Japanese language: saying more with less

Posted: June 30, 2009 | Author: Doug | Filed under: Japanese, JLPT | 3 Comments »

This is one of those lessons that I keep rediscovering over the years after I first met my wife, studied in college, and now preparing for the JLPT. It’s a lesson that comes up again and again, but becomes so important.

Having been with my wife now almost 11 years, it’s interesting to see how we speak each other’s languages. My wife has said many times that my Japanese is very wordy, and can be tiring to listen to if I talk to long. Some of this is just part of my personality (I am very chatty), but also some of it is the way I talk very precise in Japanese. Meanwhile, my wife tends to be speak English kind of clipped and a bit vague at times. She’s quite fluent, so it’s not a problem of skill, just how she expresses things.

Why is this so? Because in Japanese language, it’s very, very common to leave words out both in conversation and even in writing. Compare this to English which is a precise language where there is nothing really vague. Everything is clearly stated.

Case in point:

Q: Did you see the baseball game yesterday?

A: No, it rained, so it was canceled.

The textbook translation, speaking from experience in Japanese classes, might be something like:

Q: 昨日、野球の試合を見た？
（きのう、やきゅうのしあいをみた？）

A: いいえ。雨なので試合が中止だった。
（いいえ。あめなのでしあいがちゅうしだった。）

I made this sentence up, but I am fairly certain i did it right. If I made a mistake, please feel free to chime in. Anyways, the point is that this is grammatically correct, but in Japanese, this dialogue might be further reduced:

Q: 昨日の試合を見た？
（きのうのしあいをみた？）

A:　雨なので。
（あめなので）

Here, the dialogue is saying the same thing, but certain details have been left out, especially the second sentence, because it’s all implied. It rained, so of course it would be canceled. Sometimes, I heard/read sentences ending in ので, but I didn’t realize that this was just the same ので (because) I had studied before. It’s just that if it appears at the end of a sentence, the rest is implied.

Another example is when using the conditional と. When you use this in a sentence, it can mean “if, when” and usually implies a logical “if”, not a supposition or suggestion. In other words, a statement of fact.

So, for example, if you want to tell someone that if they don’t sleep, they’ll be tired, you can say (in textbook Japanese):

早く寝ないと明日眠いよ。
（はやくねないとあしたねむいよ。）

But you can effectively drop the second half (after と) and get the sentence: 早く寝ないと。

I know this one from experience too, since my wife will tell this to Baby when it’s time to go to bed. Or, if she is telling Baby to do something “or else”, then she can use the と particle without specifying the consequence. It’s implied after all.

Now, there are many times when you do have to be more specific in Japanese, especially when introducing a new topic, or explaining something not known by the listener previously, but as you engage in conversation with Japanese people, via email or in person, a lot can be implied without saying it, which leads to more efficient communication, and is somewhat related to the Japanese approach to non-verbal communication.

Finding the right balance is a challenge, but once you get the hang of it, you won’t sound so wordy when you speak Japanese, and won’t tire out the listerner, especially if you are married to them.

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