Japanese honorifics? [CLOSED]

[sciencewarrior]

This has been in the back of my mind since I started writing the script for Love²: Japanese honorifics, the famous "san", "kun", "chan", "sensei", "senpai", et cetera. I've been studying Japanese for almost two years, so adding honorifics was the path of least resistance, but I noticed there were parts where they started to stand out, specially in internal monologues.

What is your opinion on them? Do you feel they add flavor to the story? Do they help you understand the relationship between the characters better? Or do you find them useless at best, maybe even clunky and distracting?

[redeyesblackpanda]

I do enjoy Japanese honorifics. I'm definitely not an expert when it comes to their use, but I've felt the same way as you. It could be because I'm not native. For what it's worth, I'm using honorifics in Eternal Memories, but they aren't used in the thoughts of the main character. (That may not be the best choice, but it's what I'm doing at the moment. )

[ffs_jay]

It's a matter of taste, and I'd ask nobody get offended with what I'm going to say, but I really, really don't like 'em (I'm of course talking about using them in games or fiction, I actually find them one of the more endearing facets of the Japanese language, which is no doubt part of the reason they're so popular. They just sound cute dammit : p).

In an actual game they feel really jarring to me. It's also close to being a sure-fire way to alienate any chance of a casual, non-otaku audience, they'll take one look at it and think 'tsk, bloody weeaboos' or similar (though of course you run that risk doing anything in a VN style at all. Tsk, bloody casuals). The vibe I get from them is that of an overzealous otaku trying to make things as Japanese as possible so it seems more 'authentic' somehow. I wouldn't just apply this to western games, I don't like them in translations either. But then I'm a fan of Woolseyisms, so I would say that.

That said, there's interesting ways to use them. Something like just having the most traditional or formal Japanese characters in your story use them could work to add a little colour. When everyone's using them for everybody else, it gets clunky for me very quickly. There's a reason almost no professional translators use them.

Again, just my personal opinion, not trying to step on any toes. If you think you can make it work, go for it. There's always exceptions to any rule.

EDIT:

I'm using honorifics in Eternal Memories, but they aren't used in the thoughts of the main character.

That's not a bad compromise actually, I like that.

[Greeny]

I've lived in Japan for a while and they weren't even used that much where I lived.

[crGrey]

A matter of taste indeed.
In my case, Japanese honorifics should only be used when appropriate: when the characters themselves are Japanese.
I DO NOT like it when Japanese games/movies/television portrays americans who use the same honorifics as if they were Japanese. This of course bleeds over into when American games/movies/television don't properly interperate any other culture's way of speaking and interaction.
Proper use and direction with the proper individuals.
-crGrey

[sciencewarrior]

Thanks for the replies! A lot of food for thought.

I reviewed my script and cut my honorific count by half. The text definitely flows better, but I'm not ready to give up on all of them. The sweet girl's "kun"s are so... sweet.

[LateWhiteRabbit]

What is your opinion on them? Do you feel they add flavor to the story? Do they help you understand the relationship between the characters better? Or do you find them useless at best, maybe even clunky and distracting?

Clunky and distracting. And I feel that unless your story is set in Japan with Japanese characters there is NEVER any excuse to use them. When writing in English or other languages we have words or speaking habits that do the same thing and convey the same information as honorifics.

There's a reason almost no professional translators use them.

Exactly. Instead of Doe-san, we can say "Mr. Doe". Instead of Doe-kun we can say "Doe" (the lack of the Mr. implies familiarity or the implicit understanding that the speaker is in a position of authority over Doe). Instead of John-chan, we can say "Johnny" or "sweetheart".

Most Japanese novels translated into English have no honorifics in them at all - and they WORK.

Orson Scott Card gave some great advice to writers in one of his books (and I paraphrase) - "Only use a foreign word for a concept if there is no English word for the same concept." There are Japanese words for which no English equivalent exists, but honorifics aren't one of them.

It's also close to being a sure-fire way to alienate any chance of a casual, non-otaku audience . . . The vibe I get from them is that of an overzealous otaku trying to make things as Japanese as possible so it seems more 'authentic' somehow.

This too. It often smacks of . . . trying too hard. Like fanboy-ism for Japan. And often is the case, like redeyesblackpanda stated, people who are not "expert when it comes to their use" will use them ANYWAY. And they get them wrong, or use them in a stilted fashion.

I've lived in Japan for a while and they weren't even used that much where I lived.

