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Chinese or Japanese: which is easier? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| COF Senior Member United States Joined 5831 days ago 262 posts - 354 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 73 21 April 2012 at 7:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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As far as writing goes, I would say that Chinese is probably a bit easier as it is simply a matter of remembering characters, it's as simple or as difficult as that, depending on how you look at it.
Writing Japanese on the other hand is a rather complex mixture of 2 alphabets (albeit phonetic) and 2000-3000 Kanji. As far as the spoken language goes, the only thing Japanese has on Chinese in terms of simplicity is the lack of tones and easier pronounciation in general, otherwise Chinese grammar is more simple in almost every way. On the whole, which language would you say Western learners have more success with - Japanese or Chinese? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 2 of 73 21 April 2012 at 8:05pm | IP Logged | ||
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Writing Japanese may be more intricate, and the various pronunciations of the same
characters is certainly nerve-racking, but there is no doubt that the extensiveness of Chinese characters make Chinese more difficult. Chinese pronunciation is also much trickier because of the tones, but Japanese also has pitch, which people rarely ever bother studying but can be extremely subtle and complex. When it comes to grammar, I'd say Japanese is certainly much trickier, especially because of its morphology. In short, I have no idea which learners are more successful with, but if a person is to set out to learn Japanese correctly, I'd say Japanese is more complex. Edited by Arekkusu on 21 April 2012 at 9:14pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Superking Diglot Groupie United States polyglutwastaken.blo Joined 6643 days ago 87 posts - 194 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Mandarin | Message 3 of 73 21 April 2012 at 8:53pm | IP Logged | ||
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Both are easier.
I don't know, I find it increasingly hard to answer "which is easier" questions. Japanese writing comes with a syllabary to fall back on if you forget a kanji, so it has a safety net that Chinese doesn't have. The tonality of Chinese is really not as brain-crunchingly hard as people make it out to be... as long as you're willing to unplug from the matrix and accept that the tone of a word can affect its meaning the same way the position of your tongue can, it's not a big deal. Japanese grammar is complex but regular, unlike Spanish's complex and frequently irregular grammar. Chinese grammar is relatively uncomplex which makes picking up the basics very easy, perhaps deceptively so. Chinese pronunciation will probably cause more concern for a native English speaker than Japanese due its several phonemes that would be allophones in English (i.e. pinyin J/Q and ZH/CH). Japanese has doubled consonants and vowels, which we don't have in English and neither does Mandarin Chinese. There are many things about both languages that are either simpler or more complex than both one another and English. The question "which is easier" doesn't have an answer. Now, your last question is valid and has an answer, which I don't know for sure. I know more people who are trying or who have tried to learn Japanese, but I would confidently chalk that up to the aspects of Japanese culture that are so popular in our own -- anime, Japanese RPGs, etc., whereas I can't offhand think of any Chinese pop culture that is big in the West. 8 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Michael K. Senior Member United States Joined 5729 days ago 568 posts - 886 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto | Message 4 of 73 21 April 2012 at 9:00pm | IP Logged | ||
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What if you're speaking with a native, they don't understand a word you say, and you have to write it out?
Would it be easier to write it in kana or pinyin? Is there an equivalent to kana in Chinese? I've heard of bopomofo, but I don't know if it would be similar to kana. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| COF Senior Member United States Joined 5831 days ago 262 posts - 354 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 73 21 April 2012 at 9:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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Any Chinese person who uses a computer will understand Pinyin as that is pretty much the only imput method for Chinese.
Bopomofo was the first ever "alphabet" created for Chinese in 1910, but with the invention of Pinyin, Bopomofo has become pretty much obsolete. So on the whole, I think the most common "alphabet" for Chinese is Pinyin, because any Chinese person who doesn't understand Pinyin probably wouldn't understand Bopomofo either. Edited by COF on 21 April 2012 at 9:33pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| COF Senior Member United States Joined 5831 days ago 262 posts - 354 votes Speaks: English* | Message 6 of 73 21 April 2012 at 9:40pm | IP Logged | ||
Can you expand on why you feel that the initial simplicity of Chinese grammar is deceptive? Edited by COF on 21 April 2012 at 9:42pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| nway Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/Vic Joined 5415 days ago 574 posts - 1707 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean | Message 7 of 73 21 April 2012 at 10:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've never understood why people care to "rank" languages in terms of difficulty.
What purpose does it serve, exactly? Aside from the fact that there are no and will never be any objective ways to answer this question, what difference would it make even if we did know precisely which languages were more difficult than others? Would there be any practical benefit to such a revelation? Would you dedicate your life to another language if it meant you could shave off a few dozen hours of study time? Or perhaps knowing that your language is "objectively harder" provides you with some hollow sense of pride? The fact is that both Mandarin and Japanese have been successfully learned by Westerners. It can and has been done. It's not an elusive phenomenon like Bigfoot or a chupacabra. And until two identical people under identical circumstances learn Mandarin and Japanese while keeping record of every single moment—and the intensity thereof—studying their respective languages, we shall never know which is easier. Japanese has more writing systems, but less characters to memorize. Japanese is easier to pronounce, but it's spoken more quickly. Japanese has less tones, but they're used more subtly. It all balances out in the end. If people have to debate endlessly about which is easier (or "harder", as it's typically framed), the difference between the two clearly isn't significant enough to matter. 9 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| clumsy Octoglot Senior Member Poland lang-8.com/6715Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5178 days ago 1116 posts - 1367 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Japanese, Korean, French, Mandarin, Italian, Vietnamese Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swedish Studies: Danish, Dari, Kirundi | Message 8 of 73 21 April 2012 at 10:23pm | IP Logged | ||
I think they are equally difficult, maybe Japanese will be a little more confusing with the kanji, Chinese ones are more straightworward (one character one reading, unlike kunyomi and onyomi in Japanese, which sometimes have different meanings).
Except for Taiwan, they use bopomofo input. 
but I agree that the most of Chinese may not be familiar with it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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