Thursday, May 11, 2006

Japanese' English

Recently I'm reading some books and one of them about English. The auther is Japanese woman but she seems to live abroad.

Ah, I forgot the title but it's about the difference of the way of thinking between Japanese and English. By comparing the reports which are written by Japanese college student and the student who uses English as mother tongue, she points out the week point of Japanese' English. She doen't remark about the grammar but that stlye. (I suppose it's better to show the examples written in the book but I already return that. So I can't do now.) Well, the conclusion is if you write, about a certain topic which is given in the exam or disccussion), objective or subjective. Japanese' is subjective and English speaker's is objective. Reading those examples, I found the difference easily. For me, I'm Japanese, Japanese student's one is easy (in grammer) to read. And I also felt it "sounds" similar to mine and got tired of reading because of that point.

Most Japanese students, of course though the students are not only Enflish learner in Japan, use "I" a lot. They tend to start from "I". She mentions it's cause of Japan education and Japanese language. We all Japanese learned the writing way that we write and express our own feelings or experienses; for example, about the books we read (during summer or winter break), school events, and so on. And more, Japanese sentense doen't require having subject necessarily. So Japanese students get used to write objective.

And about the style of reports. When English speaker read Japanese' English, they don't seem to understand what the conclusion is in that. I can't explain well...but the theory applys to mine, too. Japanese' English is like a spiral. I mean, like "agree→but→even though→agree"... But English speaker's is directly.

Hmm, I got tired thinking about those, haha. I'm really Japanese. What do I want to say...? Hm, just telling the reason why Japanese' Engilsh sounds childish.

6 Comments:

Anonymous Duriyan said...

Hi, I read your blog about study english. Good blog.

my nick name is Duriyan from Malaysia. I want to make you my friend. We can read every friend blog and read story about you all. Please add me to your blog rolls. My blog URL:

http://duriyan.blogspot.com/

Name: Duriyan's Life Blog

Nice to meet you friends!

8:31 PM  
Anonymous 羽之助 said...

This actually describes a common complaint about one of the Japanese people I know's writing. Everyone complains that she never concludes and goes around in circles, always adding a "...but on the other hand" to her own argument.

To wit: Japanese writing is great in Japanese, and sucks when trying to say the same things in English.

Sigh ... it's too much trouble to maintain my Japanese blog now ... (涙)

12:05 AM  
Blogger S.S.Y. said...

This post has been removed by a blog administrator.

11:52 PM  
Blogger S.S.Y. said...

This is a very interesting topic. Yeah English and Japanese are very diferent. I think Japanese language is very fuzzy in any ways. Have you ever heard the word "Sasshi no nihongo"? (which is 察しの日本語)It's baically...Japanese you gotta guess! haha. We don't express our thinkings or feelings directly to other and it's considerd as polite in Japanese culture. It's good sometimes but not all the time. It sounds or seems very fuzzy to foreigners. We Japanese don't have problems with this that much but foreigners do. My friends once said to me "I really don't get what Japanese are really thinking!". hehe. So I think Japanese people are used to this fuzzy expressions ...and when they start learning other language, let's say English, they just transpose 'Japanese words' they have in their mind to 'English words'. So basically their expression way is the same as they do in Japanese.
In my opinion, i think we language learners just have to accept as these languages are.

11:56 PM  
Blogger AUKY said...

To duriyan,
Nice to meet you. From Malaysia,wonderful!

To 羽之助,
Ah,you haven't added Japanese translation lately,haha.I thought your idea,to translate from English to Japanese, is very nice.Come back,haha.

To s.s.y.,
"just have to accept as these languages are"
I like your this word. I forgot such important thing.Yeah,I'll remember that.

4:59 PM  
Anonymous Iwate Buddy said...

Hi Auky!
I finally got around to checking your blog again! This is an interesting story you told. I think it's funny how many of my Japanese students start their story with, "I went to Tokyo with my family." and after that they continue everything with "I". For example, "I ate ramen. Then I went to . . . " So I ask, "Who did you eat with?" "My family, of course!" Well say so! Say, "WE ate ramen!" And so it goes!

Keep on writing!

2:18 PM  

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