Condon globe. (Condon, Gilliam Co., Or.) 189?-1919, 1903-11-05
OUR ALPHABET FOR JAPAN.
Roman Script Is Hereafter to BE Use
In the Mikado's Domain.

Roman Script Is Hereafter to BE Used
iu the Mikado's Domain.
Japan seems TO be about TO take one
Of the most remarkable and not least
important Of all her steps toward har.
monizing herself with the highest civil.
ization Of Europe and America. That
is nothing less than the adoption of
Roman script-our own English alpha
bet-pari passu with. IL not as sub.
stituts for, her own ancient system Of
biography. For the last dozen years
knowledge Of Roman script has been
increasing In Japan among the most
highly educated. But now ii is pro-
posed by the most influential educa.
tonRl organization In the empire TO
make the teaching of our alphabet and
Of our mode Of word formation com.
pulsory and universal in the public
schools. 1t seems probable that the
government will adopt the proposal,
in which case, Of course. all private
schools will have to do the same, with
the result that all the children of ia
pan will presently be learning. not
necessarily the English language. but
at least to write and read their own
language In English fashion.
That will be great thing for Amer
leans and Europeans who want to
learn the Japanese language. II will
make that language little harder to
learn than French or German and will
enable people to learn II in the same
way that they learn the European
tongues. At present the great stun.
bling block in the way of mastering
Japanese is the necessity OF learning
multitude Of different ideographs.
Once japanese words are expressed In
letters like our own the task of learn.
ing will become immeasurably easier
1t will then also be much easier for
the japanese to learn our language,
for Of course our alphabetically form.
ed words seem as strange to them as
their ideographs do to US. Moreover,
1t will cause a change amounting al.
most to transformation In the Japa.
nese mind. or in the linguistic func.
tons of that mind. The Japanese will
for the first time regard words not as
indivisible integers of speech, but as
composite things formed Of letters.
Perhaps we can partly realize the
magnitude of that change by ourselves
trying to regard words as not formed
Of letters, but as indivisible units.
Nor is that all. Dual systems of
languages are denominations. Where
fore it is to be expected that, having
adopted alphabetical script by the side
Of ideography, the japanese will soon
substitute the former for the latter
altogether. 1t will be greatly to their
advantage so to do, and also to our ad.
vantage to have them do 1t. But II
will none the less be an extraordinary
thing. For the mother tongue, in all
| its details, is one of the things to
which men cling most tenaciously.
We need, to convince ourselves Of that,
to recall only the language controver-
sizes In Canada, in Bohemia, in South
Africa, in Malta and elsewhere. not
mentioning the recent clamOr about
the teaching of German in New York
public schools. We may also recall
Bismarck's inexorable opposition to
the introduction Of Roman script into
Germany in place Of the far less legi-
BILE German characters. That the Jap
anese should voluntarily make this
revolutionary change in their national
script indicates their possession of an
exceptionally high ambition to place
themselves abreast of the best civil.
zation of the world-and all this emer-
gence from savage seclusion within
the memory of men not yet grown oldI
New York Tribune.