A Fragment of the Imagination: Part 1
Friday, October 12th, 2007
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Today we’re going to start with a quiz.
• What is fragment + writing?
• What is word + fragment?
While considering this conundrum, you can read quotations about fragments. I’m hoping these quotes will block the answers from view as you ponder the issue ….
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“[I am] firmly persuaded that every time a man smiles,—but much more so, when he laughs, that it adds something to this Fragment of Life.”
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Need a hint? OK, here you go:
• Fragment + writing: 葉書
• Word + fragment: 言葉
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“Every woman is like a time zone. She is a nocturnal fragment of your journey. She brings you unflaggingly closer to the next night.”
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Does that clear things up, or not yet? Well, here’s an extremely big hint:
• Fragment + writing: 葉書. The yomi is hagaki.
• Word + fragment: 言葉. The yomi is kotoba.
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As I viewed myself in a fragment of looking-glass…, I was so impressed with a sense of vague awe at my appearance … that I was seized with a violent tremor.
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By now you likely know what these compounds mean:
• Fragment + writing: 葉書 (hagaki) means “postcard.”
A fragment of writing is a postcard! Makes perfect sense!
• Word + fragment: 言葉 (kotoba) means “word.”
A fragment of a word is a word. Makes less sense. But here’s something more logical: In addition to meaning “word,” 言葉 means “language” and “speech.” So a word is a fragment of language or speech. Everything is copacetic again, right? Wait, what’s that? I shouldn’t have defined 言 as “word” when it means “to say,” as in 言う (iu)? Yes, I know, but Jack Halpern (author of Kanji Learner’s Dictionary) says the first character in 言葉 means “word.” So just take him at his word!
Perhaps one large area of confusion remains: For the last two weeks, we’ve looked at how 葉 means “leaf.” And yet it means “fragment” here. That feels like a big leap. But perhaps it helps to think of a leaf as a fragment of a tree. Or you can think of 葉 as a fragment of 言葉 (kotoba: word). In any case, we won’t view 言葉 in a fragmented way in today’s blog. Rather, we’ll take 言葉 as a whole, seeing how it shows up as part of other compounds.
The Sound Barrier
As you’ve studied Japanese, have you ever felt as if you’ve hit a wall? Turns out, the Japanese anticipated that feeling! Check out this great term:
言葉の壁 (kotoba no kabe: language barrier) word + wall
If you’ve ever hit that wall, then surely you heard a bunch of words that sounded like nonsense. The next term describes that phenomenon:
訳の分からない言葉 (wake no wakaranai kotoba: meaningless words; words that make no sense)
meaning + to understand (negative) + word
Of course, the words you heard weren’t actually meaningless. It’s just that spoken Japanese often lacks meaning to those of us who hit that “sound barrier.” The incomprehension may stem from the following issue:
言葉付き (kotobatsuki: way of speaking, wording)
word + to adhere, attachI like this breakdown, because 付 has the sense of “glue” here. Syntax is a matter of how one glues words together!
Listening comprehension might be easier if the Japanese used fewer words. Famous as nonverbal communicators, the Japanese have compiled a staggeringly large lexicon. If you have more than fifty thousand kanji, I suppose the next thing to do is to concoct as many combinations as possible. In any case, the Japanese have a term for the number of words one uses:
言葉数 (kotobakazu: number of words; level of talkativeness)
word + number
This term refers to the number of words that an individual tends to use, indicating whether that person is chatty or reticent.
On How to Use 言葉数 in a Sentence …
Words About Words
There’s another reason for the sound barrier that many kanji-philes encounter in Japanese. The more compounds you learn, the more formal your vocabulary becomes. And if you try to use those formal words in conversation, people will snort, giggle, or inform you that your speech is about as natural as Al Gore’s dancing. It’s very confusing to receive kudos for writing “to improve” as 向上する (kōjō suru: to face + up) while being expected to say よくなる (yokunaru: to improve (literally, to become good)). At any rate, all grumbling aside, here are some terms for such distinctions:
書き言葉 (kakikotoba: written language) writing + language
話し言葉 (hanashikotoba: spoken language)
conversation + language
流行言葉 (hayarikotoba: popular expression)
fashionable (1st 2 chars.) + languageThe word for “fashionable” is 流行 (ryūkō: to flow + to go), and yet the yomi for the first half of this four-character compound is hayari, not ryūkō. Strange.
通り言葉 (tōrikotoba: common saying; slang) street + language
The breakdown of 通り here is a toss-up, because 通り can mean both “street” and “to pass.” Slang is a language that passes between insiders, but people also use it in the streets.
歌言葉 (utakotoba: poetic language/wording) song + language
花言葉 (hanakotoba: the language of flowers) flower + words
I thought this might refer to some mythical tongue spoken by flowers after humans have left the scene. But Japanese dictionaries say 花言葉 are the names of flowers that represent certain concepts or qualities. That is, roses stand for love, laurels symbolize glory, and so on.
For Other “Word” Words
with Crazy Specificity …
堅い言葉 (kataikotoba: stiff speech) stiff + language
忌み言葉 (imikotoba: taboo word) to abhor + word
Now that you’ve seen these terms, it’s time for a quiz about words about words.
