See The Changing Trend Of Japanese Language

Japanese languageseems to be the craze amongst those who want to learn one foreign language. However, mastering Japanese is no cakewalk. While this foreign language does usually retain its roots in grammatical patterns for the most part, colloquial expressions, descriptors and intensifiers can sometimes change in meaning or even gain an opposite meaning.Recently, I got a chance to speak to one of my friends from the JNU who has just completed her degree in Japanese. We discussed about the Japanese language and how it is changing, or in her words “becoming strange”. Her reasoning for as to why Japanese is becoming strange is “because of young people”. The first thing she referenced was the tendency of younger women to exclaim “kawaii!” (cute) in regards to just about anything. My friend’s issue appears not to be necessarily with the word itself or its meaning but the fact that it is stated about not just cute things, but about normal things (in her opinion) as well. The word gets a less intense meaning from its overuse while simultaneously becoming a necessary part of conversations in this subculture of young Japanese women. In fact, in many situations their conversations will stop dead in their tracks if you were to tell these girls to try to eliminate the word “kawaii” from their speech.

For those studying Japanese, you probably already know the word “ぜんぜん” (zenzen). It is a word that basically means “not at all”. Up until fairly recently, this word was always used in regards to something negative, i.e. “ぜんぜんできない” (I can’t do it at all.) However, now the word seems to be lending itself to simply being an intensifier of meaning, be it positive or negative: i.e. “ぜんぜんできる” (I can totally do it.)In all actuality, my friend is correct in her assertion that Japanese is in fact gradually changing because of young people. However, her feeling is that the Japanese that has been established in her mind is “correct Japanese”, while understandable is a fairly common misconception among older generations.

As far as my friend’s Japanese concepts are concerned, I am pretty sure that she is clear with what she is doing and what she wants to do in future. Anyways, if you are looking forward to opt for Japanese language learning in Delhi, you are happily welcome to join our band of foreign language experts.