thisiskyle Wrote:The idea of switching all katakana-fied words with their English replacement is ridiculous. Would you do the same for words borrowed from other languages? イクラ for example comes from Russian (I don't know any Russian, so I have no idea how it would be written but) should they learn the Russian alphabet and use that?

And if they should do it in Japan, why not in English speaking countries as well?
"Hey, you want to to get some 寿司 after work?"
"No thanks. I gotta pick my kid up from 空手 practice."

Edit: I see Jarvik7 specified "latin" but still...I don't see the point.

Nobody was saying they need to be the English replacement. Just latin'ize words that are in katakana right now. Obvious foreign words (from English, basically) can also be further brought closer to their original pronunciation/spelling. Japanese already distinguish obvious borrowed words from the non-obvious.

English speaking countries don't know kanji. All Japanese know romaji.

It may help with pronunciation when they are trying to learn English. In fact it almost certainly would. I hadn't thought of the kana chain thing, so you've got a point there.

As far as correctly pronouncing words borrowed from foreign languages goes, I think it's kind of a bad idea. If you are speaking normally and casually, you want it to flow smoothly. Breaking the flow to include sounds outside of the language you are using just to make sure you pronounce a foreign word accurately in it's native language seems unnecessarily abrasive to the listener.

I was once harangued by my cousin's boyfriend from Mexico because of the way I pronounced tortilla. If I were speaking Spanish, I would try to pronounce it correctly, of course, but if I'm speaking English, I think it sounds off to, in the middle of my otherwise English sentence, throw out a Spanish accent for one word.

Betelgeuzah Wrote:English speaking countries don't know kanji. All Japanese know romaji.

Not quite the same romaji though...but maybe that's your point.

Are you suggesting that they should not write カメラ or kamera, but camera?
And not ピッチャー or pittaa or pitcha- or piccha or any other ways you could romanize it, but with pitcher?

They can write it as camera or kamera. ピッチャー would be pitcher (maybe pitcheri). The vowel at the end is most important imo.

A common standard needs to be found of course, but I don't think that's a huge problem in the end. As far as sounds outside the language are concerned... I think that over time, the "outside" sounds could be fused to be a part of the language. Japanese is a very stiff language and doesn't really bend too well in my opinion, so this would benefit them I think. Either way they are forced to try to learn a whole different way of pronunciation in school.

This is just hypothetical, but I think the language could be made more flexible over time. Of course if they don't see the lack of flexibility and being limited to so few syllables as a flaw then that's fine, but I certainly do, because it limits both what they can say in their own language and how well they can learn other languages.

Quote:It doesn't seem to be an issue with many Europeans or French Canadians.

We (Finns), although are pronunciation is 70% different to English we use English terms all the time. Like the Japanese, we like to put a vowel at the end of every word though, because that does indeed make speech flow better.

thisiskyle Wrote:If you are speaking normally and casually, you want it to flow smoothly. Breaking the flow to include sounds outside of the language you are using just to make sure you pronounce a foreign word accurately in it's native language seems unnecessarily abrasive to the listener.

It doesn't seem to be an issue with many Europeans or French Canadians.

They're mixing words from languages they know.

Betelgeuzah Wrote:They can write it as camera or kamera. ピッチャー would be pitcher (maybe pitcheri). The vowel at the end is most important imo.

This is even more ridiculous than what I originally thought you were suggesting. What's the point of replacing a "wrong" word with a completely new "wrong" word in Latin letters? WTH is pitcheri?

JimmySeal Wrote:

Betelgeuzah Wrote:They can write it as camera or kamera. ピッチャー would be pitcher (maybe pitcheri). The vowel at the end is most important imo.

This is even more ridiculous than what I originally thought you were suggesting. What's the point of replacing a "wrong" word with a completely new "wrong" word in Latin letters? WTH is pitcheri?

It was a bad example I admit. If it doesn't improve anything, it's pointless to change. But do you think that there is no room for improvement? No benefits in making the language more flexible?

Why not write it pitcher and then pronounce it as correctly as you are able? All Japanese are taught English in school from a young age and if accurate pronunciation was applicable to daily speech they might actually remember it.

Yes, that would be better.

Betelgeuzah Wrote:But do you think that there is no room for improvement? No benefits in making the language more flexible?

Any system always has room for improvement, but I think replacing all the loanwords with Latin letters is the wrong way to go about it. Watering down the Japanese language's unique identity by replacing about 1/3 of their text with Latin letters would just be a travesty in my opinion. Like modifying a 500-year-old painting because it has "room for improvement."

