, so they obviously didn't spend much time observing them.

Yet blackboards used to be black, and chalkboards are made for writing with chalk... It only shows that the words the environment has changed and not the words.

Indeed. It seems I expressed myself poorly there. My point was to say that they are each one word, and not a combination of two separate ones in my mind, nor in any native English speakers' minds (I assume). They can be broken into components, but that does not mean that they are the same as their components.

Perhaps I should have said that a chalk board is different than a chalkboard, and to further complicate matters, saying "the white house" is different than "the White House." The latter acts like a compound, even though it's written with a space, while the former just means "the house that is white."

 

[Maciamo]

I believe we disagree on what "unique words" are. To me ﾆ地ﾆ団ﾆ谷ﾆ値ﾆ炭ﾆ蓄 and ﾆ暖ﾆ置ﾆ値ﾆ炭ﾆ蓄 are unique words, in that they aren't they same and they name two different things.

What I call "unique word" is a single word as opposed to a compound word. I could also complain that English lacks many single words that French has about animals, or at least for the common usage. I cited the apodemus, but most English speakers refer to it simply as "field mouse". In French it is a mulot, a completely different word from mouse (souris).

I'm actually interested in what the explanation for European languages having a non-organized vocabulary for these animals is. It seems to me that one could conversely argue that the Europeans couldn't even see the similarities in these animals, so they obviously didn't spend much time observing them.

You are kidding I hope. Isnt't the Europeans who have classified all the animals in species, genus, family, order, class, phylum and kingdom ? No such classification originated outside the Western world, which again leads me to wonder why, and whether it is not just because no Asian or African has ever cared enough to classify them. Of course it is the work of a few Europeans, but there could as well be a few Chinese or Japanese or Indians to to the same, especially that Asia's population has always been several times bigger than Europe (China alone has always been about twice more populous than Europe, Russia included). Observing, classifying and trying to understand nature has been done in all historical periods in Europe since Ancient Greece. The Romans did it, Medieval monks did it, Enlightment philosopher, scientists and travelers did it, and more and more people have done it since the 19th century. I do not know whether it is also in the school curiculum in the States, or in all European countries, but I had to learn about the scientific classification of nature (species, genus, etc.) when I was about 12 or 13. Tests included being able to replace animal names in the right categories and sub-categories. I doubt that this is done in all education system around the world, but it is certainly considered important in our culture.

Indeed. It seems I expressed myself poorly there. My point was to say that they are each one word, and not a combination of two separate ones in my mind, nor in any native English speakers' minds (I assume).

You can say "blackboard", "greenboard" or just "board" and it still means the same. Isn't that a proof that it is a combination of two separate words ? It is the same in Japanese. You can say "hatanezumi" (literally "field mouse", although it means "vole"), but this can easily be broken down in "hata" (field) and "nezumi" (mouse), which proves it is two separate words that have become a compound, just like "field mouse" in English. That is not a unique/single word for a linguist. Now you could also separate radicals of some other English words without having meaningful individual words from the separation. For instance, the roots of "anthropology" are "anthropo" ("human" in Greek) and logy (from Greek "logos" meaning "study"), but "anthropo" and "logy" alone are not words in English. Some 2-kanji words in Japanese are one word because the meaning is completely different from the separate kanji, like in 窶愿ｺ窶怒 which means Japan and no "sun book" or "sun origin". But if you mean "sun book", then 窶愿ｺ窶怒 is not a unique/single word but simply "sun" + "book". You cannot argue that "sunbook" spelt without space is more a single/unique word in English than if it is spelt with a space. The best proof is that we can write "businesswoman" or "business woman" and it still means the same.

Perhaps I should have said that a chalk board is different than a chalkboard, and to further complicate matters, saying "the white house" is different than "the White House." The latter acts like a compound, even though it's written with a space, while the former just means "the house that is white."

That is why capital letters and determinant "the" are used in "the White House", to show that we do not mean just any white house.

 

[caster51]

No such classification originated outside the Western world, which again leads me to wonder why, and whether it is not just because no Asian or African has ever cared enough to classify them.

that is why only "word of gaijin " exists ?

