Origin
Effects: Chinese versus Japanese Part 1
“Migration has involved people taking their heritage languages to new locales and developing repertoires that were not traditionally part of their community” (Canagarajah, 2). A narrative written by a fellow classmate, Alan, intentionally highlights the similarities between two languages believed to be originated from the same “ancestor”, Chinese and Japanese. Alan’s narrative consists of him telling an experience about a trip to Japan with his mother and several of her colleagues. He describes his experience as being “short but pleasant” as he emphasizes how Japanese have similar characters as Chinese throughout his narrative literary. Alan illustrates several incidents in which he inaccurately infers the interpretation of several of the Japanese characters based on their similarity in the Chinese language, his native language. Although the two languages share similar characters, the connotation of those characters have shown to differ in each culture. However, as pointed out by Alan, their denotation may still be similar: “汤” which is soup in Chinese and hot water in Japanese. As mentioned above, the two languages are believe to share a common ancestor. According to Alan, “early historical vestiges show that several races in East Asia had the same ancestor but then they moved far away from each other, so ancient Chinese characters evolved separately in China, Japan and Korea.” Which led me to ponder if Chinese and Japanese similar origin affects the identities of those who speak the languages now. Will their identities be similar or contrast? What are the significant components that a native speaker of Japanese or Chinese may identify with? In a reading by Bronwyn T. Williams, he expressed how “scholars are finding that many students tend to adopt… narrative structures. To adopt a particular structure, then, requires that students adopt a particular identity within that narrative.” As students write a narrative literary (Alan’s trip to Japan), they unintentionally reveal secret characteristics about themselves that can help construct how they identify themselves. Within my academic paper I shall try to convey the answers to the questions by thoroughly analyzing Alan’s narrative about his trip to Japan and through the usage, and application, of Canagarajah’s and Williams’ reading by introducing a term in Canagarajah’s reading that reveals the two languages deviating from social norms, identifying Alan’s identity in his narrative literary, identifying the Japanese employees in a store similar to CVS and by highlighting a factor that plays an important role in the identities of individuals.
In the beginning of Canagrajah’s introduction, he provides the reader with a unique term that is commonly being portrayed in the literacy world, monolingual orientation. Monolingual orientation, as defined by Canagarajah, is the belief, or mentality, that languages have their own unique styles and should not be mixed with the styles of other languages for communication purposes (1). Canagarajah further explains how monolingual orientation plays a strong role in both social and educational institutions and how the two has shown to establish monolingual orientation as the “norm” (1). However, after reviewing the definition behind monolingual orientation, the incredible thing about the two languages (Chinese and Japanese) is that they are anomalous to the monolingual mindset. In other words, they deviate from the notion of communicating in one specific language at a time. It is true that the two languages share their own unique style, but their styles also crosses over at times- characters- and thus accidentally breaks the monolingual orientation that is believed to be associated with society. To explain further, because of their similarities due to t their ancestral origin of deriving from the same “old” language, they deviate from the monolingual orientation while sharing similar characters that may or may not have similar meanings. Time and distance has a played a tremendous role in the evolution and distinctions of the two current languages of Chinese and Japanese (Alan). The migration, and development, of the “old” language also allowed the natives of both speakers to develop a language that helps to define their self-identity as nation and as an individual. As a result, I question whether or not their origin affects their identities as native speakers.
The description of Alan’s trip is told from his perspective as a foreigner in another country. As a Chinese speaker in Japan, Alan had some difficulty communicating with locales and reading signs in Japanese. At the beginning of his trip, Alan originally thought that he wouldn’t have difficulty translating the Japanese signs in his hotel, but after encountering his first dilemma, his paradigm about their similarities began to slowly alter. Alan expresses his confusion about the two gender rooms for the onsens (hot springs) because when translating the Japanese characters in Chinese, the rooms will be referred to as “Male soup” and “Female Soup”. That situation started the plummet of Alan’s confidence in his knowledge of the Chinese language when it came to him attempting to translate the characters of Japanese. As his trip progress, you could see by the words that Alan uses, that he reveals his dwindling confidence in his ability to comprehend the Japanese signs, such as his fear of entering the wrong hot spring room when he believed that someone switched the signs of the room. He reveals several more scenarios when a reader can see his feelings as he undergoes a new experience and/or encounter. Alan’s, as a Chinese speaker, identity has shown to be confident in his Chinese speaking skills. However, being a foreigner in another country with a similar language as his native language, has caused his confidence (including the certainty of him being able to comprehend Japanese characters using his Chinese characters knowledge) to descend until the point of him becoming embarrassed of doing something wrong...