And then there is this. I've heard this from other people in Japan as well. A lot of Japanese people aren't using honorifics as much anymore. Whether that is because of Western influence or evolving out of the class-based societal cues of feudal times, I don't know, but the fact is a lot of Japanese students aren't running around calling their classmates "-san" anymore. Even if you use all the honorifics correctly you run a risk of sounding archaic.

For example, in English it is correct to call a married woman "Mrs." and an unmarried woman "Ms." BUT anyone that is a stickler for doing so these days sounds archaic. (At least in the United States.)

You need to ask yourself WHY you want to use honorifics. If it is simply because they are "fun", then you probably shouldn't be using them.

[sciencewarrior]

A follow-up question: in a school setting, would you just use the choice between first and last name to show familiarity? Say if something like this would work:

Ayumi Tanaka is in high school. Most girls call her Ayumi, while teachers and most boys call her Tanaka, except for her osananajimi childhood friend. Ai Kaneda is the queen of the school. Even the girls in her inner circle call her Kaneda.

[LateWhiteRabbit]

A follow-up question: in a school setting, would you just use the choice between first and last name to show familiarity? Say if something like this would work:

Ayumi Tanaka is in high school. Most girls call her Ayumi, while teachers and most boys call her Tanaka, except for her osananajimi childhood friend. Ai Kaneda is the queen of the school. Even the girls in her inner circle call her Kaneda.

Well, one point right out of the gate here: I notice you have "Westernized" name order. In Japan, family names come first, personal names second. Nothing is wrong with Westernizing the order when writing in English (and is the correct way to handle translation), but I felt like pointing it out in case your were trying to use honorifics for authenticity's sake.

As for your examples (and somebody correct me if I'm wrong), the last Japanese student I talked to said they usually called all their classmates by their first names. And I doubt ANY Japanese girl would only be referred to by her inner circle by her family name. If anything it would be reversed, with her inner circle being the ONLY ones to call her by her first name.

I imagine if a student's family was very famous they might be referred to by their family name when not present, but would probably be called by their personal name in person with those familiar with them. I.e. With John Doe not present: "I hear Doe is going to be elected class president again this year." Talking to John Doe: "Hey, John. I hear you're running for class president again."

You have to be careful because what happens in the schools in anime is often outdated or archaic. Think about it: The writers of the anime have been out of school for decades, so they write school as it was when THEY were going to school. And some things are included just for fun or as a stereotype, like standing in the hall with buckets of water - which hasn't been used in real Japanese schools since the 1960s! It is used just like the dunce cap is used in Western school cartoons - as a joke. The dunce cap hasn't been used in a hundred years in real life, yet persists in school stories in popular media. Or the trope of the students bringing an apple for the teacher - seen in every school cartoon ever in the West - but not commonly done in real life since the 1950s! Or hitting kids with rulers, still shown in cartoons, now ILLEGAL to do in real life schools.

I would run into this myself if I wrote a school story. I would probably end up writing an accurate version of how school was in the 1980s, but it would be outdated today.

So be aware that anime and manga are possibly bad, archaic, or out-dated source material for correctly using honorifics the way the current Japanese generation uses them. Native Japanese will understand the joke behind these things - like we in the West do with dunce caps and Mrs. vs Ms. - but will roll their eyes at anyone using them seriously.

[redeyesblackpanda]

This too. It often smacks of . . . trying too hard. Like fanboy-ism for Japan. And often is the case, like redeyesblackpanda stated, people who are not "expert when it comes to their use" will use them ANYWAY. And they get them wrong, or use them in a stilted fashion.

...

You need to ask yourself WHY you want to use honorifics. If it is simply because they are "fun", then you probably shouldn't be using them.

All of this. There should be a legitimate reason for using them. In my case, it's because it's necessary for several events in the story. Sounding stilted and butchering things is a very high risk for people like me, so I'm trying to get as much help from others as possible to avoid doing it. If you happen to be like me, it'd probably be a good idea to seek help too.

I have no plans of a public release until I have a chance to have others look through my work and tell me what I'm doing wrong.

[Greeny]

I doubt ANY Japanese girl would only be referred to by her inner circle by her family name. If anything it would be reversed, with her inner circle being the ONLY ones to call her by her first name.

Actually, I once knew such a girl. But it was kind of like a nickname, often they'd abbreviate it.

[sciencewarrior]

I doubt ANY Japanese girl would only be referred to by her inner circle by her family name. If anything it would be reversed, with her inner circle being the ONLY ones to call her by her first name.

Hm, that isn't what I meant. I think I was too terse again. What I meant was: Imagine a school where girls from the same class just refer to each other by first name. Now imagine there is one girl that everybody talks to using her last name (and let's ignore name ordering issues for a moment here). Well, this says something about her: she keeps people at arm's length. Later she asks another girl to call her by first name: she wants to get, or at least appear closer. Another example: two friends have a fight, and after that they talk to each other by last name. Obviously, that fight shook their relationship.