How about name of ﾂ"ﾂ出ﾂ青｢窶ｹ窶ｺﾂ" by age


ﾆ畜ﾆ停?ｰ ﾆ地ﾆ誰ﾂ?ｨﾆ棚ﾆ畜ﾆ鍛ﾆ坦ﾂ（ﾆ辰ﾆ段ﾆ鍛ﾆ坦ﾂ）ﾂ?ｨﾆ湛ﾆ弛ﾆ歎ﾆ椎?ﾂ?ｨﾆ辰ﾆ段ﾂ?ｨﾆ畜ﾆ停?ｰﾂ?ｨﾆ暖ﾆ檀
ﾆ坦ﾆ地ﾆ胆 ﾆ淡ﾆ槌槌坦ﾂ（ﾆ歎ﾆ停?愴坦ﾂ）ﾂ?ｨﾆ坦ﾆ地ﾆ胆ﾂ?ｨﾆ坦ﾆ知ﾆ歎ﾆ陳
ﾆ湛ﾆ炭ﾆ鱈 ﾆ坦ﾆ鍛ﾆ恥ﾂ（ﾆ断ﾆ鱈ﾂ）ﾂ?ｨﾆ短ﾆ辰ﾆ担ﾂ?ｨﾆ稚ﾆ鍛ﾆ坦ﾂ?ｨﾆ湛ﾆ炭ﾆ鱈ﾂ?ｨﾆ棚ﾆ棚ﾆ耽ﾆ陳哉脱
ﾆ置ﾆ椎? 窶愬停?ｹﾅｾ窶ｹﾃ淒?Cﾂ ﾂ ﾆ陳照谷ﾆ歎ﾂ（ﾆ陳照谷ﾆ段ﾆ担ﾂ）ﾂ?ｨﾆ辰ﾆ段ﾆ胆ﾂ?ｨﾆ陳照停?ｰﾆ探ﾂ?ｨﾆ置ﾆ椎?
ﾅ?ﾃ鳴青ｼﾂ ﾂ ﾂ ﾂ ﾂ ﾆ停?堡淡ﾆ槌槌坦ﾂ?ｨﾆ陳照谷ﾆ段ﾂ?ｨﾆ団ﾆ弛ﾆ湛ﾂ?ｨﾆ地ﾆ筑ﾆ蛋ﾂ?ｨﾆ陳?淡ﾆ陳債?ｨﾆ置ﾆ椎?
窶ｹIﾂ州窶ｹﾃ淒?Cﾂ ﾂ ﾆ陳照谷ﾆ段ﾂ?ｨﾆ団ﾆ弛ﾆ湛ﾂ?ｨﾆ辰ﾆ段ﾆ胆ﾂ?ｨﾆ地ﾆ筑ﾆ蛋ﾂ?ｨﾆ置ﾆ椎?ﾂ（ﾆ棚ﾆ棚ﾆ脱ﾆ棚ﾂ）
ﾂ青｣ﾅ津銀?愿?ﾅ?Cﾂ ﾂ ﾆ団ﾆ弛ﾆ湛ﾂ?ｨﾆ団ﾆ谷ﾆ段ﾂ?ｨﾆ地ﾆ筑ﾆ蛋ﾂ?ｨﾆ陳?淡ﾆ陳債?ｨﾆ置ﾆ椎?
窶儖ﾅ津｣窶冢窶｢ﾃｻﾂ ﾂ ﾆ筑ﾆ停?愴椎?ﾆ鱈ﾂ（ﾆ辰ﾆ段ﾆ胆ﾂ）ﾂ?ｨﾆ筑ﾆ停?ｹﾆ担ﾂ?ｨﾆ地ﾆ筑ﾆ蛋ﾂ?ｨﾆ置ﾆ椎?
thet change the name by age
hamachi(ﾆ地ﾆ筑ﾆ蛋ﾂ） mejina>buri
young yellowtail ﾂ ﾂ?ｨﾂ adult yellowtail ﾂ ?

 

[Glenn]

You can say "blackboard", "greenboard" or just "board" and it still means the same. Isn't that a proof that it is a combination of two separate words ?

Not quite. First, I don't think I've ever heard "greenboard," but it may well exist, and I'm assuming you didn't just make it up. Second, while you can call a blackboard or a chalkboard a board, you cannot say that all boards are chalkboards.

Second, a chalk board would be a board made of chalk.

It is the same in Japanese. You can say "hatanezumi" (literally "field mouse", although it means "vole"), but this can easily be broken down in "hata" (field) and "nezumi" (mouse), which proves it is two separate words that have become a compound, just like "field mouse" in English.