Posted by Eve Kushner in Kanji Curiosity |
October 13th, 2007 at 9:19 am
[…] Learning new words often takes you down interesting paths. This morning, a post in my feed reader led me to the Japanese word 言葉狩り (kotobagari), which literally means “word hunting” and refers to the censorship of objectionable, “politically incorrect” words. This led to the Wikipedia article (in English and Japanese) on the subject. The English article mentioned that the word 支那 (shina in Japanese and zhina in Chinese), meaning China, as a word that has been subject to kotobagari, and is now only written in katakana, if it all. Wenlin defines 支那 as: […]
October 13th, 2007 at 9:27 am
The above is another pingback, this time from a biog by John Biesnecker, a Chinese-English translator in Shanghai. I left the pingback in, not only because it’s exciting to me that people are linking to Kanji Curiosity, but also because Biesnecker took the discussion of 言葉狩り quite a bit further. Here’s the link:
http://biesnecker.com/archives/2007/10/%e6%94%af%e9%82%a3-and-political-correctness/
October 16th, 2007 at 6:28 am
Thanks, Eve! I love your Kanji Curiosity Posts. Characters are what first drew me to Chinese, and now starting to learn Japanese I’m just continuing the love
Keep up the great work!
October 16th, 2007 at 7:12 am
Thanks so much, John! Wonder how long it’ll take till you start working as a Japanese-English translator, as well!
October 17th, 2007 at 5:01 am
Eve,
I just read some of your articles on kanji for the first time today, and enjoyed them tremendously! Like several of your other readers, a significant part of my motivation for studying Japanese and Chinese came from having fallen in love with the kanji/hanzi. Who can resist the appeal of symbols so rich in associations, and with etymologies displayed (albeit sometimes cryptically) in their visual forms? I especially enjoy the playfulness with which you explore this treasure house.
I still have questions about the analysis of 言葉. Halpern’s unquestionable authority aside (笑), I think as strong a case can be made for “speech” as the primary meaning of 言 as for “word(s)”, and the reading “fragment of speech” is certainly more appealing for 言葉. It is interesting that 言 is read with the kun reading in that word, whereas most compounds use on readings. Does this sway the argument one way or the other? Are there other compounds in which 言 has the kun reading? Is 葉 perhaps a disambiguator tacked on to 言, which perhaps can have both meanings when read by itself as “koto”?
October 17th, 2007 at 7:49 am
I have to say that your name makes me do a doubletake, Tony Horowitz, because I have a cousin named Tony Horwitz!
Thanks for the really nice comment!
Let me skip to the end of your kun-yomi question. Yes, 言 has the kun-yomi koto in several other compounds:
言の葉 (kotonoha: literary word)
一言 (hitokoto: single word)
独り言 (hitorigoto: soliloquy, monologue)
寝言 (negoto: talking in one’s sleep)
言霊 (kotodama: soul or power of language)
作り言 (tsukurigoto: fabrication, lie, fiction)
I’ll be talking about a few of those in upcoming blogs. Anyway, Halpern simply says that when 言 has the yomi of “koto” in compounds, this kanji means “word.”
But you’re right to laugh at any absolute statements when it comes to kanji. Your comment about Halpern makes me realize how strangely doctrinaire I can be about Halpern! I guess when you’re looking for rules to make sense of the chaotic world of kanji, you cling tightly to whatever you find!
Finally, I just don’t know what to say about your disambiguation theory. Sounds good! I’m having a little trouble thinking about it, because I had designated this time to vacuum, and if I don’t do it now, when will I get to it?! So I’m off to vacuum, and if I have any deep insights about all this during that process, I’ll let you know!
October 17th, 2007 at 11:37 am
Eve you said, “Listening comprehension might be easier if the Japanese used fewer words.”
I believe this is an erroneous statement. Japanese people often use the least amout of words possible, sometimes only saying a verb like “行くよ,” which means literaly to go, but in the conversation means, “Okay, I will go [start] now” (often used by teachers to start the class.) This makes “Listening compression difficult because of the LACK of words used sometimes.
Japanese people never like to speak their real feelings, and saying less for them is considered a good thing. They think if they say to much they are imposing their will on others. This is a big factor that plays out in all aspects of Japanese life, especially Language. For this reason, I cannot understand why you would say, Japanese people use so many words?
Just a question here Eve, have you ever actually lived in Japan?
October 17th, 2007 at 12:09 pm
Well, here’s one bit of recent experience to support what I said. Last week I asked a Japanese person how to say “nonverbal communication” in Japanese (because we were talking about that concept). He said, “Oh, you can’t really say something like that in one or two words. You need a whole sentence.”
I think you and I are talking about two separate things. One is the issue of not voicing one’s feelings (which I absolutely agree with you about). The other is the issue of how many words it takes to convey a concept. And sure, it’s not as if Japanese expressions are more verbose 100% of the time.
But … here’s the best proof yet, come to think of it, about what I’m saying. I read once in “The Japanese Language,” a book by Kindaichi (the most famous Japanese linguist) that the Japanese staged a play (I’m pretty sure it was Shakespearean). And they had to cut the plot severely because by the time they had translated everything from English to Japanese, the play would have taken something like 10 hours to perform! It was from Kindaichi, actually, that I first learned about how much wordier Japanese expressions tend to be. As I recall, it was something that bothered him intensely.