Orthographic Representation and Variation Within the Japanese Writing System Some Corpus-Based Observations
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The Study of Old Documents of Hokkaido and Kuril Ainu
NINJAL International Symposium 2018 Approaches to Endangered Languages in Japan and Northeast Asia, August 6-8 The study of old documents of Hokkaido and Kuril Ainu: Promise and Challenges Tomomi Sato (Hokkaido U) & Anna Bugaeva (TUS/NINJAL) [email protected] [email protected]) Introduction: Ainu • AINU (isolate, North Japan, moribund) • Is the only non-Japonic lang. of Japan. • Major dialect groups : Hokkaido (moribund), Sakhalin (extinct since 1993), Kuril (extinct since the end of XIX). • Was also spoken in Tōhoku till mid XVIII. • Hokkaido Ainu dialects: Southwestern (well documented) Northeastern (less documented) • Is not used in daily conversation since the 1950s. • Ethnical Ainu: 100,000. 2 Fig. 2 Major language families in Northeast Asia (excluding Sinitic) Amuric Mongolic Tungusic Ainuic Koreanic Japonic • Ainu shares only few features with Northeast Asian languages. • Ainu is typologically “more like a morphologically reduced version of a North American language.” (Johanna Nichols p.c.). • This is due to the strongly head-marking character of Ainu (Bugaeva, to appear). Why is it important to study Ainu? • Ainu culture is widely regarded as a direct descendant of the Jōmon culture which was spread in the Japanese archipelago in the Prehistoric time from about 14,000 BC. • Ainu is the only surviving Jōmon language; there had been other Jōmon lgs too: about 300 lgs (Janhunen 2002), cf. 10 lgs (Whitman, p.c.) . • Ainu is likely to be much more typical of what languages were like in Northeast Asia several millennia ago than the picture we would get from Chinese, Japanese or Korean. • Focusing on Ainu can help us understand a period of northeast Asian history when political, cultural and linguistic units were very different to what they have been since the rise of the great historically-attested states of East Asia. -
On Translation a Short Introduction to the Japanese Language Will
On Translation A short introduction to the Japanese language will illustrate the kind of difficulties one encounters in translating Japanese into the European languages, and vice versa. Linguistically, Japanese is an isolated language. It has no relation to Chinese. It must have had some relation to Korean, another isolated language, but the two went into different directions thousands of years ago. Some linguists claim that the Japanese language, along with the Korean, belongs to the Ural-Altaic family, yet the claim remains hypothetical. The Japanese language features some characteristics that would seem most strange to those who are only familiar with the European languages. For example, a grammatical subject is unnecessary in Japanese to construct a grammatically complete sentence. “淋しい” (Sabishii) means (someone is) lonely. It is a complete sentence, but there is no subject. The sentence may mean ‘I’m lonely,’ ‘you are lonely,’ ‘he/she is lonely,’ ‘the rock is lonely,’ ‘all human beings are lonely,’ etc, depending on the context. It may furthermore refer to a vague sense of loneliness which needn’t be specified. It is true that in some European languages, such as Italian, a grammatically complete sentence is possible without a named subject. But the subject can always be determined by the inflection of the verb (and often also by the changes in the articles, adjectives and nouns): “Sono sola,” “Sei solo.” A Japanese sentence may be very long and still be without a subject. Tale of Genji , for instance, might contain a sequence of three long sentences without subjects, yet in each a different subject would be implied. -
Title Classical Japanese in Linguistic and Cross-Cultural Perspective Sub