The katakana words are already a foreign influence and arabic numbers & latin alphabet are already sprinkled throughout Japanese texts. Someone who overuses foreign words will sound just as bad with katakana pronunciation as with accurate pronunciation. The "defend language purity" ship has sailed long ago.

JimmySeal Wrote:

Betelgeuzah Wrote:But do you think that there is no room for improvement? No benefits in making the language more flexible?

Any system always has room for improvement, but I think replacing all the loanwords with Latin letters is the wrong way to go about it. Watering down the Japanese language's unique identity by replacing about 1/3 of their text with Latin letters would just be a travesty in my opinion. Like modifying a 500-year-old painting because it has "room for improvement."

If 1/3rd of Japanese words are borrowed I don't think replacing them with latin letters would be much worse. They have already done most of the watering down work by themselves.

I don't think any big language has gone to such lengths to implement foreign words into their everyday vocabulary than Japanese have (okay, there's English). In a way that's what makes the language unique. They just absorb words from all over the world with more or less adjustments instead of making up proper Japanese counterparts. The difference between English and Japanese, though, is that English is way more flexible to allow for this to happen without making the words seem so out of place.

JimmySeal Wrote:

Betelgeuzah Wrote:I personally wish that the Japanese would learn to pronounce foreign words better and ditch the katakana bandaid. Some of the words look like they were desperately trying to Japanize a word that doesn't translate into kana at all.

So would you suggest Japanese people write like this?:
先月Europa旅行に行ってItaliaでhikingしてきた。おいしいpastaもいっぱい食べられて、めっちゃrefreshできた。

I can see if they're learning *english* that writing in english is a good idea. Writing english in katakana is going to lead to horribly confused pronunciation.

But if they're at all suggesting anything like that sentences above, that's just retarded. ヨーロッパ is a *japanese* word. Randomly writing that word in another language is just weird. I presume they're only suggesting it when the rest of the sentence is in romaji. Even so, the idea that it will improve communication is bizarre. If you need to communicate with someone who doesn't speak japanese, but speaks english, write the damn sentence in english!

Imho, the "accurate" pronunciation of ハイキング ends in a "gu" sound. Randomly changing languages mid sentence and pronouncing it as it is pronounced in english is like french people who insist on pronouncing french derived english words in french. At best it's misguided (not everyone will understand them), at worst it's horribly pretentious. I know several japanese people who have great english accents. They still pronounce english loan words in japanese as japanese. And if you're going to do that, why do otherwise when writing?

English's habit of not changing the spelling of loan words to match the corrupted pronunciation is not a feature. Japanese is still highly phonetic (even kanji are to a large extent). What is gained by breaking that?

zigmonty Wrote:But if they're at all suggesting anything like that sentences above, that's just retarded. ヨーロッパ is a *japanese* word. Randomly writing that word in another language is just weird.

If europe replaces ヨーロッパ it most definitely becomes a *japanese* word. It is still borrowed, but this time at least more accurate. Of course now it would be weird because "europe" is not a Japanese word, but that doesn't mean it can't be.

Quote:Imho, the "accurate" pronunciation of ハイキング ends in a "gu" sound. Randomly changing languages mid sentence and pronouncing it as it is pronounced in english is like french people who insist on pronouncing french derived english words in french.

Nobody gives a damn about the French. Japanese need to deal with English and this would help them with that, while making their own language more flexible. English can say lolFrench or lolanylanguage because they have the privilege other languages don't have by being The world language.

I agree with zigmonty.

Either completely romanize Japanese or keep it how it is.

I do hate long katakana words though. The ones where they've just been lazy and based iton spelling and consequently end up doubling or tripling the number of syllables, instead of localising it a little as in リモコン、コンビニ etc.

I like the way in chinese they create a lot more unique chinese words rather than just borrowing (eg. 硅谷 guigu=silicon valley), or when they do they base it on pronunciation rather than spelling.

You can't suddenly make an entire population learn a bunch of new sounds by mixing English words in their text. It would just make Japanese even harder for native speakers to learn to read than it already is.

nadiatims Wrote:I agree with zigmonty.

Either completely romanize Japanese or keep it how it is.

The thing is, though, that due to how Japanese works kanji is pretty much a necessity. However, I don't see how having both katakana and romaji around is practical in the least.

