Japanese Customer: Technology is changing Japanese language.

Photo: Looking up Kanji on a Japanese mobile phone

Comment:

The high adoption of mobile phones by Japanese customers is changing how Japanese language is written and conveyed. Mobile phone features in Japan such as email, Internet browsing, GPS, dictionaries, voice record, television viewing, music playback have created a growing dependence that has changed language usage particularly Kanji (Chinese characters) which are used to express ideas, feelings and symbols in Japanese language. A large percentage of Japanese customers have begun to rely on their mobile phone (keitai) when they cannot remember the shape, structure , meaning or pattern of a particular Kanji character. Japanese learners typically memorize up to 10,000 kanji for daily use. The complexity, similarity of characters and the pressures of daily life mean many people simply forget the character. A quick look up on their mobile phone jogs their memory. Kanji will always be taught at schools but the mobile phone seems to be replacing paper and electric dictionaries as the most useful tool to remember these difficult characters.









"According to a survey by the Agency for Cultural Affairs "For young people, kanji is something they type (from the cellphone pad or the personal computer keyboard) rather than write with their hands," said author Tatsuro Dekune. "The ability to write correct kanji may be considered inconsequential someday."







Source: More people are checking kanji on cellphones
by AKIHIKO SHIRAISHI,
ASAHI SHIMBUN
IHT/Asahi: September 17,2007).
http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200709170052.htm


Further reading:


Book -Personal, Portable, Pedestrian: Mobile Phones in Japanese Life

Learn about study in Japan at Study Abroad Japan