Life In 19x19

Uberdude wrote:But I basically agree with Herman, the Japanese terms might put off some but attract others. Which is more I don't know. I avoid using too many with beginners (just "atari" and "ko" later when that comes up) and tend to only use the Japanese ones where there isn't a good concise English alternative (so I say aji, tenuki, sente, gote, sometimes shimari or enclosure, semeai or capturing race, but approach not kakari and never moku), so only a dozen or two (I'm sure there are past posts with lists).

Here is one such list I made when this topic came up before which seemed to find a fair bit of agreement: http://www.lifein19x19.com/forum/viewto ... 86#p189686

gowan wrote:Translations are sometimes amusing. For example, monkey jump for saru suberi. Saru does mean monkey, but jump for suberi is a little odd. Literally suberi is "slide", not exactly a jump. But tobi is also a jump, but saru no tobi isn't used .

Monkey Slide seems to make more sense than Monkey Jump since the move is a slide rather than a jump.
Still, Monkey Jump is more amusing and probably more memorable.

Re: Monkey Jump vs. Monkey Slide

I wonder what other monkeys would think of this—I've always thought of it as being a Monkey Swing, think Tarzan

Stefany93 wrote:

Bill Spight wrote:

tapir wrote:If you want to reach children and pensioners (the two demographics I eye for the spread of Go) using a foreign language is not a good idea.

Oh, I think that children take it in their stride. They are, after all, superb language learners.

True. And it is easier for everyone to say "atari" then "Your stone or group has only one liberty left"

You are all aware the foreign language in the quoted section is English (which is a foreign language for most Europeans) not Japanese? Indeed atari is easier, that is why it persists, together with terms like tesuji, aji, semeai. But there is zero benefit in using "ladder" instead of "Treppe" or "snapback" instead of "Mausefalle" for German speakers (and similarly for other languages), yet this happens with people who learn from the internet exclusively and the OP indeed asks for English terminology for the "EU".

Relying on English very much limits your reach (outside the UK and Ireland) by age, class, education etc.

What makes you think that everyone in the EU has English as their native language? For many people, English terminology is a poor substitution for Japanese terminology and one that only loses the exotic aspects.

Exactly.

But there is zero benefit in using "ladder" instead of "Treppe" or "snapback" instead of "Mausefalle" for German speakers (and similarly for other languages)

Not really true. There are now several hundred books (not to mention websites, vidaos, etc) in English using English terms, compared with a handful in German and even fewer in other languages. Access to this literature seems useful. Go is a useful way to learn English. In my experience young Europeans are now especially keen to learn English, and in my view a far more remarkable and useful transformation than the emergence of AlphaGo has been the way young French people often now speak English willingly and well. When I was studying in France 40 years ago, very few French people would make the slightest effort, and for those who did it was usually mere baragouinage.

There is also the problem that not all foreigners pronounce Oriental terms in the same way. I'm sure some will remember haengma being touted as three syllables. Even within English there is no agreement: byoyomi as buy oh yohmi, along the lines of Kyoto with the first part as in kye which is bafflingly common (baffling mainly because the same people pronounce Tokyo correctly). Then we've got those Americans who insist on putting the Oriental names the wrong way round as (in Kaiho Rin).

So, unlike go or hawkit cows, it is not all black and white.

Nobody has yet said this, so maybe about time.

It is NOT just that there are many languages around. It is also that some of these languages readily accept "loan words" while others do not.

That makes it strange to see this matter raised with regard to English since that language is perfectly "happy" taking into its own words from other languages. To the point that is quickly forgotten by English speakers that these words weren't always English.

Subotai wrote:The [chinese] words might even be easier for people to pronounce than the Japanese.

My experience is that when speaking with Japanese people, "igo" is usually understood immediatly. With Korean people, "baduk" sometimes need two tries and (iirc) is better understood if you frankly pronounce "paduk". With Chinese people, "weiqi" needs many more tries with random intonations and I often had to describe the game for my Chinese interlocutor to understand.