I thought you might be interested to know that "vole" comes from Norwegian "voll(mus)," meaning "field (mouse)," and as late as 1805 is was written "volemouse" in English. It was obviously clipped to its present form today, and it's not surprising or strange for "field mouse" (a compound word, by the way) to be used for it, as it's just the English version of the Norwegian. Also, see above about "a chalk board."

So, not only do Japanese and English make compound words, but Norwegian does too. Actually, it seems to be an extremely common way of creating new words in any language.

What is also common is to give an animal a name based on some description of it, such as "dolphin" being from Greek meaning "fish with a womb," or "porpoise" being described as a "pork fish."

As a side note, coinage is extremely rare.

That is not a unique/single word for a linguist.

I say it is, because all the linguistics materials written by linguists that I've read also say it is.

Now you could also separate radicals of some other English words without having meaningful individual words from the separation. For instance, the roots of "anthropology" are "anthropo" ("human" in Greek) and logy (from Greek "logos" meaning "study"), but "anthropo" and "logy" alone are not words in English.

Indeed. But I don't think that's relevant here, as it is the same as putting two kanji (read with Sino-Japanese readings and in which at least one is a bound morpheme) together to get a word.

Some 2-kanji words in Japanese are one word because the meaning is completely different from the separate kanji, like in 窶愿ｺ窶怒 which means Japan and no "sun book" or "sun origin". But if you mean "sun book", then 窶愿ｺ窶怒 is not a unique/single word but simply "sun" + "book". You cannot argue that "sunbook" spelt without space is more a single/unique word in English than if it is spelt with a space.

It doesn't make any sense either way. It's not a word, and as far as I know there's no such thing as a book with the properties of the sun.

Either way, 窶愿ｺ窶怒 is not a compound word, because a compound word is one made up of two (or more, I suppose) free morphemes, and ﾆ男ﾆ蛋* is not a free morpheme meaning "sun." A "sun book" (whatever that's supposed to mean) would be more like 窶伉ｾ窶配窶堙娯?怒 anyway, but I can't say that makes any sense either.

*I'm taking the reading ﾆ男ﾆ蛋 here because I'm going with the (I assume) older version of 窶愿ｺ窶怒 as ﾆ男ﾆ鍛ﾆ竹ﾆ停?? If I were to take ﾆ男 as the reading of 窶愿ｺ here then the argument still stands, as there is no free morpheme ﾆ男 meaning "sun."

The best proof is that we can write "businesswoman" or "business woman" and it still means the same.

That means that it's a compound word no matter whether you break it up or not, that's all. It's still a single word. That it has its own entry in the dictionary is proof of this. That it can be written as one (orthographical) word is also proof of this.

Also, if we were to take "business" as one word and use it to modify "woman," what would that mean? I think it has no meaning. Along similar lines, if we take "blackboard" and separate it into "black" and "board," the meaning changes. Therefore, both "businesswoman" (with a space inserted or not) and "blackboard" are single words that express different concepts than they would if broken up into a simple noun phrase.

Interestingly, I've read complaints of a German speaker wondering why English likes to separate its compound words, as in German "field mouse" wouldn't be separated, as it apparently wasn't in Norwegian.

One last thing for now:

Nice explanation, but I prefer mine about Asiatic lions.

What did you mean by "mine" here? Did you mean it's your explanation as in you found it and are endorsing it, or do you mean it's yours as in you wrote it?

 

[Maciamo]

I thought you might be interested to know that "vole" comes from Norwegian "voll(mus)," meaning "field (mouse)," and as late as 1805 is was written "volemouse" in English. It was obviously clipped to its present form today, and it's not surprising or strange for "field mouse" (a compound word, by the way) to be used for it, as it's just the English version of the Norwegian.
...
So, not only do Japanese and English make compound words, but Norwegian does too. Actually, it seems to be an extremely common way of creating new words in any language.

What is also common is to give an animal a name based on some description of it, such as "dolphin" being from Greek meaning "fish with a womb," or "porpoise" being described as a "pork fish."

I don't know where you got from what I wrote that only Japanese and English had compound words. Most, if not all, languages have them. It may have been common in ancient languages, but words imported from other languages (e.g. Greek or Norwegian into English) are not considered as compound words in the importing language. The frequency of compound words also varies by linguistic families. Germanic languages have more compound words than Latin languages. For instance I cannot think of one common animal in French which is a compound word, while English has roe deer, field mouse, sperm whale, killer whale, etc.