There are other ways to show this kind of relationship upgrade/downgrade, but I thought this would be "efficient", for lack of a better word. You can tell where two characters stand with a greeting, for example.

[GratuitousMoonspeak]

I read a web comic once, set in Japan but by an American (I think) creator. She kept honorifics in the case of nicknames that used them, which wouldn't translate the same way as legal titles would have.

I'm not sure what to do about them, personally. I kind of like the English dub of Haruhi Suzumiya's take on honorifics, i.e. Mikuru is referred to as 'Miss Asahina' to show that Kyon respects her, while he uses other people's surnames without a title in front to suggest they're on a different level of acquaintance, and that he just calls Haruhi 'Haruhi.' But even then, since Americans are much different about familiarity than many portrayals of Japanese people in Japanese media, your audience still not might fully understand it if they're not familiar with Japanese culture in general.

It does kind of reek of fanboyism, but I don't know many casual players of visual novels. On a related note, I think it was handled okay in the Persona series, where they did use honorifics, but I don't feel like it really hurt the games overall. They're set in Japan, after all :-/

[ffs_jay]

It does kind of reek of fanboyism, but I don't know many casual players of visual novels

Those two things mightn't be unrelated, though. VNs have almost no learning curve, someone who's never played a videogame in their lives could have a decent go at them. And games like Phoenix Wright (yeah, I know it's a bit of a weird hybrid, but it's still an interesting case in point) have shown that at least a portion of casual/mainstream players are happy to get on board for a good story and some interesting gameplay. It's probably not coincidental that Phoenix Wright had an extremely Westernised translation, either.

On a related note, I think it was handled okay in the Persona series, where they did use honorifics, but I don't feel like it really hurt the games overall. They're set in Japan, after all :-/

Persona would be one of the examples that work with honorifics I think, as besides from being set in Japan, it feels very culturally Japanese, if that makes any sense. Additionally, they have a kind of an otherworldy feel to them anyway, and the use of cultural touches like honorifics adds to that, for Western audiences at least. It's an interesting example in that it adds to the feel in a way that wouldn't even have been apparent to the original audience.

[LateWhiteRabbit]

I doubt ANY Japanese girl would only be referred to by her inner circle by her family name. If anything it would be reversed, with her inner circle being the ONLY ones to call her by her first name.

Hm, that isn't what I meant. I think I was too terse again. What I meant was: Imagine a school where girls from the same class just refer to each other by first name. Now imagine there is one girl that everybody talks to using her last name (and let's ignore name ordering issues for a moment here). Well, this says something about her: she keeps people at arm's length. Later she asks another girl to call her by first name: she wants to get, or at least appear closer. Another example: two friends have a fight, and after that they talk to each other by last name. Obviously, that fight shook their relationship.

There are other ways to show this kind of relationship upgrade/downgrade, but I thought this would be "efficient", for lack of a better word. You can tell where two characters stand with a greeting, for example.

The first example is okay, but I still think it's kind of a lazy way to show that emotion or bonding. It is a shorthand that most players, unless they are very familiar with Japanese customs and honorifics, may not even pick up on. Again, something like that is much better shown through characterization and interactions than relying on subtle cultural cues.

And I've never heard of a case like your second example. It doesn't make any sense for it to go in reverse. If I'm friends with John Doe and I've been calling him John for years, a big fight is not going to make me start calling him Doe. The same holds equally true in Japan, I'm sure. The ONLY time I can see this happening is a boss/employee relationship where the boss became friendly enough to call the employee by his first name, but a big fight or disappointment causes him to go back to calling his employee by his last name, to signify the employee has lost favor in his eyes. People that have been true friends don't do that to each other, because they THINK of that person in their head by their first name.

Once more, characterization is the best way to handle these things, not honorifics. You say "efficient" but I say "lazy". You can STILL tell where two characters stand with a simple greeting, even in English. An icy reception. A curt reply. Ignoring the greeting. An uncomfortable silence. Etc.

Honorifics are NOT a shortcut. They are cultural and social mores and cues based on centuries of living under a feudal system that ended only (relatively) recently. Their proper use is very complicated and highly intuitive. Persona kept honorifics in the English translation, yes, but that was EASY, because a native Japanese speaker had placed all the honorifics to begin with.

I honestly feel like if you are not fluent in Japanese you shouldn't be using honorifics. The same information can be conveyed in English with a little thought.