Should Japan Abolish Kanji?

[nekojita]

I linked earlier to a page about moving to a kana-only system:
カナモジカイ

If you look at the top, there are three pdfs with different versions - one with this カナモジ , one with mixed hiragana/katakana, one with hiragana only. I think the mixed kana is easiest (although the version with kanji is still easier for me). They have some articles there about their arguments which are interesting to read. They do suggest on one page that you might have to take some care in choosing which words to use*.

But the idea that this would be something like

Super-Elite Europeans are attempting to dumb-down Japanese society.

is incorrect. The society who own the page linked above was founded in 1920 by native speakers (although the main people involved worked or studied abroad; 山下芳太郎 was a diplomat, so that probably had some influence on his views).

It is unlikely that anything will ever happen; these are minority views and if anything modern technology is making it easier for people to use kanji. Now HTML5 has added ruby support, and that is going to make a big difference as well.

*Regarding the homophone issue, this is interesting:
http://www.nhk.or.jp/bunken/summary/kotoba/yougo/pdf/048.pdf

 

[Tott BeBop]

Abolish kanji? Why don't we just overthrow the monarchy and replace it with communists?

 

[Huayra]

well, kanji does make japan more difficult to learn, but it was fun to learn.

 

[user46182]

Wow, 16 pages and into its 8th year.

Has anybody asked for the job to translate all text of pre-Bye-Bye Kanji into post-Bye-Bye Kanji kana? IF that character set is done away with?

I mean, think of the boom in employment for those that could do the job! Serious money there. Universities may have a rush of enrollment in -- what course? Whatever. The thousands upon thousands of books and manuscripts and whatever -- HEH!! LAWS!!! All that stuff would have to be translated into post-Bye-Bye-Kanji kana. And it would have to be done before a few generations down the line we can't find any more people that can read kanji. Wow, what an industry we'd have to play in for a few decades.

And the software that would need rewriting would have you programmers buying new cars really soon.

The economic possibilities boggle the mind.

Might create a cultural blackhole where there are already challenges upon the culture, but who cares? It's the MONEY! What's that tune -- "We're In The Money" or something like that.

Wait, the money. Have to change the currency, right? No nasty kanji on the bills, right? More money to be made. It just keeps getting better and better. From the "Make Money" point of view. Heck, who cares about culture?

 

[jonway]

Kanji is a adopted from the Han Dynasty.
To certain extent, it has historical values. We should respect it.

No, we shouldnt abolish Kanji although I am having a hard learning it too.

 

[ZikCo]

If japanese have no kanji.

That japanese isnt japanese

 

[pauro12]

As much as I wanted it dead by heart, still I won't. What's the sense of knowing something that you wanted yourself to be proud off if it's actually easy to do. Kanji makes Japanese so fun to learn. Knowing hundreds feels like you owe your friends of them not knowing any.

 

[Mark of Zorro]

Does Japanese Really Need Kanji?

In the above thread I made a point about how kanji is ridiculous for names, because just by seeing the kanji, you don't know how to actually read it half the time. People's names get written wrong and read wrong, and its a constant source of unnecessary frustration and embarrassment. I so wish I could post this there, but:

TEPCO apologizes for getting Abe's name wrong during his visit to Fukushima ? Japan Today: Japan News and Discussion

But plant operator TEPCO, which has been lambasted internationally for what critics say is its hapless handling of the catastrophe at Fukushima, used the wrong Chinese character for Abe’s surname.

Not just the idiots at TEPCO, really anyone could have made the mistake, and despite all the hands the suit must have passed though, no one would have noticed. This is not a simple typo. It can't be. If Obama's name was misprinted Oboma, I bet someone would have noticed real fast, and it would be a genuine typo. You don't choose an entirely wrong kanji by accident and it fools a bunch of people. I guarantee the wrong kanji was chosen simply because of the complications created by trying to fit the square peg of Chinese Characters into the round hole that is the Japanese language. And that is why nobody noticed until Abe himself pointed it out.

 

[FrustratedDave]

Your name example is pointless, every language has counterintuitive pronunciations and it does not stop at English. Going off your logic I suppose we should get rid of the Roman alphabet b/c names cause confusion in some cases. I don't know how many times I have heard someone miss pronounce someones's name and have to be corrected the name holder

The fact is that if you understand Kanji you are more than likely to get the reading correct and I don't believe that incorrect readings of a name in Japanese happens more often than in English.

Again your argument pointless.

