With the political stability, economic growth and cultural revitalisation of Japan after its unification by Tokugawa Ieyasu, the educational infrastructure also grew to meet new literacy demands. Governmental schools endowed by the shogunate (Shōheikō) and by the domains (hankō), which catered to the upper military class of the samurai, focused on classical Chinese studies, particularly the Neo-Confucian canon taught in kanbun, a style of classical Chinese. Given the prestige of Neo-Confucian Chinese learning and of the kanbun writing style, these were taught also in temple schools (terakoya) and private academies (juku) that were open to the lower classes, thus contributing to the spread of this particular type of literacy. However, Chinese learning in these schools often involved memorising rather than reading, both because of educational traditions and socio-ideological factors, and also because of the sheer difficulty of reading kanbun, a de facto foreign language. The present article investigates the contrasting implications of Neo-Confucian learning and of the kanbun writing style for the development of education and literacy in Japanese society: while the prestige of Chinese learning contributed to the demand for and development of educational facilities, its complexity also acted as an obstacle to the development of widespread functional literacy.
Soon after the publication of the CEFR in 2001, the Association of Japanese Language Teachers in Europe (AJE) started a research project on the history of language teaching in Europe, carried out a survey of language policies in various European countries, and presented prospects for learning and teaching Japanese as a foreign language in Europe. The association recognizes the need to share the concepts and achievements of the CEFR.The Japan Foundation (JF), partially influenced by the CEFR, set up the JF Standard for Japanese Language Education in 2010. This standard offers tools that teachers and students can use to plan their teaching/learning through self-assessment of their language ability levels. The JF is also publishing new types of textbooks for Japanese education, emphasizing cross-cultural understanding between peoples.The Japanese Language Proficiency Test was revised in 2010 and is now ability-oriented; it is indirectly influenced by the CEFR.The authors analyzed Japanese education at the University of Ljubljana in relation to the CEFR assessment levels. At the end of their undergraduate study, students reach approximately level B1/B2 of the CEFR, and at the end of the master’s course level C1. There are difficulties in assessing the current Japanese courses using the CEFR framework due to the specific character of Japanese, particularly in relation to the script, politeness and pragmatic strategies, and students’ familiarity with current events in Japan and background knowledge of Japanese society. Nevertheless, the CEFR framework offers concrete ideas and new points of view for planning language courses, even for non-European languages.
Japanese language teaching does not have a very long tradition in Slovenia, yet the teaching of Japanese has significantly developed both in qualitative and in quantitative terms in the past 20 years. This paper presents an overview of past Japanese language courses and of the development of Japanese language instruction in Slovenia at various levels of instruction and in different institutional settings, pointing out changes in learner motivation, increasing accessibility of language learning resources, and the growth and diversification of (present and potential) Japanese language teachers. The paper concludes with some suggestions for further development and for an increased networking among Japanese language teachers and learners.
Reading is one of the bases of second language learning, and it can be most effective when the linguistic difficulty of the text matches the reader's level of language proficiency. The present paper reviews previous research on the readability and simplification of Japanese texts, and presents an analysis of a collection of simplified texts for learners of Japanese as a foreign language. The simplified texts are compared to their original versions to uncover different strategies used to make the texts more accessible to learners. The list of strategies thus obtained can serve as useful guidelines for assessing, selecting, and devising texts for learners of Japanese as a foreign language.Keywords: readability; simplification; Japanese as a foreign language; textbook analysis; reading PovzetekBranje je eno od temeljev učenja drugega ali tujega jezika in je lahko posebej učinkovito, ko jezikovna težavnost besedila ustreza bralčevemu nivoju jezikovnega znanja. Članek nudi pregled dosedanjih raziskav na področju berljivosti in poenostavljanja japonskih besedil ter predstavlja analizo zbirke poenostavljenih besedil za učence japonščine kot tujega jezika. Iz primerjave poenostavljenih besedil z njihovo originalno različico izhaja seznam različnih strategij, ki so jih pisci uporabili, da izboljšajo dostopnost besedil za učence. Seznam teh strategij lahko služi kot iztočnica za ocenjevanje, izbiranje in sestavljanje besedil za učence japonščine kot tujega jezika.