Quote:You can't suddenly make an entire population learn a bunch of new sounds by mixing English words in their text. It would just make Japanese even harder for native speakers to learn to read than it already is.

Come on... nobody here is stupid enough to assume that you just flip a switch and the language changes. It's a long process, possibly spanning generations, to make said "English words" become "Japanese words" that are very much similar to their English counterparts. In the end people would learn these sounds during infancy and they'd be integrated into the language as a whole.

Reminds me of this clip, specifically the parts at 1:30 and 3:05. I also find it ridiculous to switch to another language's phonology mid-sentence. I believe the only languages that do this regularly are those whose speakers are predominately bilingual. Japan, in spite of the compulsory English classes, is not a mostly bilingual society, so I see no reason why they would be doing this.

What I find 'ridiculous' is that Japanese switch to "another language's vocabulary" using "borrowed vocabulary-letters" mid-sentence. But that's what they do, and when they have taken it this far already claiming that switching to "another language's phonology/alphabet" on top of it would be ridiculous sounds funny to me. English is a part of their lives whether they want it or not, and the language is already full of English influence.

They could either try to make their language less influenced by foreign languages by making up words of their own or do what they've been doing thus far and take the next step.

Betelgeuzah Wrote:What I find 'ridiculous' is that Japanese switch to "another language's vocabulary" using "borrowed vocabulary-letters" mid-sentence.

No they don't. I suppose you think パン is "another language's vocabulary" too? How many hundred years does it have to be in the language before we can call it a proper japanese word? I suppose anyone who pronounces tsunami with a silent t in english is pronouncing it wrong? What about all those english speakers who can't make the tsu sound without a lot of effort? Or manga or karaoke or karate or... We've corrupted all those words to fit better into natural english pronunciation.

As for them writing loan words in katakana... meh, i think that's got more to do with the lack of spaces than anything. Without kanji in the words to break the sentence up, any sentence composed mostly of loan words and particles would be pretty damn hard to read.

vonPeterhof Wrote:Reminds me of this clip, specifically the parts at 1:30 and 3:05. I also find it ridiculous to switch to another language's phonology mid-sentence.

Yes, that's *exactly* what i meant.

zigmonty Wrote:No they don't. I suppose you think パン is "another language's vocabulary" too? How many hundred years does it have to be in the language before we can call it a proper japanese word?

Look, I put it in quotes for precisely that reason. The fact is that once upon a time, it wasn't a proper Japanese word. Now it is. That's why I find it odd that people keep justifying their stance on the alphabet/pronunciation change as "it doesn't belong to Japanese" or that it sounds ridiculous or whatever. Originally neither did the words that were borrowed. But now they very much do. That's the point. The language changed then, why can't it change now? What may not be a proper Japanese pronunciation today may be proper Japanese pronunciation tomorrow.

Jarvik7 Wrote:The "defend language purity" ship has sailed long ago.

All major languages borrow words and phonological influences from other languages, but can you name one language that writes all of its loanwords in another language's writing system, while still maintaining the original writing system for everything else? Chinese doesn't do it. Russian doesn't do it. Greek doesn't do it. Thai doesn't do it. Korean doesn't do it. Arabic doesn't do it. Et cetera, et cetera. So why should Japanese do it? Katakana distinctly represents word pronunciations within Japanese's systematic and elegant phonological system. Are you really suggesting they should shoehorn foreign pronunciation into their sentences? Why? They'll sound more ridiculous than this lady.

Katakana has been part of the Japanese language for 1000 years. There's nothing unnatural or un-Japanese about it.


English has probably the most inconsistent, confusing, wacky alphabetic spelling of any language on the planet. The notion that trying to stuff that, and all of its sounds and syllables, into the Japanese language could somehow constitute some kind of improvement is completely baffling to me.

JimmySeal Wrote:Are you really suggesting they should shoehorn foreign pronunciation into their sentences? Why?

Like they shoehorn foreign words into their sentences? Like they shoehorn romaji and numerals to their sentences?

What you don't seem to understand is that it's not foreign pronunciation if it becomes a part of the language (and thus DOES NOT sound ridiculous any longer). Just like the shoehorned words that were not originally part of the language became as such.

All the languages you mentioned differ from Japanese in the way that they haven't created a whole new writing system based around writing foreign words in particular. Yet even that system can't accomplish everything and thus romaji is used. Romaji, on the other hand, can do what katakana can and more.

Loan words written in katakana are not "foreign words". They're Japanese words of foreign origin.