 

[somerville]

Mark of Zorro,
I have read many of your posts and understand your point. With modification, Japanese possibly may become something like European languages, which you may find easier.
But for people who grow up in places where Kanji is everywhere, using Kanji makes more sense and is not as difficult as it seems.
Kanji provides a lot of clues phonetic spelling system lacks, this may not be the case for you since they are too alien for you. But for me, just looking at a Kanji word, which even I have never seen before, or not even touched similar topics, I can guess the meaning most of the time. I have hardly used dictionary after middle school.
Kanji helps to classify concepts, you know this new word is for a type of fish,that is for some type of plant. It is like object oriented programming language with a good naming system, concepts are more obvious with this seemingly complicated system.
Due to the more systematic construction of words (comparing to sound based only), Kanji is good for well established area where we are not yet familiar with. The same characters used for different area link concepts you don't know with something you know in everyday life, as the 凍土壁 example undrentide gave to you.
English may be easier to read, but what does the new word you just read out mean? If you cannot figure out the new word's meaning, being able to read it out is pointless. I hear native English speakers ask "what is xxxxx" all the time. English is quite the opposite to Kanji, you may read it but you have no idea what it is. Kanji may not be easy (for foreign people) to read out, but since it is for written language, and it lets you know the idea when you see it, that serves its purpose.
Kanji is a tool that has higher initial cost, but over time it is worth the effort. Romanji or kana only saves time at the beginning, over a person's lifetime it is less efficient for people using it a lot. For non native speaker who only occasionally using it, yes, the hours you spent learning Kanji may not get good pay back. However, native speakers don't base their language approach on how fast foreign people can learn it.
That said, your effort trying to improve the language is proper and well appreciated.

Does Japanese Really Need Kanji? | Japan Forum

In the above thread I made a point about how kanji is ridiculous for names, because just by seeing the kanji, you don't know how to actually read it half the time. People's names get written wrong and read wrong, and its a constant source of unnecessary frustration and embarrassment. I so wish I could post this there, but:

TEPCO apologizes for getting Abe's name wrong during his visit to Fukushima ? Japan Today: Japan News and Discussion

Not just the idiots at TEPCO, really anyone could have made the mistake, and despite all the hands the suit must have passed though, no one would have noticed. This is not a simple typo. It can't be. If Obama's name was misprinted Oboma, I bet someone would have noticed real fast, and it would be a genuine typo. You don't choose an entirely wrong kanji by accident and it fools a bunch of people. I guarantee the wrong kanji was chosen simply because of the complications created by trying to fit the square peg of Chinese Characters into the round hole that is the Japanese language. And that is why nobody noticed until Abe himself pointed it out.

 

[somerville]

By the way, there are many techniques to read Kanji when you don't know it. Each person may have his comfortable way.

Of course first you do have to know some simple ones.

Then you can just read the parts you recognize, and since you may often show a little hesitation when you read unkown ones, the listeners (if they use Kanji as most adults do) can rebuild what you read. This is kind of like English, when the first time I mention "elite", I pronounced ee-light, because I tried combining the sound of "E-lection + po-LITE". Then I was told it reads more like "a lit".

Now when you read it out, and you get a wrong pronounciation, the other party mostly knows what you meant because they can analyze the possibilities. Further, they know that you don't really know that concept well, and they may help you to understand it better. Think about this: If you don't know that word well, the other party still knows what you said and also know that you are not very familiar with it. Isn't that a pretty helpful? This is actually helpful for me when I learnt characters and words, because my parents would correct me if they had time, or just forgot it if they were busy.

Another thing is some people can build new Kanji words or use different Kanji with the same/similar sound and you find awnsome. Those people are often literature genius, but might be difficult for you to catch the feeling without understanding Kanji. You lose a lot of fun not knowing Kanji.

For names, if you read a name to another people, you can say XM as in XY and MN. You need to use 3 -5 words at most to clarify every Kanji. That is no more difficult than in English which forces you to repeat every single letter.

 

[Mark of Zorro]

Your name example is pointless, every language has counterintuitive pronunciations and it does not stop at English. Going off your logic I suppose we should get rid of the Roman alphabet b/c names cause confusion in some cases. I don't know how many times I have heard someone miss pronounce someones's name and have to be corrected the name holder

The fact is that if you understand Kanji you are more than likely to get the reading correct and I don't believe that incorrect readings of a name in Japanese happens more often than in English.

Again your argument pointless.

I think you meant to say that arguing with you is pointless?

No, you don't throw out a whole alphabet because of spelling variations. You reform the alphabet and the spellings (reform dude. I don't what part of that word makes your brain hurt). For example, what purpose do the letters C, X and Q serve? None as their pronunciations are all available in S,K, Z and W and combos of them.

You say you see no difference between Sean and Shawn and 隆 and 孝? I believe you really can't. Yes, I believe you!

 

[FrustratedDave]

I think you meant to say that arguing with you is pointless?

I know it is difficult for you, but try not to confuse yourself with anyone else.

No, you don't throw out a whole alphabet because of spelling variations. You reform the alphabet and the spellings (reform dude. I don't what part of that word makes your brain hurt).

It usually only hurts when I read your garbage comments.