Title Classical Japanese in linguistic and cross-cultural perspective Sub Title Author De Wolf, Charles Publisher 慶應義塾大学日吉紀要刊行委員会 Publication 2020 year Jtitle 慶應義塾大学日吉紀要. 英語英米文学 (The Keio University Hiyoshi review of English studies). Vol.73, No.2020 (9. ) ,p.69- 87 Abstract Notes Genre Departmental Bulletin Paper URL https://koara.lib.keio.ac.jp/xoonips/modules/xoonips/detail.php?ko ara_id=AN10030060-20200930-0069 慶應義塾大学学術情報リポジトリ(KOARA)に掲載されているコンテンツの著作権は、それぞれの著作者、学会または 出版社/発行者に帰属し、その権利は著作権法によって保護されています。引用にあたっては、著作権法を遵守して ご利用ください。 The copyrights of content available on the KeiO Associated Repository of Academic resources (KOARA) belong to the respective authors, academic societies, or publishers/issuers, and these rights are protected by the Japanese Copyright Act. When quoting the content, please follow the Japanese copyright act. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org) Classical Japanese in Linguistic and Cross-Cultural Perspective1) Charles De Wolf In the preface to his famous A Dictionary of the English Language (1755), Samuel Johnson notes: “When we see men grow old and die at a certain time one after another, from century to century, we laugh at the elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who being able to produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and phrases from mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm his language, and secure it from corruption and decay, that it is in his power to change sublunary nature, or clear the world at once from folly, vanity, and affectation.” I cite this not only to show that, though no modern linguist, Johnson was quite aware that “mutability” applies to human language as well as all else that is “sublunary,” but also to note that, as learned as he was, Johnson knew far less about the history of the English language than anyone with curiosity and access to Wikipedia can learn, in a matter of minutes or at most hours. -
Chinese Script Generation Panel Document
Chinese Script Generation Panel Document Proposal for the Generation Panel for the Chinese Script Label Generation Ruleset for the Root Zone 1. General Information Chinese script is the logograms used in the writing of Chinese and some other Asian languages. They are called Hanzi in Chinese, Kanji in Japanese and Hanja in Korean. Since the Hanzi unification in the Qin dynasty (221-207 B.C.), the most important change in the Chinese Hanzi occurred in the middle of the 20th century when more than two thousand Simplified characters were introduced as official forms in Mainland China. As a result, the Chinese language has two writing systems: Simplified Chinese (SC) and Traditional Chinese (TC). Both systems are expressed using different subsets under the Unicode definition of the same Han script. The two writing systems use SC and TC respectively while sharing a large common “unchanged” Hanzi subset that occupies around 60% in contemporary use. The common “unchanged” Hanzi subset enables a simplified Chinese user to understand texts written in traditional Chinese with little difficulty and vice versa. The Hanzi in SC and TC have the same meaning and the same pronunciation and are typical variants. The Japanese kanji were adopted for recording the Japanese language from the 5th century AD. Chinese words borrowed into Japanese could be written with Chinese characters, while Japanese words could be written using the character for a Chinese word of similar meaning. Finally, in Japanese, all three scripts (kanji, and the hiragana and katakana syllabaries) are used as main scripts. The Chinese script spread to Korea together with Buddhism from the 2nd century BC to the 5th century AD. -
Source-Based Translation and Foreignization: a Japanese Case
Source-Based Translation and Foreignization Source-Based Translation and Foreignization: A Japanese Case Yukari Fukuchi Meldrum Modern Languages and Cultural Studies, University of Alberta Introduction Foreignization, as currently understood in Translation Studies, is a concept that is charged with “more emphasis on the ideological pressure against the target-language culture than on the faithfulness to the original text” (Tamaki, 2005: 239). In other words, it is a conscious operation of bringing a foreign flavor into translations in order to counteract the effects of domestication, claimed by Venuti (1995) to be the cause of invisibility of translation and translators. Tamaki, in her 2005 paper, also cautions that the concept of foreignization should not be confused with a literal method of translation. Literal translation does not involve ideological intentions and is a mere translation method. In this paper, I will attempt to provide a supporting view that source-based translation, often seen in Japanese translation, needs to be understood outside of foreignization in the above sense. Specifically, I will illustrate that Japanese readers, in premodern times, had to gain specific knowledge and adapt to what was required in order to read and interpret texts in a satisfactory manner. This could have been a factor for the source-orientedness of Japanese translations still observed in a certain form today. By examining this background of Japanese text culture, the more source-based translation is shown to be merely a translation carried out by a literal method without any political or ideological intentions. Therefore, the concept of foreignization does not have a place in Japanese translation. -