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“Migration has involved people taking their heritage languages to new locales and developing repertoires that were not traditionally part of their community” (Canagarajah, 2). A narrative written by a fellow classmate, Alan, intentionally highlights the similarities between two languages believed to be originated from the same “ancestor”, Chinese and Japanese. Alan’s narrative consists of him telling an experience about a trip to Japan with his mother and several of her colleagues. He describes his experience as being “short but pleasant” as he emphasizes how Japanese have similar characters as Chinese throughout his narrative literary. Alan illustrates several incidents in which he inaccurately infers the interpretation of several of the Japanese characters based on their similarity in the Chinese language, his native language. Although the two languages share similar characters, the connotation of those characters have shown to differ in each culture. However, as pointed out by Alan, their denotation may still be similar: “汤” which is soup in Chinese and hot water in Japanese. As mentioned above, the two languages are believe to share a common ancestor. According to Alan, “early historical vestiges show that several races in East Asia had the same ancestor but then they moved far away from each other, so ancient Chinese characters evolved separately in China, Japan and Korea.” Which led me to ponder if Chinese and Japanese similar origin affects the identities of those who speak the languages now. Will their identities be similar or contrast? What are the significant components that a native speaker of Japanese or Chinese may identify with? In a reading by Bronwyn T. Williams, he expressed how “scholars are finding that many students tend to adopt… narrative structures. To adopt a particular structure, then, requires that students adopt a particular identity within that narrative.” As students write a narrative literary (Alan’s trip to Japan), they unintentionally reveal secret characteristics about themselves that can help construct how they identify themselves. Within my academic paper I shall try to convey the answers to the questions by thoroughly analyzing Alan’s narrative about his trip to Japan and through the usage, and application, of Canagarajah’s and Williams’ reading by introducing a term in Canagarajah’s reading that reveals the two languages deviating from social norms, identifying Alan’s identity in his narrative literary, identifying the Japanese employees in a store similar to CVS and by highlighting a factor that plays an important role in the identities of individuals.
In the beginning of Canagrajah’s introduction, he provides the reader with a unique term that is commonly being portrayed in the literacy world, monolingual orientation. Monolingual orientation, as defined by Canagarajah, is the belief, or mentality, that languages have their own unique styles and should not be mixed with the styles of other languages for communication purposes (1). Canagarajah further explains how monolingual orientation plays a strong role in both social and educational institutions and how the two has shown to establish monolingual orientation as the “norm” (1). However, after reviewing the definition behind monolingual orientation, the incredible thing about the two languages (Chinese and Japanese) is that they are anomalous to the monolingual mindset. In other words, they deviate from the notion of communicating in one specific language at a time. It is true that the two languages share their own unique style, but their styles also crosses over at times- characters- and thus accidentally breaks the monolingual orientation that is believed to be associated with society. To explain further, because of their similarities due to t their ancestral origin of deriving from the same “old” language, they deviate from the monolingual orientation while sharing similar characters that may or may not have similar meanings. Time and distance has a played a tremendous role in the evolution and distinctions of the two current languages of Chinese and Japanese (Alan). The migration, and development, of the “old” language also allowed the natives of both speakers to develop a language that helps to define their self-identity as nation and as an individual. As a result, I question whether or not their origin affects their identities as native speakers.
The description of Alan’s trip is told from his perspective as a foreigner in another country. As a Chinese speaker in Japan, Alan had some difficulty communicating with locales and reading signs in Japanese. At the beginning of his trip, Alan originally thought that he wouldn’t have difficulty translating the Japanese signs in his hotel, but after encountering his first dilemma, his paradigm about their similarities began to slowly alter. Alan expresses his confusion about the two gender rooms for the onsens (hot springs) because when translating the Japanese characters in Chinese, the rooms will be referred to as “Male soup” and “Female Soup”. That situation started the plummet of Alan’s confidence in his knowledge of the Chinese language when it came to him attempting to translate the characters of Japanese. As his trip progress, you could see by the words that Alan uses, that he reveals his dwindling confidence in his ability to comprehend the Japanese signs, such as his fear of entering the wrong hot spring room when he believed that someone switched the signs of the room. He reveals several more scenarios when a reader can see his feelings as he undergoes a new experience and/or encounter. Alan’s, as a Chinese speaker, identity has shown to be confident in his Chinese speaking skills. However, being a foreigner in another country with a similar language as his native language, has caused his confidence (including the certainty of him being able to comprehend Japanese characters using his Chinese characters knowledge) to descend until the point of him becoming embarrassed of doing something wrong...
Want more!?! CLICK HERE!!!!