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The Japanese Language in the Eyes of Postwar Japan—A Review Article

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

John J. Chew Jr
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Abstract

Japan's Modern Myth is a scathing attack on those Japanese academics who shape current attitudes toward the Japanese language. They are portrayed as ignorant of linguistic science and as incapable of producing a sound comparison of Japanese with other languages. The book also attacks the Japanese media and the Japanese government for propagating the unscientific, racist theories of these academics. The belief that Japanese is too difficult for foreigners to master and its obverse, that Japanese must pay a heavy psychological price to master a foreign language, are only the most serious of the various notions attacked in Japan's Modern Myth.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 43 , Issue 3 , May 1984 , pp. 475 - 480
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1984

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References

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