But, you are suggesting throwing away all Japanese Kanji characters. So throwing away all the Latin characters in favor of something more practical is certainly needed in the English language and this would also be considered reform, going off your logic. Better start a thread about the how the English language needs a huge overhaul Zorro.

For example, what purpose do the letters C, X and Q serve? None as their pronunciations are all available in S,K, Z and W and combos of them.
You say you see no difference between Sean and Shawn and 隆 and 孝? I believe you really can't. Yes, I believe you!

I didn't say any of that, you just did. Again ,you either purposefully make up things to suit yourself or you really are low end of the IQ scale. But, just to entertain your feeble brain, there are more than just Sean and Shawn in regards to counterintuitive pronunciations and your single example to try and validate your name example in Japanese holds absolute no merit what so ever. Further more, Sean and Shawn are great examples of counterintuitive pronunciations that have become common place and most of society would be able to tell the difference, on the other hand Japanese population will have problem reading pronouncing the names 隆 and 孝 correctly.

I suppose I should not judge, but unfortunately a lot of ALT teachers have a habit of not being able to grasp the Japanese language, present company included.

 

[Mark of Zorro]

your single example to try and validate your name example in Japanese holds absolute no merit what so ever.

Its hard to tell if you just feel some compelling need to be an A-hole or if your memory gets wiped every two weeks. Both maybe? I put six examples in the other thread, as if any one with a grasp of the Japanese language would need even one.

I also posted a link to an article about how TEPCO employees did not even know the right kanji for the PM's name.

on the other hand Japanese population will have problem reading pronouncing the names 隆 and 孝 correctly.

My point exactly. Nobody knows what they are by reading but have to be told what they are.

Better start a thread about the how the English language needs a huge overhaul Zorro.

Excuse me, Mr. I-like-to-call-others-feeble-minded, but we are not talking about entire languages but rather writing systems. Yes I have started threads about reforming the English alphabet, thank you very much. I actually have my own writing system.

But, you are suggesting throwing away all Japanese Kanji characters. So throwing away all the Latin characters in favor of something more practical is certainly needed in the English language and this would also be considered reform,

I do not believe it is necessary to replace the English alphabet, but it would be nice. But if we did it would be a full on replacement and that would be stretching the word "reform". As it is Japanese uses a mix of kanji and kana, and getting rid of kanji would leave the kana (two types), thus it is not a complete replacement, thus use of the word reform is apt. And I am not the only one using the word reform to refer to this.

Anymore nits to pick? Or are you going to keep picking that one?

 

[FinancialWar]

If the word uses non-Joyo kanjis, especially animals and plants, they don't bother use kanji, and furthermore is that the use katakana to for such words, when these words are obviously Japanese vocabulary, e.g., ウナギ、ウサギ、リンゴetc.

They even avoid "difficult" joyo kanjis too, and we get writings like 憂うつ.

 

[nakayama2022]

This issue was raised up I think sometime before in Japan but it never got passed.

Do you think they should keep kanji? Kanji is makes it more difficult to learn Japanese, and hiragana and katagana could be used to write any word. Since Kanji is basically a copy of Chinese and hiragana and katagana are more Japanese unique, I don't see why kanji should be kept.

What do you think?

廃止すべきです。

 

[nakayama2022]

I am Japanese. He is more familiar with Chinese characters than the average Japanese. The average Japanese praises Chinese characters, but that's wrong. There are countless Chinese characters that cannot be read not only by people with disabilities but also by healthy people. In the case of English, you only have to worry about the spelling sequence, but in the case of Japanese, you have to worry about the letters. Kanji causes many problems.

 

[HJain]

They can't, they won't, and they don't have to. Kanji is the heart of their language, and abolishing it is not different than abolishing Roman alphabets from English. Moreover, Kanji is not just a part of the language; they respect it - that's why calligraphy and all.

My wife's parents I am not sure why, but they registered her name in Hiragana and not Kanhi... and she has not yet pardoned them for that.

However, seriously I feel that they should abolish Katakana. Katakana is a severe roadblock to the Japanese to be fluent in English. Actually it's a joke to teach English to the school kids writing it in Katakana

 

[mdchachi]

However, seriously I feel that they should abolish Katakana. Katakana is a severe roadblock to the Japanese to be fluent in English. Actually it's a joke to teach English to the school kids writing it in Katakana

If they did that, they'd simply write those same words in Hiragana which wouldn't solve the problem.

 

[Mikawa Ossan]

It's a joke teaching kids English using katakana because katakana was never intended to be a medium for writing English. It's meant for writing Japanese. Granted, these days it's used mostly for writing words of foreign origin, but even then those words have been incorporated into the Japanese language.