A Comparative Analysis of the Simplification of Chinese Characters in Japan and China
CONTRASTING APPROACHES TO CHINESE CHARACTER REFORM: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE SIMPLIFICATION OF CHINESE CHARACTERS IN JAPAN AND CHINA A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI‘I AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS IN ASIAN STUDIES AUGUST 2012 By Kei Imafuku Thesis Committee: Alexander Vovin, Chairperson Robert Huey Dina Rudolph Yoshimi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express deep gratitude to Alexander Vovin, Robert Huey, and Dina R. Yoshimi for their Japanese and Chinese expertise and kind encouragement throughout the writing of this thesis. Their guidance, as well as the support of the Center for Japanese Studies, School of Pacific and Asian Studies, and the East-West Center, has been invaluable. i ABSTRACT Due to the complexity and number of Chinese characters used in Chinese and Japanese, some characters were the target of simplification reforms. However, Japanese and Chinese simplifications frequently differed, resulting in the existence of multiple forms of the same character being used in different places. This study investigates the differences between the Japanese and Chinese simplifications and the effects of the simplification techniques implemented by each side. The more conservative Japanese simplifications were achieved by instating simpler historical character variants while the more radical Chinese simplifications were achieved primarily through the use of whole cursive script forms and phonetic simplification techniques. These techniques, however, have been criticized for their detrimental effects on character recognition, semantic and phonetic clarity, and consistency – issues less present with the Japanese approach. By comparing the Japanese and Chinese simplification techniques, this study seeks to determine the characteristics of more effective, less controversial Chinese character simplifications. -
How to Learn Japanese Simon Reynolds How to Learn Japanese
How to Learn Japanese Simon Reynolds How to Learn Japanese Copyright 2007 by Simon Reynolds All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any manner whatsoever—electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any system of storing and retrieving information—without written permission from the publisher, except for brief quotations embodied in reviews. Email: [email protected] Website: http://sprstrikesback.googlepages.com/home Manufactured in the U.K. First Edition: 2007 Book and cover design by Simon Reynolds and Yuka Reynolds Visit our website! How to Learn Japanese Simon Reynolds TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. WHY LEARN JAPANESE? 4 2. LEARNING TO LEARN 5 Where to start Should I learn to read and write Japanese? Approaches to learning 6 Finding a teacher Language schools Language exchange 7 Self-study Self study tips Building vocabulary 8 Learning grammar Listening 9 What did you say? Speaking 10 Confidence Less is more Tips on starting a conversation Get out of jail free 11 Troubleshooting Slang Practice Writing 3. PERFECTING PRONUNCIATION 13 Vowel sounds Intonation Thinking in syllables Small tsu Dots and circles Combined syllables 14 Su Ha and he Common mistakes Homonyms 15 Pronunciation practice 4. WRITING RIGHT 17 Stroke order Learning the kana Flashcards Installing Japanese fonts on your computer Learning Kanji 18 How many kanji do I need? Approaches to learning kanji Component analysis AKA the fast track Using the internet 19 Learning the pronunciations Kanji town 20 Kanji game Buying a kanji dictionary Starting to read Visit our website! How to Learn Japanese Simon Reynolds Audio books 21 More reading on the web Japanese tests JLPT J-test 22 Kanji test 5. -
601D 13Spring Syllabus