Granted, I don't speak Chinese (neither Korean), but I think it is by far the most difficult to pronounce and get understood for most people. You seem to have the opposite opinion and I'd be interested to learn more.

Japanese syllables all end in vowels, with the exception of the "ん" sound, which is pretty similar to "n" in English.

Because of this fact alone, I think Japanese is the easiest to pronounce between Japanese, Korean, and Chinese.

Not baffling at all (Kyoto vs Tokyo)

English speakers often have trouble with phonemes in some word position but not others. For example, may take some practice to be able to say "tsar" even though they have no trouble at all with "cats" << the "ts" sound often occurs in the middle and at the end of English words but there is no English word that starts with it >>

Languages are like that.

Yes, languages are like that. And some have trickier nuances than others. I don't mean to imply that Japanese pronunciation is 100% easy to get perfect; just that it's easier than Chinese or Korean.

Of the three, Chinese seems trickiest to me. In Korean, double consonants take a bit of time to get, and then understanding pronunciation nuances with various letters following the batchim can be tricky. But I think getting the tones right in Chinese is harder than all that. Admittedly, I have limited experience in Chinese pronunciation, but it seemed tough when I tried.

When I was first learning Japanese, basic pronunciation was never hard at all - grammar was tricky to wrap my head around for awhile.

That being said, if you want to pronounce Japanese like a native speaker, that takes some work. But that's true for all of these languages.

Mike Novack wrote:Nobody has yet said this, so maybe about time.

It is NOT just that there are many languages around. It is also that some of these languages readily accept "loan words" while others do not.

That makes it strange to see this matter raised with regard to English since that language is perfectly "happy" taking into its own words from other languages. To the point that is quickly forgotten by English speakers that these words weren't always English.

Indeed. Anyone who has ever looked at a thesaurus will see that English is full of words that essentially mean the same thing, for example big and large or understand and comprehend. Given the choice, when English has been offered words from different sources, it has often taken both. English likes words. If it is willing to take in a new word when it already has a good one for a particular thing or object ... thought or idea... it should certainly be willing to do so if it doesn't.

Atari is here to stay.

Not baffling at all (Kyoto vs Tokyo)

English speakers often have trouble with phonemes in some word position but not others. For example, may take some practice to be able to say "tsar" even though they have no trouble at all with "cats" << the "ts" sound often occurs in the middle and at the end of English words but there is no English word that starts with

The initial sound in Kyoto exists as an initial sound in words like cute, and ditto for by in byoyomi (cf. beauty) so it probably the spelling that throws people, not the phonemes. AS to Tokyo, I can't readily think of other words with kio in them but there are words like audio and radio. However, there is the example of Ohio that could be followed, especially as its also a placename. But there are two other factors thta should militate towrds pronouncing Kyoto and Tokyo in similar fashion. ONe is that they are both place names often coupled together, and the other is that Kyoto has often been mentioned in news bulletins in connection with the Kyoto Protocol, and there it is almost always pronounved correctly.

We do have aword in 3nglish that begins with ts and I haven't heard anyone have trouble with it - tsunami, now common also as a metaphor. Going back further, I can't recall any English speaking chess players have trouble with Zugzwang but as that is spelt with a zed I can easily imagine some people using the zed for that reason.

It's true that English has borrowed very many words from other languages, but mots of that occurred centuries ago, and asking a new go player to take on board dozens of Japanese terms in one fell swoop with little context or use in wider contexts is a big ask.

Incidentally, Japanese is probably even more receptive to loan words than English. Major sources are chinese, Dutch, German and English, and english words are being added every day. JApanese newspapers have to publish thick tomes every year to explain all the new words they,ve used in the previous year, so they at least find coping with large volumes of new words a challenge.

My own experience is that, roughly, for every new player you attract because of exotic foreign terms, you lose one. For every player willing to take on the burden of new words you lose one who isn't. The upshot is that it doesn't really matter which approach you take to go terms - you end up with the same size population either way, just with different people.