シンプルな形で音だけを表わすアルファベットと違い、複雑な形で音と意味を表わす漢字は、それぞれの文字が単語のような役割をします。日本では常用漢字だけでも2,136
字が使われており、これを50ある平仮名や50あるカタカナと混ぜて使うのですから、外国人にとってどれほど難しいことでしょうか。
さて、パソコンの漢字変換機能に依存している昨今では、私自身もどのくらい漢字を正しく書けるのか、あまり自信を持てないのが正直なところ。たまには直筆で手紙でも書いて、漢字知識の錆落としをしたほうが良いかもしれません。
写真：台湾の公園にあった標識。現在、漢字は日本、中国、台湾で使用されています。
Difficulty of Kanji
This is what I heard from the Canadian mother and daughter
whom I invited the other day. They have lived in Japan for 9 years in total and
speak very good Japanese, but they have difficulty in reading and writing of Kanji
(Chinese characters). The daughter goes to a regular public elementary school
and she cannot earn good scores on exams because of Kanji in questionnaires. The
mother cannot understand notices from school, either.
Unlike alphabets which indicate pronunciations in simple
shapes, each Kanji works like a word with meanings and pronunciations in complicated
shapes. We have 2,136 Kanji on the national list of common use, and we use them
mixed with 50 Hiragana and 50 Katakana. I can only imagine how difficult this
writing system is for foreign people.
To be honest, however, I am not quite confident in writing
Kanji correctly since I am spoiled with the Kanji conversion system on
computers. Maybe I should use a pen to write a letter with my own hands from
time to time to brush-up on my Kanji knowledge.
Picture: a signage at
a park in Taiwan. Kanji is currently used in Japan, China and Taiwan.