Jerca Vogel Slovenščina -diskurzi, zvrsti in jeziki med identiteto in funkcijo SLOVENŠČINA -DISKURZI, ZVRSTI IN JEZIKI MED IDENTITETO IN FUNKCIJORazmerja med jeziki, jezikovnimi zvrstmi in diskurzi se v slovenskem prostoru v zadnjih desetletjih bistveno spreminjajo. Med družbenimi procesi, ki vplivajo na spreminjanje jezikovne prakse, velja omeniti predvsem na eni strani globalizacijo z zavestjo o večkulturnosti, s katero se ne srečujemo zgolj na makro-oz. medjezikovni ravni, temveč tudi na mikro-oz. znotrajjezikovni ravni, in na drugi strani vedno večjo spremenljivost in fluktualizacijo individualnih in kulturnih življenjskih prostorov in stilov, značilni za t. i. postmoderno družbo. Če se je torej posameznik tradicionalno umeščal v določeno družbeno skupino, ki ga je opredeljevala kot govorca zanjo značilne različice slovenščine, danes sočasno postaja član številnejših in raznovrstnih družbenih (socialnih, starostnih, poklicnih, interesnih, geografskih …) skupin. Z vstopom v vsako od njih v svoj osebni govorni repertoar sprejema nove jezikovne zvrsti, njihove različice in diskurze, ki v določenih vlogah in kontekstih postajajo njegovo identitetno sidro. Spreminjanje in spremenljivost jezikovnega okolja, v katerem različne zvrsti stopajo na področja, ki so bila v skladu s strukturalistično teorijo opredeljena kot prostor knjižnega jezika, ter v katerem se pojavljajo novi diskurzi in nove zvrsti, tako od »tradicionalnih« kot od »novih« družbenih skupin in njihovih govorov zahtevata ponovno vzpostavljanje, potrjevanje ali preurejanje razmerij, od posameznika pa vedno večjo občutljivost za izbiro ustreznega jezika, zvrsti in diskurza v raznovrstnih kontekstih.Marko Stabej v uvodnem prispevku Slovenščina, kontinuum tako ugotavlja, da norma oz. standard pomagata pri odločanju o tem, ali neka komunikacijska pojavnost sodi v množico (zvrst, diskurz, žanr), v katero se glede na sporočevalčev namen želi umestiti. To, ali jo bodo prejemniki vanjo tudi uvrstili, pa je odvisno ne zgolj od formalnih meril, temveč tudi od družbenih razlogov in spremenljivih okoliščin. Če želimo razčlenjevati jezikovni kontinuum, moramo torej upoštevati tako hitro spreminjajoče se jezikovne prakse kot večrazsežnost in večfunkcijskost vsakega govornega dogodka. V razpravah, zbranih v monografski publikaciji, smo zato skušali na novo pretresti razmerja med diskurzi, zvrstmi in jeziki v sodobnem slovenskem jezikovnem prostoru. Razmislek o tem, kako govorci z njihovo izbiro izražajo identiteto in uresničujejo različne funkcije, pa smo umestili na tipična področja osebnega, formalnega in javnega življenja, tako da so razprave razvrščene v pet poglavij: Slovenščina v medijskem prostoru, Slovenščina v znanosti, Slovenščina v šoli, Slovenščina v umetnosti ter Jezik kot izraz kolektivne in osebne identitete. S tem smo skušali jezikovno dogajanje in pojave umestiti v širši okvir, ki bi omogočil izhodišča za razmislek o potrebi po diskurzivni prožnosti ter kritični izbiri jezikov, diskurzov in zvrsti.V pogosto najbolj izpostavljenem prostoru medijev oz. ...
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