On Wed, 13 Aug 1997, Thomas R Jefferys wrote:
Although one point: The English/Navaho
analogy was way off. At least Japanese was derived from Chinese.
No, it wasn't. This is one of the most common myths about the language.
Chinese is a Sino-Tibetan language. Japanese... well, there is a huge
disagreement to what language family Japanese is, but it most certainly
isn't Sino-Tibetan. All of the Sino-Tibetan languages have tonal aspects to
them. That is to say, the change in pitch of the language actually carries
semantic meaning. The Sino-Tibetan languages also have an SVO deep
structure and is highly isolating.
On the other hand, Japanese is not tonal at all. For the most part, it has
a SOV deep structure, and carries a significant inflection. Not only that,
it's also highly sensitive to who you're talking to (differences in pronoun
use and verb formation depending on your social relationship to the
listener). In many ways, it bears more similarity to Turkish and the Altaic
languages.
Japanese did do a lot of lexical borrowing from Chinese, but that is
different. Far different.
Well, I am more of a linguistics expert than you. I took a course. As I
said, this so-called "certainty" is a *myth.*
You mean you took a _WHOLE_ course in linguistics!?! I am truly amazed,
and bow down before your mightiness.
However, as far as i can tell from what chunk of the thread i can see, the
original question was about kanji, and while i'll agree that most of the
language was not derieved from the chinese (although a few things,
including one of the earlier names of japan were) most of the kanja is
quite similar between japanese and chinese.
with the exception of the japanese kanji (kokuji), most kanji are similar,
if not identical, to their japanese counterparts. I even believe the on
reading is often as close to the chinese pronounciation as the japanese
can manage.
Geoff Finger Harvey Mudd
aka Griffon Claremont, CA
LUAG --> -=|=-=|=-=|=-=|=-=|=-=|=-
http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~gfinger New and Improved! :)