It doesn't make any sense either way. It's not a word, and as far as I know there's no such thing as a book with the properties of the sun.

Either way, 窶愿ｺ窶怒 is not a compound word, because a compound word is one made up of two (or more, I suppose) free morphemes, and ﾆ男ﾆ蛋* is not a free morpheme meaning "sun." A "sun book" (whatever that's supposed to mean) would be more like 窶伉ｾ窶配窶堙娯?怒 anyway, but I can't say that makes any sense either.

"Sun Book" was just an example of what a book might be called, like the "Jungle Book". Maybe it wasn't a very good example. What about ﾅｽﾃ絶?ｰﾃｯ ? If you mean society then it is only one word, but if you mean "company meeting" as a shortening of 窶ｰﾃｯﾅｽﾃ絶?ｰﾃｯ窶ｹc for instance, then it becomes two words.

That means that it's a compound word no matter whether you break it up or not, that's all. It's still a single word. That it has its own entry in the dictionary is proof of this. That it can be written as one (orthographical) word is also proof of this.

I think we are turning around the pot, Glenn, as you refuse to understand my point and are cavilling about definitions. Definitions and usages apart, what I meant from the beginning is that I find it more "primitive" to have a compound noun for animals than a non-compound noun. It's ok to have compound nouns for new words (e.g. about technology) or concepts, but I dislike them for physical things or common life beings.

I am amazed how you have managed to turn a small part of one of numerous arguments I had that the Japanese cared less about nature, into a protracted argument about linguistic definitions. Because after all you still have no excuse or explanation for the absence of gender, young and cries of common animals native to Japan (which was only one of my dozen arguments). All you have done is wondering what a "sun book" could be, whether ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq were mythical creatures rather than actual lions, or whether a chalkboard was made of chalk, which is seriously offtopic.

What did you mean by "mine" here? Did you mean it's your explanation as in you found it and are endorsing it, or do you mean it's yours as in you wrote it?

I meant it as the one I had explained above. Your explanation of why there is a kanji for lion in Chinese and Japanese is because it is a mythical creature. My explanation is that lions are native to Asia (India) as well (which you didn't know).

 

[Maciamo]

Glenn, you may understand better what I mean by "unique word" (or "unique term" ?) if we look at bird classifications. If we look at the Falconidae order, there are over 50 birds, all with names composed on an "adjective + noun" pattern (e.g. "pelegrine falcon" or "crested caracara"). The same is true in Japanese. However, English has 6 different nouns : the Caracara, the Krestel, the Falcon, the Falconet, the Merlin and the Hobby. Japanese only has 3 : カラカラ, ハヤブサ and チョウゲンボウ.

Even for bigger birds of prey that are very clearly distinguishable, Japanese has some surprising categorisations. For example, amidst the Accipitridae order, English has unique nouns for eagles, vultures and bateleur, but all of them are "adjective + ワシ" in Japanese. You could argue that "vulture" is always "adjective + ハゲワシ" (literally "bald eagle"), but then English has even more nouns if we count sea-eagles, fish-eagles, snake-eagles, serpent-eagles, which are all ワシ too. The same is true of hawks, hawk-eagles, sparrowhawks and goshawks, which are all タカ.

It's fine that the Japanese refer to all fish-eagles, snake-eagles, etc. just as ワシ, but vultures (or even the red-beaked "bateleur") are so different that I cannot accept it.

 

[Glenn]

I just want to reply to one thing, then I'm done.

All you have done is wondering what a "sun book" could be, whether ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq were mythical creatures rather than actual lions, or whether a chalkboard was made of chalk, which is seriously offtopic.

I only wondered what a "sun book" could be because you brought it up. You act as though I came up with it on my own in an attempt to go offtopic.

I didn't wonder about whether ﾅｽ窶塲ｽq were mythical creatures, or whether the word was used to distinguish actual lions from mythical creatures, either. I said it was the old Chinese word for an imaginary creature that was said to be king of the beasts, and then they used the word for actual lions. Then I said that the Japanese used it too, but that they have ﾆ停?ｰﾆ辰ﾆ棚ﾆ停? which is different in connotation, in that it only means the actual animal and has no cultural connotations.

I also didn't wonder whether a chalkboard is made of chalk. I know it isn't. You're twisting my words around here and I don't appreciate it at all.