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From: edwards@uwmacc.UUCP (mark edwards)
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: Re: Lookalike Japanese, Mispronunciations
Message-ID: <1862@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 30-Dec-85 09:04:43 EST
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.1862
Posted: Mon Dec 30 09:04:43 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 1-Jan-86 00:58:18 EST
References: <161@aero.ARPA> <926@mmintl.UUCP> <2547@sdcrdcf.UUCP>
Reply-To: edwards@uwmacc.UUCP (mark edwards)
Organization: UWisconsin-Madison Academic Comp Center
Lines: 44
Keywords: Proper Nouns, Idioms

In article <2547@sdcrdcf.UUCP> barryg@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Lee Gold) writes:
>Re "Juki-o oboete iru" deciphered as "I teach at a private academy":
>
>"Teach" is oshiete. Oboeru means to try to learn.
>But the -o marks juku as the object of the verb, as if it were lessons.

   Was this my sentence ? If so it was oshiete iru, not oboete iru.

>	*       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
>I think one reason English speakers deciphered the lookalike sentence while
>the Japanese speaker didn't may relate to our smaller vocabulary to search.

  The english language has more words than Japanese according to a recent
  issue of U. S. News.

>I know that the more Japanese I learn, the harder I find it to translate
>a phrase quoted (frequently imprecisely) by a friend without ideographs.
>
>For instance, I remember when looking at "kanajo" (really "kanojo") the
>possibilities that flitted through my mind included:
>	kana-jo (syllabary-female):  an esoteric word for syllabary signs,
>referring to the fact that during the Heian period women wrote in kana,
>men in ideographs.
>	a misspelling of kanai-jo:  a redundant term for a wife
>	a misspelling of kanai-ju-:  one's whole family
>
>If I knew more Japanese, I could have thought of more things.

  A point understood and well taken. It is difficult to read Japanese
  in romanji, even though it would be much easier to write it that way.

  But I think english has a few of the same problems. In recent leters
  from my japanese girlfriend, she writes, " ... lap presents", or it
  might of been, "... rap presents". Undoubtably she means "wrap". 
  She also makes horrid syntax errors, omits necessary words, but
  I still recover (most of the times) the meaning. 

  Let's try a sample sentence with a badly misspelled word.

   I beered my whole life on this one game.

  Is it understandable ? or have I gone off the deep end .......

  mark.