Course Syllabus JPN601D First-Year Japanese I Spring 2013 Classes JOSHU section Tu & Th M, W, & F #32315 (green) 8 12:30 - 2:00 ENS 126 1:00 - 2:00 RLM 5.112 #32320 (yellow) 9 12:30 - 2:00 ENS 126 2:00 - 3:00 RLM 6.114 Instructor Office Tel E-mail Office Hours Midori Tanaka WCH 4.114 475-6033 [email protected] TBA Please do not leave voice message on my tel. I. Course Objectives 1) To acquire four skills in the Japanese language: •Listening: Ability to understand simple every day conversation. •Speaking: Ability to handle some survival situations through circumlocutions and repetitions. •Reading: Ability to read simple, short reading materials including semi-authentic materials. •Writing: Ability to write simple sentences learned in class using the appropriate hiragana, katakana, and kanji. 2) To acquire a fundamental knowledge of Japanese grammatical structures. 3) To acquire some knowledge of the Japanese culture. II. Required Course Materials 1) Textbook: "Yookoso! An Invitation to Contemporary Japanese," By Yasu-Hiko Tohsaku, 3rd edition 2) Workbook/Laboratory Manual for Yookoso! An Invitation to Contemporary Japanese, 3rd edition •You should be able to access both textbook and workbook at the PCL reserve desk. 3) Audio CDs: An Invitation to Contemporary Japanese," By Yasu-Hiko Tohsaku, 3rd edition •You can also listen to the CDs through “Real Player.” Log on to http://www.laits.utexas.edu/itsaud/ Password is hamasaki. Call 471-0407 if a different password is requested. • You can also listen to the audios through McGraw-Hill website http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072408154/student_view0/ 4) Handouts including homework assignments etc. -
Sociophonetic Variation at the Intersection of Gender, Region, and Style in Japanese Female Speech
SOCIOPHONETIC VARIATION AT THE INTERSECTION OF GENDER, REGION, AND STYLE IN JAPANESE FEMALE SPEECH A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics By Sakiko Kajino, M.S. Washington, D.C. March 18th, 2014 Copyright 2014 by Sakiko Kajino All Rights Reserved ii SOCIOPHONETIC VARIATION AT THE INTERSECTION OF GENDER, REGION, AND STYLE IN JAPANESE FEMALE SPEECH Sakiko Kajino, M.S. Dissertation Advisors: Natalie Schilling, Ph.D. and Robert J. Podesva, Ph.D. ABSTRACT This dissertation is a sociophonetic study of 46 female Japanese speakers from three major metropolitan regions: Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka. While previous work on Japanese Women's Language assumes a monolithic speech variety, this study shows that women in the three regions exhibit strikingly different speech patterns. Rather than constructing a uniform gender identity, Japanese women produce gendered figures that typify particular geographic regions while negotiating the regional stereotypes. Three phonetic features in 25 dyadic conversation recordings of 46 participants are analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively: breathy voice, acoustic characteristics of voiceless sibilant fricatives /s/ (e.g. sumi ‘charcoal’) and /ɕ/ (e.g. shumi ‘hobby’), and intonational patterns (accented vs. deaccented) of negative polar questions (e.g. amaku nai? ‘isn’t [this] sweet?’). The analyses present the cross-regional patterning as well as intra-regional variation using the mixed-method technique with sociolinguistic variationist analysis, close examination of conversations, and ethnographic approach. The cross-regional analyses, which present big-picture patterns for the three phonetic features, show the following: 1) A feature that is considered to mark gender (i.e. -
Arxiv:1812.01718V1 [Cs.CV] 3 Dec 2018
Deep Learning for Classical Japanese Literature Tarin Clanuwat∗ Mikel Bober-Irizar Center for Open Data in the Humanities Royal Grammar School, Guildford Asanobu Kitamoto Alex Lamb Center for Open Data in the Humanities MILA, Université de Montréal Kazuaki Yamamoto David Ha National Institute of Japanese Literature Google Brain Abstract Much of machine learning research focuses on producing models which perform well on benchmark tasks, in turn improving our understanding of the challenges associated with those tasks. From the perspective of ML researchers, the content of the task itself is largely irrelevant, and thus there have increasingly been calls for benchmark tasks to more heavily focus on problems which are of social or cultural relevance. In this work, we introduce Kuzushiji-MNIST, a dataset which focuses on Kuzushiji (cursive Japanese), as well as two larger, more challenging datasets, Kuzushiji-49 and Kuzushiji-Kanji. Through these datasets, we wish to engage the machine learning community into the world of classical Japanese literature. 