Politeness in Japanese

[ysabetwordsmith]

Plenty of people know that Japanese has layered lexicons of grammar and vocabulary that indicate respective rank.  But most textbooks don't teach much beyond the fact that it exists.  This intermediate guide goes into considerably more depth.

Another quirk is that Japanese people consider it rude to say "no" outright.  Here's an article that looks at the nuances of polite refusal in Japan as a Guess Culture. 

Comments

Informative links, thanks.

[pronker]

Dave Barry described the 'no' difficulty in his book, "Dave Barry Does Japan." He and his wife were planning the next leg of their Japanese trip, which needed a train. The hotel's concierge played all around the subject and Mrs. Barry kept hammering away at the plans, while Dave picked up right away that the concierge's answer was "No, there aren't any trains to your destination on Sunday evening."

A quote from the book: "The method (of learning Japanese) recommended by experts is to be born as a Japanese baby and raised by a Japanese family, in Japan. And even then it's not easy."

Re: Informative links, thanks.

[ysabetwordsmith]

LOL yes. When I learn a new language, it's not wide but it's deep, because I create a native speaker in my brain. The Japanese one is not a close match for any of the rest of me, but is nevertheless still in there. This explains the doubletakes I sometimes get from Japanese people when deploying my limited but apt array of cultural responses. Some of them will pull all kinds of shit when they believe they can't get caught, and then if called on it, act like they've been caught with their pants off.

[fayanora]

This is useful to me and my writing, my Ravenstone story has a couple Japanese characters. In fact, in one scene, I deliberately used an archaic umm... Like -San or -Chan, I can't think of the word. Anyway, I used an archaic version because kitsune still have lords and ladies and royalty, even if modern Japan doesn't.

Yay!

[ysabetwordsmith]

That's cool.