able to use English, German, and Dutch. Most people along the borders of linguistic regions in Japan have long been accomplishing similar linguistic feats. That the Japanese have succeeded in establishing a modern state in the short period of time since the Meiji period illustrates the intelligence of the Japanese. The spread of the common language, too, is perhaps one of its manifestations.
2Occupational Differences
Military jargon
The differences existing within the Japanese language are largely regional and professional. One group famous for possessing a special jargon of its own was the old imperial army. The exclusive nature of armies is something international, and foreign armies also have special languages. A. M. Halpern, an American linguist who was once with the Civil Information and Education Section of the U.S. occupation forces, wrote in the magazine Shis no Kagaku (The Science of Thought)1 for January 1949 about the singularity of American soldiers’ speech. Comparing it with
The Japanese army used military terms formulated by the state, which abhorred words of foreign origin and used Chinese character words or their Japanese translations exclusively. New recruits had a hard time learning how to use terms like henjka (lace boots)* and bukkanj (a drying place).† At the Army Provisions Depot, kyarameru (caramel) was called gunrsei (essence of army food), spu (soup) was nkanj (thick meat and vegetable soup), raisukar (curried rice) was karamiiri shirukake meshi (rice with spicy gravy), and korokke (croquettes) was aburaage nikumanj (fried meatballs).2
Elements that are typical of military jargon can be found not only in vocabulary but also in grammar. The use of the de-arimasu style is, perhaps, most well known. In general, military expressions were conventional and lacked flexibility. The following account by Sakakura Atsuyoshi, a Japanese language scholar, conveys this characteristic very well.
When I was a new conscript we once went on field exercises. I wanted to tell a superior private something about the target: Itch hodo saki ni ikken’ya ga mieru desh? (About one ch beyond you can see a solitary house, can’t you?). But I could not express this in military language, no matter how hard I tried. I knew perfectly well that in military speech itch was yaku hyaku meitoru (about 100 meters), saki ni was zenp (ahead), ikken’ya was dokuritsu kaoku (an independent house). But I could not for the life of me express mieru desh (you can see . . . can’t you?) in de-arimasu style. Miemasu ka (Can you see?) could not be right, of course. Miemash (You see, don’t you?) would not likely be militaryspeech. After thinking of this and that, I finally realized thatexpressions of familiarity, which require another’s sympatheticresponse, simply could not be expressed in military jargon in the first place.3
The peculiarity of military terminology is due to the isolated nature of the military world. Similarly, there are many special terms maintained in Buddhist circles, and in gay society and the gambling world.
Offcial terminology
The following is a quotation from the writings of Japanese novelist Agawa Hiroyuki.
Try and look up in the T
There are many more terms of this type specially used by government offces. For example, what we ordinarily call rintaku (a bicycle taxi) is termed sekkyaku-y keishary (light vehicles for customers), and what we ordinarily call kuzuya (a waste-paper dealer) is called shigen kaish-in (resources recovery man).5
Railroad terms often come under attack, since they are in daily public use.
Fumikiri ichiji teishi.
Crossing temporarily closed—This makes one think: “What, is this crossing closed today?” (But the real meaning of this notice is: “Crossing! Stop for a moment before you proceed!”)
Ishitsubutsu o ssa itashimasu.
We shall search the carriage for lost articles—This makesone think: “Ishitsu? Why, you mean wasure mono (forgotten articles).’’
Ori nori wa ohayaku negaimasu.
Please be quick in getting off and getting on—This makes one think: “Then we’ll have to say yokin no ire dashi (the depositing and withdrawing of accounts), won’t we?”*
Shchakueki ni tchaku no jikoku wa jshichiji sanjippun de arimasu.
The time of arrival at the terminal station is 5:30 P.M.—This makes one think: “It’s enough to say, ‘We’ll arrive in
Kanamori Tokujir