1 Introduction Recorded historical documents give us a peek into the past. We are able to glimpse the world before our time; and see its culture, norms, and values to reflect on our own. Japan has very unique historical pathway. Historically, Japan and its culture was relatively isolated from the West, until the Meiji restoration in 1868 where Japanese leaders reformed its education system to modernize its culture. This caused drastic changes in the Japanese language, writing and printing systems. Due to the modernization of Japanese language in this era, cursive Kuzushiji (くずしc) script is no longer taught in the official school curriculum. -
Japanese Major and Minor Revised: 06/2021
Japanese Major and Minor www.DEALL.Pitt.edu/Japanese/Japanese-Major Revised: 06/2021 The Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures offers courses in the language, literature, film, linguistics, and culture of China and Japan; the department offers both a major and a minor in Japanese. A full sequence of courses in the modern standard language of Japan and a variety of offerings, ranging from introductory to specialized, illuminate various facets of Japanese civilization. Students whose interests range broadly across the civilization of East Asia may want to take advantage of the Asian Studies certificate program. The departmental curriculum for the Japanese major is composed of three main categories as follows. Courses designed to develop competence in the four skills of the Japanese language, plus courses for advanced study. Courses taught in English and focused on the mainstream of Japanese culture as reflected in literature, drama, and film. Courses for the advanced study of literature and linguistic analysis. Required courses for the Japanese major Capstone course The Japanese major requires the completion of 54 credits JPNSE 1999 Capstone Project (three credits) must be taken distributed as follows. during the student’s last term as an undergraduate. Language courses Non-departmental course requirements JPNSE 0001 First Year Japanese 1 + Students must complete three courses related to Japan offered JPNSE 0002 First Year Japanese 2 + by other Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences departments. Two JPNSE 0003 Second Year Japanese 1 + of these courses must have at least 50% Japan-related content. JPNSE 0004 Second Year Japanese 2 + The Asian Studies Center at the University Center for JPNSE 1020 Third Year Japanese 1 International Studies (UCIS) maintains a list of Asia-related JPNSE 1021 Third Year Japanese 2 classes, which students may use to identify Japan-related + Note: JPNSE 1061 may replace both JPNSE 0001 and JPNSE 0002; JPNSE 1062 courses. -
Japanese Typing Tutorial (For Mac): コンピュータで日本語
JPN_Typing_Tutorial_Mac.doc Japanese Typing Tutorial (for Mac): コンピュータで日本語 1. Enable Japanese language features 1) In the Microsoft Office 2004 folder on your hard disk, open the Additional Tools folder, and then open the Microsoft Language Register folder. 2) Drag the Microsoft Word icon on top of the Microsoft Language Register utility. 3) In the Select the language to enable for pop-up menu, click Japanese. Note After running the Microsoft Language Register program, you should select the Japanese keyboard layout provided with the Apple OS, or a third-party keyboard layout of your choice. To do so, open System Preferences, click International, and then click the Input Menu tab. 4) In the menu bar at the top of the screen do you see American flag icon or “A” in the black box? Click the icon, and choose [あ] Hiragana. 2. How to Type ひらがな 2.1 Romaji Typing System When you type Japanese, you have to use Romanization because HIRAGANA or KATAKANA is not listed on your keyboard. But the Romanization you are supposed to use for the word processor is not quite the same as the one you learned in class. You have to interpret Romanization as a mere substitution for the written syllables, HIRAGANA. You first have to consider how the word you want to type is written in HIRAGANA and then transcribe each HIRAGANA character into corresponding romaji. After typing in the Romanization, hit ‘Enter’ key (do not hit ‘Space’ key before hitting ‘Enter’ key, that will convert HIRAGNA into Kanji). Hit space key after each word if you want to have a space.