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Chinese or Japanese: which is easier? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| OneEye Diglot Senior Member Japan Joined 6850 days ago 518 posts - 784 votes  Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, Taiwanese, German, French | Message 57 of 73 22 June 2013 at 7:42pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
Really? I had no idea. You do realize that you came into this thread by saying "Japanese is undoubtedly harder for English speakers," don't you? Did I miss something between then and now? Because you're contradicting yourself now, only hours later. There's one thing I can agree with you on though. This "debate" has not been worth having. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Victor Berrjod Diglot Groupie Norway no.vvb.no/ Joined 5109 days ago 62 posts - 110 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Japanese, Korean, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 58 of 73 22 June 2013 at 11:22pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
When you say Chinese is hard, what do you mean? It's a claim I hear very often, but so far I haven't experienced any hardships that I wouldn't expect in most other languages as well.
Syllables are not entirely unproblematic, but it's no more inaccurate to say that a given Japanese word has a certain amount of syllables than to say that it has a certain amount of morae. When the vowel is elided, you lose a syllable, but the reason you lose the syllable is that you lost the single mora that the syllable consisted of. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Cabaire Senior Member Germany Joined 5599 days ago 725 posts - 1352 votes | Message 59 of 73 22 June 2013 at 11:23pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
This kind of argument one hears for every type of phonotactics in a languages. There are those that sound like la-so-ki-bu-ra-ti (relying heavily on vowels and open syllables) and thos that sound like krikstparkslumpstantr (relying heavily on consonants and closed syllables) When learning the first kind the people are lamentating: "How should I learn all those words! They are far to complex and knotty." When learning the second kind the people are lamentating: "How should I learn all those words! They sound all the same to me. 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| OneEye Diglot Senior Member Japan Joined 6850 days ago 518 posts - 784 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, Taiwanese, German, French | Message 60 of 73 23 June 2013 at 3:10am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
The writing system, for one. The fact that, like I alluded to, you have to learn Classical/Literary Chinese if you really want to get any good at it. Tones. The fact that I recognize some 4000 characters, but still come across new ones on a daily basis and in nearly every document I translate. The large number of monosyllabic words that can be joined together almost at will with other monosyllabic words to form new disyllabic words. But the real challenge for me has been learning how Chinese speakers express concepts in completely different ways than an English speaker would. That, and remembering that if I want to use dry humor or sarcasm, I have to actually announce that I'm joking before anyone laughs, which kind of ruins it, and before I announce it, they might think I'm a jerk or an idiot.
That's not what I'm talking about. In the example I used, 私 (わたし), when the final 'i' is elided there are still 3 morae (wa, ta, sh). 3 morae, 2 syllables. You can't really say that 私 has three syllables, because it sometimes can have only two, depending on the speaker and surrounding sounds. But you can always say it has three morae. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Victor Berrjod Diglot Groupie Norway no.vvb.no/ Joined 5109 days ago 62 posts - 110 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Japanese, Korean, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 61 of 73 23 June 2013 at 10:07am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
I understood what you meant, but I may be wrong about [ɕ] in the coda not being moraic. The way I understand it, "mora" (and "syllable") is a phonological term and not a phonetic one ("diphthong" is another example). Counting morae in the syllable coda of Japanese but not in Irish, as the Wiki article does, is probably a matter of getting it all to make sense in the theory of a particular phonology, as the example of English <cat> illustrates well. The same is also true for syllable, although the definition of syllables is more readily agreed on.
Although I count these as cultural reasons, I agree that the writing system is an obstacle. But I don't agree that you have to be able to read academic literature in order to be any good at a language (although you probably do need to be good at it in order to read academic literature). Depending on how different it is from normal speech, I may even consider it a different language.
I suppose the fewer tones you're used to, the more difficult it will be to learn new ones, so from the standpoint of an English speaker I'll have to agree. Tones are not as important in most languages.
If you work as a translator, then it's no wonder you mentioned academic writing! But yeah, the writing system isn't very practical. I really like the characters for aesthetic and philological reasons, but they are a real obstacle for achieving literacy.
But that goes both ways, since it's also easier for you to make new words. Then again, listening tends to be more difficult than speaking.
I've done that too, but usually I have trouble with things like puns and grammatical jokes (which I'm very fond of in Norwegian and English). At first, I just assumed that they didn't get it because my level is so low that they expect me to make mistakes and having trouble expressing myself sometimes, and indeed they sometimes correct me when I'm joking by using constructions that are technically grammatical, but would never be used in that way (an English example off the top of my head is "he should have been going to have been made CEO", and a Japanese one is "なくなくない"). Even when I explain the joke, no matter what language I do it in, they either still don't get it, or don't understand how something like that could be considered humour. That said, I've been in the opposite situation of not laughing at my Chinese friends' jokes sometimes too. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| OneEye Diglot Senior Member Japan Joined 6850 days ago 518 posts - 784 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, Taiwanese, German, French | Message 62 of 73 23 June 2013 at 10:24am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
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For me, learning a language goes hand in hand with learning the culture. You can't separate the two, and the lack of similar cultural background does make Chinese very difficult.
I disagree that you don't have to read academic writing to be good at a language, but then my standard for "good" is "able to do what any well-educated native speaker could do, and nearly as well." I understand not everyone shares that same idea, and that's OK with me.
No, unfortunately it isn't. You have to be able to do it the way a native speaker would, or a native speaker likely won't understand. Understanding the words is one thing, but being able to do this effectively yourself can be quite difficult. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Victor Berrjod Diglot Groupie Norway no.vvb.no/ Joined 5109 days ago 62 posts - 110 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: Japanese, Korean, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 63 of 73 23 June 2013 at 11:21am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
Although I talk about linguistic and cultural knowledge separately myself, I can respect your perspective. In getting to know a different culture, you'll need to learn things wouldn't be necessary in the culture you're from, so the greater the cultural distance, the more there is to catch up on when compared to the educated standard you revealed in the next paragraph.
Your standards are higher than mine. Your "good" is my "excellent", to put it that way! :) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| OneEye Diglot Senior Member Japan Joined 6850 days ago 518 posts - 784 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, Taiwanese, German, French | Message 64 of 73 23 June 2013 at 12:54pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
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It's mostly just because I don't feel "good" yet myself, so I know "good" must be better than I am now. :) Hopefully I'll feel "good" when I make it to that level.
2 persons have voted this message useful |
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