 

[bentenmusume]

However, seriously I feel that they should abolish Katakana. Katakana is a severe roadblock to the Japanese to be fluent in English. Actually it's a joke to teach English to the school kids writing it in Katakana

If they did that, they'd simply write those same words in Hiragana which wouldn't solve the problem.

More to the point, there's no "problem" at all. Loanwords in a language do not exist to help native speakers of that language become fluent in the foreign language from which they were derived -- and honestly it's kind of a bit ethnocentric to suggest this.

Should the English language adopt katakana/hiragana/katakana so that native English speakers become stop reading "karaoke" as "carry-okee", "karate" as "kuh-RAH-tee", etc., and therefore become better at pronouncing Japanese? What about all the countless words borrowed from other languages? Going back to Japanese, how do you propose that the Japanese language represent the countless words that are derived from languages other than English (アルバイト) or coined in Japanese to begin with (パソコン, コンセント, etc.)

If you want to criticize Japanese people's English ability, fine, I suppose -- though again, I would argue it's a lot better than, say, 99% of American/British native English speakers in literally any foreign language -- but the root cause for this would be in the school system and the way in which English is taught (and simply the fact that English and Japanese are two completely unrelated languages meaning that they are hard for speakers of the other language to learn), not simply the fact that loanwords exist and are pronounced using the sounds of the Japanese language.

 

[mdchachi]

More to the point, there's no "problem" at all. Loanwords in a language do not exist to help native speakers of that language become fluent in the foreign language from which they were derived -- and honestly it's kind of a bit ethnocentric to suggest this.

Should the English language adopt katakana/hiragana/katakana so that native English speakers become stop reading "karaoke" as "carry-okee", "karate" as "kuh-RAH-tee", etc., and therefore become better at pronouncing Japanese? What about all the countless words borrowed from other languages? Going back to Japanese, how do you propose that the Japanese language represent the countless words that are derived from languages other than English (アルバイト) or coined in Japanese to begin with (パソコン, コンセント, etc.)

If you want to criticize Japanese people's English ability, fine, I suppose -- though again, I would argue it's a lot better than, say, 99% of American/British native English speakers in literally any foreign language -- but the root cause for this would be in the school system and the way in which English is taught (and simply the fact that English and Japanese are two completely unrelated languages meaning that they are hard for speakers of the other language to learn), not simply the fact that loanwords exist and are pronounced using the sounds of the Japanese language.

The "problem" I was referring to was what EmbJapan mentioned -- that of teaching/learning English in Japan.
I haven't really been exposed to English teaching in Japan but I assume that they use katakana to help them learn English which obviously is not very helpful especially when it comes to pronunciation. As you say -- or infer -- it's not possible for them to adopt loan words using the native pronunciation. And of course we don't do that either. The only other solution would be to prevent adoption and coin new words like they try to do in French.

 

[bentenmusume]

Native Japanese who have a genuine need and desire to learn English figure out a way to do that and succeed in it. I have met many of these people, and their English abilities are better than the Japanese ability of 99% of the native English speakers who try to learn Japanese.

Those who don't, don't. And if a native Japanese has no real need to speak English, why should they even care? Answer: they shouldn't.

Just like native English-speaking Americans who have a genuine desire and motivation to learn a foreign language succeed in doing so, and those who don't give a **** because they can just slack off and use English everywhere and get away with it...don't.

I'm really tired of (and I'm not talking about you or EmpJapan -- just in general) native English-speaking people who want to **** on how Japanese people can't speak English, when the vast majority of English speakers can't be arsed to learn any foreign language to any degree of proficiency.

Why is it incumbent upon Japanese people to master English when the vast majority of non-Japanese-speakers will never come close to anything approaching reasonable proficiency in Japanese?

It's all just ethnocentric bullshit.

 

[bentenmusume]

And if you think that representing English with katakana is meant as an actual medium for teaching English to Japanese natives who genuinely want to learn English and are taking serious classes, sorry, but...you're wrong.

If katakana is used as a pronunciation guide for literal five-year-olds or in a karaoke bar for some random おっさん (not you, Mikawa Ossan ) who is trying to sing Journey's "Separate Ways" or Frank Sinatra's "My Way", you have another thing coming.

Try to get a random American/British five-year-old or 50-year-old businessman to sing a song in Japanese using any representation of Japanese pronunciation, and then maybe we can talk.

Please.

 

[mdchachi]

Why is it incumbent upon Japanese people to master English when the vast majority of non-Japanese-speakers will never come close to anything approaching reasonable proficiency in Japanese?

Because it's the lingua franca of international business. In my current company it's shocking the lack of English capability of some people. Not just vocally but even written. Of course to be fair, these people whose career was spent on the domestic market probably never expected to be thrust into an international company like they were after they purchased an American company. Lucky for them they can get by somewhat with Deepl. Plus the help of others like myself and some of the Japanese who are more bilingual. The good news is this situation helps keep me gainfully employed.