The Dawn of the Chinese Language System
When about to embark on the study of a foreign language, the student’s first thought is often to provide himself with two aids: a dictionary and a grammar book. The Chinese have found no difficulty in producing the first. As regards the latter, the Chinese have never devised any specific rules that establish the syntax of a language, obviously because such rules have never been needed. However, several attempts have been made by foreigners to deduce a grammatical system which should prove as rigid and binding as those of western languages. Other Chinese Translation groups have gone to the opposite extreme and maintained that Chinese has no grammar at all. There is quite a bit of truth to this. The only thing that matters is the ability to decode Chinese in terms of word order, or syntax.
The Chinese and Japanese symbols bear some resemblance only at first glance. As Japanese and Chinese characters maintain their fundamental meanings, one can easily detect the contrast in grammar and pronunciation. Evidently, a simple Chinese text may be of little difficulty to be understood by a Japanese English Translation company, but the idea of receiving a correct translation of it seems to be highly inconceivable. Bearing in mind the proximity of the Japanese, Korean and Chinese islands, the similarities among their languages are obvious and quite reasonable. Thus in the era of Christ spoken discourse between Korean and Japanese inhabitants would have been impossible had it not been for professional interpreters According to some linguists the two languages are placed in the Altaic language family, while others consider them to be language isolates. This is how historians view the sequence of events: the Koreans were the first foreign nation to establish a contact with the Japanese. The Japanese reluctantly endeavored to adapt the Korean alphabet so that it could fit the scheme of their own language. No matter whether the Chinese and Japanese characters exhibit quite a number of similar features, the two languages are separated by a strong dissimilarity although Chinese literature was assimilated and calligraphy adopted in the Japanese language.
It is an enigma where the Korean people originates from. Unlike the Uralic language of Japan, the Korean language, belonging to the so-called Turanian group of languages, had neither a literary nor an ethical message to deliver. Logically, its writing did not draw any attention. Modern Korean is written with spaces between words. Traditionally it was written in columns but is now written in rows. Historians believe that Koreans invented their own alphabet, which makes Korean Translation particularly difficult since it is an entirely unique language with a unique alphabet. Most of traditional Korean literature is written in primarily Chinese characters, but its literary values cannot be compared to those of Japan and China. It is true that most written Korean documents are thought to have their roots in China. However, over time, and since the beginning of the twentieth century, documents and texts have gradually evolved to be written in the Korean alphabet. Furthermore, the modern Korean writing tradition places the Korean alphabet first when producing a text. Translation of these texts into other languages has become a major business throughout Korea and elsewhere around the world.
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