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Japanese in 1973 vs 2010 | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| aabram Pentaglot Senior Member Estonia Joined 5535 days ago 138 posts - 263 votes  Speaks: Estonian*, English, Spanish, Russian, Finnish Studies: Mandarin, French | Message 1 of 8 26 February 2010 at 12:32pm | IP Logged | ||
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I have small request to Japanese speakers. I've come across one old(ish) Japanese
textbook and I'm using it among other sources in my studies. It features quite large chunks of texts for every chapter and I thought it'd be nice for practicing reading. However, since the book originates from 1973 I'm curious whether the language (usage) has changed enough for me to be alert on some things I might encounter in the text. First text of the book, all three pages of it, can be accessed here: 1st page 2nd page 3rd page I'd be grateful if you take a look and give your opinion about the style. Is it normal, is it outdated? Is there something I need to be vary of? Textbook itself is Учебник японского языка (для продолжающих), част I, Москва 1973. That explains the general tone, which, no doubt, is familiar to those who know Soviet era textbooks. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TixhiiDon Tetraglot Senior Member Japan Joined 5466 days ago 772 posts - 1474 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese, German, Russian Studies: Georgian | Message 2 of 8 26 February 2010 at 2:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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Japanese is not my native language but I couldn't see anything, on the first page at
least, that struck me as outdated or unfamiliar. On the other hand, it doesn't read very naturally. It seems very wooden and lacks the smoothness that good written Japanese has. It's difficult for me to give specific examples (although 立派 is used far too often!) It's just a sense I have. But then again you're not really likely to get beautifully written sentences in a language learning textbook so I'm sure it serves its purpose. What I completely LOVED about it, though, was the tone of socialist propaganda, what with the workers building the big new apartment block and the greatest metro in the world. It's completely fascinating and it makes me want to get a copy of the textbook, although I guess it's not so easy to find. EDIT: There are a few strange things - not necessarily outdated, just not very natural. For example, in conversation people would usually say 道路を渡る, not 道路を 横断する. Similarly, 自動車 is not really used in conversation. Instead you would say 車, even in polite conversation with strangers. Also, I have never heard the phrase お 伺いします used to mean "Excuse me" or "I have a question" as it is here. Maybe お伺い したいのですが, but even that is rather stilted except in business transactions. Edited by TixhiiDon on 26 February 2010 at 2:37pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| aabram Pentaglot Senior Member Estonia Joined 5535 days ago 138 posts - 263 votes Speaks: Estonian*, English, Spanish, Russian, Finnish Studies: Mandarin, French | Message 3 of 8 04 March 2010 at 4:40pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for looking into it. I'll bear your warnings in mind. I'll be scanning more so if
you're interested, I could make a PDF out of them and share. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Sayumi Groupie Japan Joined 5420 days ago 51 posts - 75 votes Speaks: Japanese | Message 4 of 8 04 March 2010 at 6:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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That'd be great. Edited by Sayumi on 04 March 2010 at 6:31pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kounotori Triglot Senior Member Finland Joined 5346 days ago 136 posts - 264 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English, Russian Studies: Mandarin | Message 5 of 8 13 April 2010 at 11:57am | IP Logged | ||
Aabram, minne hävisit? But yeah, a PDF would be awesome. And I agree that from what I can see, the Japanese in the book isn't outdated, but just run-of-the-mill textbook Japanese, which is only supposed to illustrate grammatical points. Not smooth text, but serves its purpose. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| aabram Pentaglot Senior Member Estonia Joined 5535 days ago 138 posts - 263 votes Speaks: Estonian*, English, Spanish, Russian, Finnish Studies: Mandarin, French | Message 6 of 8 13 April 2010 at 1:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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Tässä ollaan, tässä ollaan.
Thanks for reminding me, I've been postponing it since it's quite a bit of work. Perhaps this weekend I'll have enough time for it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6013 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 7 of 8 13 April 2010 at 2:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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The difference between natural Japanese in 1970 and 2010 will not be that great, but the difference in textbook Japanese will be massive. For a long time, grammar was looked at in a structuralist way, where the rules were all rigid and independent of meaning. This is why it TixhiiDon describes it as "wooden". Modern thinking on language has been influenced by Transformational Grammar and Systemic Functional Grammar, which focus on the meaning that grammatical features add to a sentence, and where the meaning of a single grammatical feature can be changed drastically by what follows (for example, "Sit down" and "Take a seat" both use the imperative mood, but the latter is more polite, more cooperative, almost an offer rather than a command).
This is why phrases like the much ridiculed "the pen of my aunt" aren't seen as often in modern textbooks -- the authors are trying to mimic natural language more closely, rather than producing artificial sentences that serve to demonstrate structure without giving a solid sense of meaning. (They're mostly still pretty wide of the mark, but there has been a steady improvement over the years.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Monox D. I-Fly Senior Member Indonesia monoxdifly.iopc.us Joined 5137 days ago 762 posts - 664 votes Speaks: Indonesian* | Message 8 of 8 13 February 2018 at 3:05pm | IP Logged | ||
How are they read and what do they mean? 1 person has voted this message useful |
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